No switching between panels using keyboard (Tab)

[Jude2]

I'm trying to find a way to do something very simple in the XnView MP browser: Move back and forth between the Folders panel and the Folder contents (file list) panel without using the mouse (IE, by using reasonably few keystrokes).

I tried using the <tab> key, but this isn't very convenient because there are so many "stops" in the <tab> key destination ring (I counted 13 in XnView MP 0.83). Even worse, there are almost no visual cues to tell me where I am. Only the Path panel and Quick Search show visible cues when I enter or leave them with <tab>. Otherwise, I have no idea where the <tab> key has taken me. I can't even tell if I'm in the Folders pane or the Folder Contents (file list) pane without using up/down arrow to see if the selection moves. I can't even figure out what some of the <tab>-reachable destinations are. The large number of possible destinations and the lack of visible "where am I?" cues makes the <tab> key almost useless.

Is there some other way to move between the Folders panel and the Folder Contents panel using the keyboard? I have a large number of old CDs and DVDs full of stuff that I want to browse, and using the mouse is much too slow. I need something faster and easier to help me get through all of this stuff with reasonable effort.

I'm running XnView MP 0.83 on Linux Mint 18 Cinnamon 64-bit.

[Erixx haxx]

Hello:

I'm not sure what exactly you are refering to.

Do you mean views: thumb/details
- or modes: browser/viewer
- or just focus on different panels.

Have you looked into the keyboard shortcuts section in options menu. interface>> Shortcuts. Does this help any.

Thanks

[Jude2]

I want to move back and forth between:
1) The Folders panel that lets me navigate the folder tree using the keyboard
2) The unnamed panel that displays thumbnails/details so I can browse files in the selected folder using keyboard

The only ways to do this that I found found so far are:

1) Use the mouse to move between the two panels. This is slow because I have to repeatedly grab my mouse, re-position the pointer and click

2) Use the <tab> key . This is even worse because it requires a lot of <tab> keystrokes to do this (total of 13 keystrokes for one round trip), and because the UI doesn't let me see what panel the <tab> key has taken me to. I figured out by experiment that it takes 9 tabs to get from the folders panel to the thumbs/details panel, and 4 tabs to get from thumbs/details back to folders. That's a lot of keystrokes, and there's no visible indication that anything is happening while I'm hitting tabs.

I looked in Tools->Settings->Interface->Shortcuts, but the only command I could find that moves focus to a specific panel is cmd_catFocus (default assignment of F9 key). I couldn't find any entries that seemed to do what I want.

I find the "invisible" action of the <tab> key to be very disturbing. In most cases, using the <tab> key produces NO visible change in the display, but it does change the interpretation of subsequent keystrokes, If I use my mouse to select a folder in the Folders pane, I can then use my arrow keys to navigate between folders. If I then hit the <tab> key, the arrow keys stop working but there is NO visible change in the UI display. If I keep hitting the <tab> key, the arrow keys will eventually start working in the thumbs/details panel but there is NO visible indication that I have gotten there. The only way to see that I am in the thumbs/details panel is to try the arrow keys to see if they change the currently selected file. I think this is very frustrating, and that it makes the <tab> key almost useless.

[Erixx haxx]

Hello:

Ok, I Think I understand now.

You want to switch focus from: Tree panel/ Browser panel
via keyboard.( but tab is a problem )

So far I have this from a search:http://newsgroup.xnview.com/search.php? ... anel+focus
May or may not help you. ** these look old **

I'm short on time right now. I'll try an help more tomarrow. Maybe someone else with more info will help also.

[helmut]

In short:
You (Jude2) want a way to switch quickly between panels (especially tree pane and file list and vice versa) using the keyboard.

[Jude2]

Correction: It appears that the number of destinations in the <tab> destination ring depends on the current display layout. Removing panels from the display causes the corresponding entries to be removed from the <tab> destination ring.

My earlier statement that there seem to be 13 possible <tab> destinations was based on experiments I did after altering my Layout. I restored the default XnView MP configuration by deleting my .config/xnviewmp directory and letting XnViewMP re-create it. After I did this, I saw 16 possible destinations in the <tab> destination ring. I am now trying to map them, but it's very tedious because of the "invisible" <tab> key action (the <tab> key changes focus, but there is usually NO visible indication of what panel it moved me to).

[Jude2]

Whoops, it looks like I was posting my previous message while you were posting yours. The reply to your post:

>In short:
>You (Jude2) want a way to switch quickly between panels (especially tree pane and file list and vice versa) using the keyboard.

is:

Yes. Moving between these two panels is something I do very frequently when browsing archived material. I'd like to do it as quickly as possible. It doesn't have to be the <tab> key, I'd be happy with anything that I can type quickly. Allowing me to define shortcut keys to set the focus to specific panels would be fine, and would probably be generally useful to other people.

I also think it would be very helpful if there was some visible indication of what panel currently has focus. Using the <tab> key to navigate is very frustrating because I can't see where I am by looking at my display. In most cases, <tab> looks like it does nothing because there is no visible indication that anything changed.

[Jude2]

I just discovered yet another complication: The list of destinations that can be reached with <tab> navigation depends on whether or not an entry is selected in the thumbs/details pane.

Immediately after selected a new folder by clicking in the folder pane, I see 16 possible destinations in the <tab> destination ring. As soon as I select a file in the thumbs/details pane, the number of possible destinations increases to 19. If I switch to a different folder by clicking in the Folders pane, the number of destinations goes back down to 16.

I am counting the ring size by:
1) Hit <tab> key until entry in Path bar is highlighted (this is one of the two destinations that shows visible changes when I "arrive" and "leave")
2) Count the number of <tab> keystrokes it takes to go all the way around the ring and get back to Path.

This is just my personal opinion: The large number of possible destinations in the <tab> key destination ring, the variable construction of the ring, and the fact that focus isn't visible in the UI all combine to make the current implementation of <tab> navigation pretty much useless.

[rogerdahl]

It is now 5 years later, and there has been no improvement on this, as far as I can tell. It's just a very strange shortcoming in an otherwise very powerful program.

[xnview]

It is now 5 years later, and there has been no improvement on this, as far as I can tell. It's just a very strange shortcoming in an otherwise very powerful program.

So a shortcut to switch between folder & thumbnail view?

[rogerdahl]

Hi Pierre, thank you for XnView -- it's awesome.

Yes a shortcut to cycle the focus between the thumbnail view and any of the panels that are currently visible. Configurable shortcut with F6 and Shift-F6 as the defaults for moving to next/previous would be perfect. Also, as previous poster mentioned, visible feedback as to which panel has the focus is needed. It would be a great improvement for people who primarily use the keyboard.

So a shortcut to switch between folder & thumbnail view?

[xnview]

to switch only between panels, and not text files, other widget, right?

[rogerdahl]

to switch only between panels, and not text files, other widget, right?

That is correct, Pierre. Sorry for the late reply.

[xnview]

So between these panels: Thumbnails view, folder view, favorites view, Categories filter
but between info or categories panel too??

[xnview]

See issue for current status and some details.