shift=and-close-the-current-folder?

[Murray Cumming <murrayc usa net>]

It would be superb if we had Nautilus keyboard navigation that's as
usable as that in Mac Classic. That needs a keyboard modifier for "and
close the current one" that works for both keyboard and mouse-click
navigation. This is even more important now that Nautilus is spatial.
Here's my latest attempt at a plan:
  
*** Keyboard navigation:

Here's my summary of what happens in GNOME 2.4 [1], in both the list and
tree views, when you try to use modifier keys with the up/down arrow
keys in nautilus:

Modifier(s)      Up Arrow              Down Arrow

0. None         Move Selection up   Move Selection down 
1. Alt          Open parent           Open selected
                  (Sometimes Alt-Down stops working)

2. Ctrl         Move focus up        Move focus down
                  (Focus is an accessibility thing)
3. Shift        Selection up         Selection down
                  (Selects more than one item.
                   Only works in ListView.)
4. Alt-Ctrl    Choose workspace    Choose workspace
                   (Shows your metacity workspaces in a small window in
                   the middle of the screen and allows you to choose
one,
                   even if you have only a horizontal arrangement of
                   workspaces)
5. Shift-Ctrl Same as 2.
                  (I think GTK+ is just ignoring the Shift, so this is 
                   still available to us.)
6. Alt-Shift  Switch workspace Switch workspace
                  (Like 4, but without showing the choice window)


Personally, I think the problem is solved if we remove the Metacity
Alt-Shift key-combination. Then we would
have 
Alt-Down to open the folder
Alt-Shift-Down to open the folder and close the current one.
Alt-Up to open the parent folder
Alt-Shift-Up to open the parent folder and close the current one.

People could still then use Alt-Ctrl to switch between workspaces, with
the nifty little workspace choice window. I think it's greedy for
metacity to take 2 key combinations for what is basically the same
feature. And they'll still have Alt-Tab and Alt-Shift-Tab which do much
the same thing.

*** Mouse-click Navigation:

It would be nice to use the same modifier as for window navigation, to
mean "and close the current folder". So I suggest
Shift-Double-Click = "open the folder and close the current one".


TODO: Remove this: Note that you won't see the same thing in GNOME 2.4,
because metacity stole Alt-click until recently:
http://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=79315


*** So, are there any objections to this plan:
1. Persuade Havoc to remove the metacity Alt-Shift-Arrows feature.
2. Implement Shift-Double-Click to open-and-close-current.

[1] Red Hat 9.

-- 
Murray Cumming
murrayc usa net
www.murrayc.com