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nextcloud / gallery

DEPRECATED Gallery app was replaced by Photos
https://github.com/nextcloud/photos
GNU Affero General Public License v3.0
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nc15 version no longer shows previews of folders #493

Open schniepp opened 5 years ago

schniepp commented 5 years ago

Feature request

User type: Logged-in or public user

User level: Beginners, intermediate or advanced

Description

Until NC14, folder thumbnails show previews of images in the folder. Now this is completely gone and only the folder icon is shown in grid mode. This functionality is dearly missed. Please bring it back.

Since this functionality was present already under NC14 but is no longer available at present, I was torn whether to file this as a bug report (regression) or as a feature request.

Benefit / value

It will be more efficient to browse large collections of data. Now, one needs to go into every folder to get an idea what's inside.

Risk / caveats

None known.

Sponsorship

Are you a developer willing to implement this feature?: no

Can you sponsor the development of this feature or do you know someone who can?: no

schniepp commented 5 years ago

I just realized that nc15 actually implements both the old and the new functionality. This means that technically, all the functionality is there. I think the problem is more like how this is presented in terms of the UI. This is a subtlety, and perhaps not a high-priority item. However, in terms of a polished UI, it should be addressed. I am explaining this in detail below, which is a bit wordy (sorry).

Up to nc14, clicking the "Toggle Grid View" button switches between "grid view" and "list view" (could also be called "detail view"). Clicking the button for the "Gallery" app invokes the same mode, except that it is starting in the root directory. Clicking the "toggle grid view" button switches back to list view. In that sense the UI was somewhat consistent. (Although it is not obvious that the "Gallery" button was even needed.) It turns out that in nc15, there are actually 3 different view modes. If we start in the default "list view" in a particular folder, clicking "toggle grid view" will indeed invoke grid view. However, it is the nc15 implementation of grid view, showing all folders simply as large folder icons (without providing a preview of the image files inside), and showing all files of the folder (not only the ones for which a preview thumbnail is available). This mode has advantages and disadvantages compared to nc14. The main disadvantage (in my view) being that there is no meaningful preview of folder content — this is what this bug report was originally about. It turns out, however, that by clicking the "Gallery" app button invokes a third type of view mode — I could call it "gallery view", which is the same as in nc14. As in nc14, this always starts in the root folder (why?). Clicking the "toggle grid view" button switches it back to list mode. This means that in terms of the functionality everything is there. However, it is inconsistent from a UI perspective, since the toggle is not a real toggle. Clicking it once from gallery view, it invokes list view, clicking it again, it invokes grid view. I think the UI should fully respect the fact that there are 3 view modes (and all 3 view modes are actually very useful). One problem in the current implementation (apart from the inconsistency) is that a particular folder cannot be directly switched to gallery mode. One needs to click "Gallery" and then walk back from the root folder to the desired folder. Possible solutions: (1) I think the cleanest solution would be to make it obvious that there are 3 different view modes that can be reached from each view. In that case, the gallery button would no longer be needed. (1a) Three buttons; one for each of the view modes, the one of the current view mode grayed out/inactive. Disadvantage: needs more space. Advantage: everything can be achieved with a single click. (1b) Two buttons, not showing the button for the current view mode. Needs a little bit less space than 1a. (1c) A drop-down menu allowing to switch between the three view modes. Advantage: does not need more space than the current solution. Disadvantage: needs two clicks instead of one. Solution (2): keep everything as it is, but make it such that clicking "Gallery" does not start from root folder, but instead from current folder. Advantage: probably easiest to implement, and solves the problem that one no longer needs to reach a particular folder by starting from root. One can immediately switch any folder to "gallery view". Disadvantage: still inconsistent from a UI perspective.

Julien-Blanc-tgcm commented 5 years ago

An important thing to take into consideration is sharing. I use the gallery view to share some photos with friends : it is much nicer than the file view or the new mosaic view. Currently, sharing from the gallery gives a link that opens the gallery view. That should not be broken by a new selection scheme.

Also note that since the nc15 update, if someone clicks on the "folder view" button in a shared gallery, he can’t go back to the gallery view.

setnes commented 5 years ago

I would have logged this as a bug. The grid view is not a good replacement for gallery view. Eliminating the ability to switch to gallery mode from within a folder with images forces a user to navigate the entire NextCloud file tree to get back to the same folder in gallery mode. Then... if they switch to list/detail view, they cannot get back to gallery view. This is a big mess.... especially for private link sharing.

Grid view is for all files. Gallery view is for images.

github-tomster commented 5 years ago

great example again. where are these decisions made? look at the 'feature' there: https://github.com/nextcloud/android/issues/3348 @schniepp nice report! @who-ever-decided-that! taken away a bit more of user-control, well done! @world 99% of the users wont even notice the difference...

mzamot commented 5 years ago

This is true, but unfortunately the gallery doesn't seems to be actively maintained.