Backward search checkbox placement

jdp · Agent Joined: Jul 23, 2010 Posts: 15

I've two long standing issues, and now on the forum I'd like to ask. I'll start another thread for the second.
Would it be possible to have the search backward (vs forward) checkbox placed in the "less options" section of the Find & Replace dialogue? (Showing permanently when Find & Replace is used.)
As it is, when the dialogue appears, you can't tell if you are searching -> or <- without taking time (small, but the usual cumulative issue) to open the More Options. This is (for me) a very heavily used item.

pluby · The Architect Joined: Jun 16, 2003 Posts: 11949

FYI. I have moved this forum topic to the NeoOffice New Feature Requests forum.

I am pretty confident that this is feasible to implement this feature request. However, based on my quick review of NeoOffice's underlying OpenOffice.org code, the engineering work to implement this feature request would probably require more than a trivial amount of time.

Since our donations only support one full-time software engineer (me), we can only devote our limited engineering time to features that are likely to generate enough new donations to reimburse the NeoOffice project for the time spent implementing them.

Essentially, new features need to be self-funded. So, based on my estimate of the work required to implement this feature request, we need to see at least 5 NeoOffice donors post that they also want this new feature. If that many NeoOffice donors post that they want this new feature, then we will have a pretty good level of confidence that the new feature will generate the necessary donations and I will then start working on the new feature.

Is this a feature that any other NeoOffice donors want to see added to NeoOffice? If so, please let us know.

Patrick

ovvldc · Posted: Sun Jul 25, 2010 1:23 am Post subject:

Yes, please! So useful if you click 'next' just a little too quickly.

James3359 · Posted: Mon Jul 26, 2010 2:16 am Post subject:

Yes please from me too. I have always felt it was odd that this feature does not appear in the basic find dialog.

ovvldc · Posted: Fri Jul 30, 2010 8:47 am Post subject:

Wow, I thought this would be popular. Is nobody else interested or is everyone just on summer vacation? Wink

Best wishes,
Oscar

Gust · Councilperson Joined: Oct 09, 2007 Posts: 137

I've had similar thoughts in the past with respect to the "selection only" search option. It happened to me in the past that neo couldn't find text strings while I immediately noticed them in the text---only to find out later on that the hidden "selection only" filter was selected.

So rather than moving around search options I would like to suggest to display the extended search dialogue by default. Would that make sense?

pluby · The Architect Joined: Jun 16, 2003 Posts: 11949

I have implemented this new feature request. Interestingly, I was looking at Gust's suggestion as a simpler way to implement the feature and I ended up finding that this feature could be implemented fairly easily by programmatically repositioning the "Backwards" checkbox and then move all of the controls below the new position down a bit.

Can anyone install the following test patch and tell us if the new feature works correctly for you?:

Intel:
http://joe.neooffice.org/test/NeoOffice-3.1.1-Patch-1-Test-19-Intel.dmg

PowerPC:
http://joe.neooffice.org/test/NeoOffice-3.1.1-Patch-1-Test-19-PowerPC.dmg

Patrick

PGAGA · Captain Joined: Jan 22, 2009 Posts: 50

Saturday, July 31, 2010

Quick test indicates it works as advertised.

Phil

ovvldc · Posted: Sun Aug 01, 2010 1:39 am Post subject:

One click more than the original proposal, but seems to work just fine Smile

pluby · The Architect Joined: Jun 16, 2003 Posts: 11949

sardisson · Town Crier Joined: Feb 01, 2004 Posts: 4588

Alas, this change has broken the layout of this window.

In the bottom half of the window (e.g., stuff that is still hidden), the right column controls are out of alignment with the left column controls they belong to, and there's a strange line with a gap in it (it maybe belongs to "Search direction"?). See annotated attachment.

pluby · The Architect Joined: Jun 16, 2003 Posts: 11949

It looks like my code is trying to be too fancy. I have some code that tries to shift all of the checkboxes upward to fill the gap left after I move the Backwards checkbox.

The problem is that in the OpenOffice.org code, I have no way to determine which items in the right hand column need to be positioned relative to an item in the left hand column. So, I think the safest thing for me to do is to not shift any of the checkboxes upward to the fill the gap and just leave to the small gap. The gap is not aesthetically pleasing, but it causes no harm.

I will post a new test patch later today with this change.

Patrick

pluby · The Architect Joined: Jun 16, 2003 Posts: 11949

I have fixed the problem that sardisson reported. Can anyone install the following test patch and tell us if there are any other problems in the new feature that you see?:

Intel:
http://joe.neooffice.org/test/NeoOffice-3.1.1-Patch-1-Test-21-Intel.dmg

PowerPC:
http://joe.neooffice.org/test/NeoOffice-3.1.1-Patch-1-Test-21-PowerPC.dmg

Patrick

James3359 · Posted: Mon Aug 02, 2010 4:14 am Post subject:

This seems to work for me. After I had installed the test patch the first time I launched NeoOffice and called up the search dialog, the search backwards chackbox was pre-selected as was the concealed regular expressions checkbox. Once I had de-selected the latter then whole words option was un-greyed and its checkbox was selectable. (iBook 1.33 GHz 1.5GB PowerPC G4, OS X 10.4.11)

ovvldc · Posted: Mon Aug 02, 2010 9:03 am Post subject: