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I find single click opening of files in Plasma is irritating and think that the users who desire to have a single click file opening fall into a minority of human computer interaction paradigms. While it is easy enough to change this in the settings, having to do this is just an inconvenience.

Agreed. Majority of desktop users have double-click by default. Deviating from the norm for no good reason just confuses people.

Well I suppose users migrating from windows might appreciate it. Having not been indoctrinated into the double click paradigm, I don't see the point. Apart from the fact that double clicking is ergonomically more stressful, I see it as a nice distinction to use as a default setting.

Indoctrination? The thought of comparing established usability paradigms to indoctrination seems foolish. It's like saying the use of QWERTY keyboards is because we've all been indoctrinated to do so.

Single click file opening removes the capability of multi file selection via shift clicking. As every time you click on a file, it opens.. Unlike innovation and optimizations in business, with regards to usability, It's meaningless to divert from a way of doing things that have been established tried and proven over decades just for the sake of being different.

skeightley wrote:Single click file opening removes the capability of multi file selection via shift clicking.

That's not completely true.
You can still "shift click" by holding down the Ctrl key while clicking.
And there are the '+'/'-' overlay icons with which you can add/remove a file to the selection.

To the topic: I use single-click since about 10 years now (because of KDE's default), and prefer it pretty much.
Actually having to double-click feels awkward to me meanwhile...

wolfi323 wrote:

skeightley wrote:Single click file opening removes the capability of multi file selection via shift clicking.

That's not completely true.
You can still "shift click" by holding down the Ctrl key while clicking.
And there are the '+'/'-' overlay icons with which you can add/remove a file to the selection..

The functionality for shift click selection is there and works as desired, but when you click on a given file it will open. So in the process of say cherry picking 10 files out of say 1000 that can't be selected via drag selection, you will have opened 10 files that you will have to close again because you only wanted to select them. Do you not find this behavior odd?

Shift clicking selects/deselects multiple files/folders within a range. Ctrl clicking does the same for individual ones. Nothing should be opened with these operations.

I certainly do find the behaviour you're experiencing odd. I've never come across it myself.

stevek wrote:Shift clicking selects/deselects multiple files/folders within a range. Ctrl clicking does the same for individual ones. Nothing should be opened with these operations.

I certainly do find the behaviour you're experiencing odd. I've never come across it myself.

Do you have single click file opening enabled?

skeightley wrote:Do you have single click file opening enabled?

Yes, I do have single click enabled. A single click with no modifiers opens the file/folder.

stevek wrote:

skeightley wrote:Do you have single click file opening enabled?

Yes, I do have single click enabled. A single click with no modifiers opens the file/folder.

Ok, this is interesting. Am in the process of reinstalling Fedora/Plasma for a different reason and will test this again. Will also be testing on Arch later in the week.

The issue I have raised can be divided into multiple issues and may even highlight a bug. The issues being the more subjective topic of single vs double click file opening as preferable default, and whether shift click selection while single click file opening is active should or should not be opening any given file during selection, which it should not be doing.

At the end of the day. It is in a DM and FM's best interest to be as user friendly as possible while catering to the masses so that it can become more widely adopted, therefore increasing it's user base and future sustainability. To that end, single click file opening as default simply is not fulfilling that goal.

stevek wrote:

skeightley wrote:Do you have single click file opening enabled?

Yes, I do have single click enabled. A single click with no modifiers opens the file/folder.

I just tried it as well.

If I hold down Shift and click on a file/folder, the files in the range are only selected, nothing is opened.
(with single click enabled)

So this works as expected here, just like with Ctrl to add/remove *one* file from the selection.

skeightley wrote:At the end of the day. It is in a DM and FM's best interest to be as user friendly as possible while catering to the masses so that it can become more widely adopted, therefore increasing it's user base and future sustainability. To that end, single click file opening as default simply is not fulfilling that goal.

Have you considered that 'wide adoption' may not be the goal? Maybe the developers are more interested in elegance and efficiency than 'catering to the masses'.

Good luck with the new installations.

stevek wrote:
Have you considered that 'wide adoption' may not be the goal? Maybe the developers are more interested in elegance and efficiency than 'catering to the masses'.

Good luck with the new installations.

When as a movement, you commit yourself to make the best free software for desktop, you are inadvertently 'catering to the masses' and seeking 'wide adoption' by default. Which is the most sensible thing as that is a sure fire way to achieve that goal. To that end you will then need to adopt HCI standards the majority are familiar with. There's nothing stopping any solution being elegant and efficient too, and in fact should be a priority.

After fresh Fedora/KDE install, the problem that I was experiencing before were during multiple file selection via shift click, all selected files would open as they where being clicked now seems to have disappeared and now operates as intended. However I still find that when single click file opening is enabled, the first file is inadvertently opened as I only shift click to select multiple files after the first one has been selected. Perhaps that's a result of my 'indoctrination' of widely adopted and successful HCI standards.

// Off topic
Thanks for the luck, Fedora is a piece of cake and have installed many times in the past, but installing Arch will be a new experience I'm looking forward too. I have done it unsuccessfully before as for some reason wifi-menu was not included so couldn't connect to the internet to dl a DM/ grab updates/ install other packages haha. What I would love to find out is what makes it's terminal/text look so good and why haven't other distros adopted it. Something to do with identifying and setting the optimal resolution before it loads.

skeightley wrote:When as a movement, you commit yourself to make the best free software for desktop, you are inadvertently 'catering to the masses' and seeking 'wide adoption' by default. Which is the most sensible thing as that is a sure fire way to achieve that goal. To that end you will then need to adopt HCI standards the majority are familiar with. There's nothing stopping any solution being elegant and efficient too, and in fact should be a priority.

I understand your point. I don't personally agree with all you've said, but it's interesting to see another point of view.

skeightley wrote:After fresh Fedora/KDE install, the problem that I was experiencing before were during multiple file selection via shift click, all selected files would open as they where being clicked now seems to have disappeared and now operates as intended. However I still find that when single click file opening is enabled, the first file is inadvertently opened as I only shift click to select multiple files after the first one has been selected. Perhaps that's a result of my 'indoctrination' of widely adopted and successful HCI standards.

Maybe aiming for the overlay icon that wolfi323 mentioned would help?

skeightley wrote:// Off topic
Thanks for the luck, Fedora is a piece of cake and have installed many times in the past, but installing Arch will be a new experience I'm looking forward too. I have done it unsuccessfully before as for some reason wifi-menu was not included so couldn't connect to the internet to dl a DM/ grab updates/ install other packages haha. What I would love to find out is what makes it's terminal/text look so good and why haven't other distros adopted it. Something to do with identifying and setting the optimal resolution before it loads.

It's been many years since I last installed Arch, so I couldn't comment about that. Got to love rolling release

If even Apple does it like Windows and most DE's, there must be a reason. One click to select, two to open is much better than holding any key combination or whatever.

Also, as far as users not indocrinated by Windows, macOS or other DE's... Are there any? Only some guys in some very poor countries. And even then, the guys on these countries usually would have their first experience in a PC with an old version of Windows or a lightweigth version of Linux, which would use some other DE that's not KDE 5, none of which use single click to open by default. None. Zero. Nada. Nenhum.

Almost every pro-single-click argument I've read here assumes the world has been dominated by the Linux KDE desktop and that people in poor countries have their first experiences with dual core 2GB+ RAM PCs. Because that's the only scenario I can think of in which massive amounts of people would have their first experience with a KDE powered Linux desktop PC.