Hello,

I have noticed a few different type of file pickers on my KDE box. They work differently and there seems to be no way to make them use consistent settings like always show preview or item size etc. GNOME using its own file picker makes sense but it also seems like there is also difference between Qt and KDE file picker. Why don't apps on KDE use KDE file picker?

Thanks.

They do use the same picker.

Can you give an example where they don't?

david_edmundson wrote:They do use the same picker.

Can you give an example where they don't?

This is from Konversation


This is Konqueror. Notice preview is enabled.


This is Transmission-qt. Notice preview is disabled. From what I understand it is a Qt5 app.


This is desktop settings.


There is no consistency. They all are of different sizes. They pop up on different locations on screen. They all use different folder sizes. They all show items in their own order like tree-view or detail-view.

So:
Konversation: example is a folder selector not a file selector. They're deliberately different as you won't need all the file specific stuff.

Transmission: Qt5 app with everything else being qt4.. ends up using a different config file

Konqueror and plasma-desktop: They look identical, no?

david_edmundson wrote:So:
Konversation: example is a folder selector not a file selector. They're deliberately different as you won't need all the file specific stuff.

Folder selection picker uses different shortcut than what Dolphin would use like F8 to show hidden files and F10 to create a new folder. I am not sure why it doesn't use system defaults like "Alt+." to show hidden files.

david_edmundson wrote:Konqueror and plasma-desktop: They look identical, no?

Are different apps suppose to have different settings(preview, folder size, folder view) for file picker?

For fun of it , here is some bad coding on part of Genymotion which is also a Qt app. I am not sure why it is so bad.

By 99% chance it uses a stylesheet (and that sheet is broken/designed towards a specific UI style/color scheme/...)

Usability input:
- The folder selector having less options than file picker makes sense, but other than that, they should behave identically, so them using different shortcuts for the same action is indeed a usability bug. Is that still the case in KF5? If so, a bug should be filed.
- Settings like icon size or preview should be consistent across file pickers from different applications unless there is a very good reason why they should be different for a specific application. They should load their config from the same file.

FTR:
* previews are disabled in one of the pickers, because the mime pattern is retricted to torrent files (and there's likely no preview renderer, nor a sane preview for those)

* I believe the wallpaper choosing dialog uses different preview/size settings because of the *very* specific purpose (choose a wallpaper...)

* afaiu, changes to one file chooser are stored immediately, but that doesn't cause a reconfigure in other applications (ie. if you start 3 processes and adjust the file chooser in each, the last change persist and impact following processes, but the 3 processes will have different settings for the time being)

luebking wrote:FTR:
* previews are disabled in one of the pickers, because the mime pattern is retricted to torrent files (and there's likely no preview renderer, nor a sane preview for those)

* I believe the wallpaper choosing dialog uses different preview/size settings because of the *very* specific purpose (choose a wallpaper...)

* afaiu, changes to one file chooser are stored immediately, but that doesn't cause a reconfigure in other applications (ie. if you start 3 processes and adjust the file chooser in each, the last change persist and impact following processes, but the 3 processes will have different settings for the time being)

In that case, I see nothing wrong except for the shortcut inconsistency between folder chooser and file picker (the shortcut inconsistency that once existed between Dolphin and the file open/save dialogs thankfully has been fixed by now).