[Deskbar] Do not show Tracker when no Tracker windows are open

[NullAndVoid]

Do not show Tracker when no Tracker windows are open. There is nothing you can do with Tracker when no windows are open.

This behavior creates a lot of confusion, especially for new users, which was apparent in the R1B1 reviews.

This could be an optional preference.

[waddlesplash]

This is incorrect; there is something you can do: use the "Vulcan death grip" to kill Tracker.

New users who are confused should read the Userguide or other materials that explain these and other UI/UX differences from other OSes. We aren't other OSes; we don't need to behave identically to them just so users are not confused. That's what the documentation is for.

[NullAndVoid]

Replying to waddlesplash:

This is incorrect; there is something you can do: use the "Vulcan death grip" to kill Tracker.

So Tracker is always displayed in Deskbar in case it crashes?

[waddlesplash]

No, it's displayed there because it does have a "window" -- the Desktop is drawn by Tracker. You can't interact with that as a normal window, so it doesn't show up in the list.

If Tracker actually crashed then it would be restarted automatically. But if a replicant locked up or something like that, you may need or want to restart Tracker manually, and the Vulcan Death Grip is the easiest way to accomplish that.

[jscipione]

I do think this comes from a misunderstanding of how apps work on Haiku. Like on Mac OS but not Windows, applications can be running even without any windows open and live in the Deskbar. Tracker is always running therefore always gets a Deskbar entry. If you kill Tracker it will automatically be reloaded by the launch daemon. One change that results from killing Tracker is that Tracker will get sorted differently unless you have the Deskbar preference "Tracker always first" or "Sort running applications" turned on.

[NullAndVoid]

Replying to waddlesplash:

No, it's displayed there because it does have a "window" -- the Desktop is drawn by Tracker. You can't interact with that as a normal window, so it doesn't show up in the list.

If Tracker actually crashed then it would be restarted automatically. But if a replicant locked up or something like that, you may need or want to restart Tracker manually, and the Vulcan Death Grip is the easiest way to accomplish that.

Is it necessary to always have Tracker in Deskbar, or is it just an convenience? Meaning, if Tracker was not in Deskbar and it crashed, is the user screwed or not?

I suggested to simply add an option so that the user can decide their preferred behavior, similarly to how spatial/single-window mode is configurable in Tracker.

Replying to jscipione:

I do think this comes from a misunderstanding of how apps work on Haiku. Like on Mac OS but not Windows, applications can be running even without any windows open and live in the Deskbar. Tracker is always running therefore always gets a Deskbar entry. If you kill Tracker it will automatically be reloaded by the launch daemon. One change that results from killing Tracker is that Tracker will get sorted differently unless you have the Deskbar preference "Tracker always first" or "Sort running applications" turned on.

I understand that, but I can not make the connection to have always have Tracker in Deskbar just because it is always running.

[humdinger]

Can we please not close tickets from the get-go? Let's see if there's worthwhile discussion on this topic.
I think there is. While I do agree, that the "Tracker" entry in Deskbar whould stay, I'd like to see the Desktop there under Tracker. That will show the user that the Desktop is part of Tracker.

If there's only the Desktop under Tracker windows, "Hide all" should be greyed out. "Close all" could quit, i.e. restart, the Tracker.

[jscipione]

Replying to NullAndVoid:

Is it necessary to always have Tracker in Deskbar, or is it just an convenience? Meaning, if Tracker was not in Deskbar and it crashed, is the user screwed or not?

It is necessary to always have Tracker, as well as any running standalone app, in Deskbar. If Tracker hypothetically crashes and is not restarted, the user is screwed. We could make the conscious choice to hide the Tracker entry if no windows are open, but we would have to treat Tracker in a special way to do it.

I suggested to simply add an option so that the user can decide their preferred behavior, similarly to how spatial/single-window mode is configurable in Tracker.

Hide Tracker if no open windows

I understand that, but I can not make the connection to have always have Tracker in Deskbar just because it is always running.

All standalone apps (that is non-replicants) get an entry in Deskbar as long as they're running.

Replying to humdinger:

I think there is. While I do agree, that the "Tracker" entry in Deskbar would stay, I'd like to see the Desktop there under Tracker. That will show the user that the Desktop is part of Tracker.

If there's only the Desktop under Tracker windows, "Hide all" should be greyed out. "Close all" could quit, i.e. restart, the Tracker.

We have to first solve the problem of how to Show the Desktop. In (default) spatial mode you can only have 1 Desktop window open at any time, and that means the magic Desktop window, showing the contents of the Desktop in a regular window is not allowed. In Browser mode you can additionally open one or more regular windows pointing to Desktop folder. When you uncompress a file to the Desktop using Expander it is suppose to "open" the window after it's done or when you download a file to the Desktop using Web+ you can click "Open" button in the Downloads window to open the folder containing the file. In both these cases right now in spacial mode nothing happens because the Desktop folder (i.e. the Desktop) is already open. In Browser mode we open a new Desktop window and show the files. What should happen perhaps is that when you "open" the Desktop folder in spacial mode we do a "Show the Desktop" and hide all open windows. This should also happen in Expander and Webpositive. Once this is complete, we can add the magic Desktop window to the Tracker window list (always) and clicking the menu item would toggle Show the Desktop.

Edit: spatial not special

[waddlesplash]

I suggested to simply add an option so that the user can decide their preferred behavior, similarly to how spatial/single-window mode is configurable in Tracker.

We aren't KDE, we don't add options for every possible little change.

I understand that, but I can not make the connection to have always have Tracker in Deskbar just because it is always running.

As jscipione noted, macOS behaves the same way here and leaves applications in the launcher even if they have no windows open (and closing all windows does not exit them), so we don't need to spend much time justifying this difference from Windows, IMO.

we do a "Show the Desktop" and hide all open windows. This should also happen in Expander and Webpositive. Once this is complete, we can add the magic Desktop window to the Tracker window list (always) and clicking the menu item would toggle Show the Desktop.

+1.

[NullAndVoid]

Replying to waddlesplash:

As jscipione noted, macOS behaves the same way here and leaves applications in the launcher even if they have no windows open (and closing all windows does not exit them), so we don't need to spend much time justifying this difference from Windows, IMO.

I find it strange that it is suddenly ok to compare the behavior to other OS's, when it suites your argumentation – something I wasn't allowed to do (not that I ever did):

You wrote waddlesplash:

We aren't other OSes; we don't need to behave identically to them just so users are not confused.

I simply stated a behavior that is non-intuitive and created an enhancement ticket for discussion. I don't care how it technically works or how Mac OS/Windows/KDE works, I just want it to behave in a predictable and intuitive way.

My opinion is that you closed this ticket on false pretense. Please reopen it and close it when an agreement has been made whether changes should be made or not.

[waddlesplash]

So far all are basically in agreement that we shouldn't hide Tracker. There is already another ticket somewhere else about having a Show the Desktop feature, so we should append jscipione's comments to it. So this should remain closed.

Of course you can compare to other OSes. Sometimes the companion is apt, sometimes it isn't, but just because another OS does it one way or another doesn't mean we have to. I note in this case we behave the same as macOS as then we are not going against convention; if we truly were going against convention a more robust explanation woild have to be made.

It behaves in a way I find intuitive, and macOS users find familiar. It's not familiar to Windows users perhaps, but we aren't Windows.

[NullAndVoid]

Replying to jscipione:

It is necessary to always have Tracker, as well as any running standalone app, in Deskbar. If Tracker hypothetically crashes and is not restarted, the user is screwed.

Is that true? If Tracker crashes, will Deskbar stop working? If not, could Tracker be restarted using ProcessController, Terminal or Team Monitor?

Replying to waddlesplash:

It behaves in a way I find intuitive, and macOS users find familiar.

Let others speak their mind before closing the ticket. You might be wrong.

Replying to waddlesplash:

It's not familiar to Windows users perhaps, but we aren't Windows.

I'm using both Mac OS and Windows and I find Haiku's implementation non-intuitive. Mac OS's Finder is similar, but in contrast to Haiku, Finder has uses when no windows are open. I correctly stated this in the ticket description (I cannot argue that "Vulcan death grip" counts):

NullAndVoid:

There is nothing you can do with Tracker when no windows are open.

Replying to waddlesplash:

So far all are basically in agreement that we shouldn't hide Tracker. There is already another ticket somewhere else about having a Show the Desktop feature, so we should append jscipione's comments to it. So this should remain closed.

So why did you close this ticket as invalid and not duplicate?

[waddlesplash]

If Tracker crashes, will Deskbar stop working?

No.

If not, could Tracker be restarted using ProcessController, Terminal or Team Monitor?

Tracker should be restarted automatically in the case of an actual crash. In the case of a hang it won't be, and hence the Vulcan death grip is useful.

Let others speak their mind before closing the ticket. You might be wrong.

I haven't heard anyone bring up this specific UI issue before; but if someone else wants to chime in, the ticket will still appear in RSS feeds and the bugs mailing list. They aren't prevented from commenting just because it's closed.

but in contrast to Haiku, Finder has uses when no windows are open

All applications, not just Finder, appear in the dock when there are no windows open. Some third-party applications I sometimes use on macOS really do have no real "uses" when there are no windows open, but they stay there because they open files faster than if they were starting from nothing. So that's not the only reason Finder is in the dock.

So why did you close this ticket as invalid and not duplicate?

Because strictly speaking, we still want to show Tracker when there are no windows open, the reason the ticket was created is invalid.

[NullAndVoid]

Replying to waddlesplash:

If not, could Tracker be restarted using ProcessController, Terminal or Team Monitor?

Tracker should be restarted automatically in the case of an actual crash. In the case of a hang it won't be, and hence the Vulcan death grip is useful.

Useful, but not necessary. So all arguments that it must be in Deskbar is the same as my username, NullAndVoid.

The point I'm making is that Tracker do not need to be in Deskbar, you just want it to.

[cb88]

I use a deskbar addon showing the desktop, you can make it a keyboard shortcut also... ​https://depot.haiku-os.org/#!/pkg/minimizeall/haikuports/1/0/0/-/5/x86_gcc2?bcguid=bc171-JJCH

Adding special features to the Tracker menu entry is arguably just as wrong as hiding it. Allowing applications to customize their Deskbar entries sounds interesting though.

[waddlesplash]

It seems we already have "minimize all" at least as a shortcut, but it's not very obvious. There's already a ticket about it (#14707); so discussion about adding a "show the desktop" would probably be an extension of that and should go in there.

[waddlesplash]

The point I'm making is that Tracker do not need to be in Deskbar, you just want it to.

No, by our UI convention of all GUI applications appearing in the Deskbar, even ones with no windows currently open, it needs to be there. We can argue about the conventions we've chosen, but that would be a different argument.

But as I noted already, we are not so special here, as macOS has the exact same convention. So, I expect if we did have that argument, it would be a whole lot of bikeshedding and eventually we would decide that most people like status quo is just as it is.

[pulkomandy]

I find the "app with no window" entry in DeskBar quite useless. Sure, the app is running, and then what? You can't quit it, you can't make it open a window, you can't do anything besides killing it using a secret poweruser shortcut. What's the point?

However, I think we can make this useful. Besides just "show the desktop", this would make sense if the app could provide a menu to show when clicking the deskbar item. When using Tracker in non-spacial mode, a "new window" entry could be there. I could imagine MediaPlayer running windowless and having "next song", "previous song", etc reachable from the DeskBar. MacOS allows apps with no window for a similar reason: you can still reach their menubar; and also they used to have no concept of minimized windows so that was the only way to unclutter your desktop back then. But we don't have these problems.

So currently, we allow no-window apps but no way to interact with them (killing doesn't count as interaction). That's indeed not right and confusing to users.

[miqlas]

I can imagine the Tracker entry without any window could list the favorited folders.

[nielx]

Remove milestone for tickets with status = closed and resolution != fixed