Public bug reported:
Binary package hint: thunar
After navigating into a subfolder, and then to the parent folder, Thunar
swaps the meaning of the forward and back commands. Keying in the
"back" command does nothing, while keying in the "forward" command takes
me back to the previously visited folder.
I think Thunar is attempting to be smart here, by recognizing the parent
folder as the previously visited folder, and effectively replacing my
"up" command with a "back" command. Sadly, this well-intended
misfeature only ends up breaking UI consistency and throwing a wrench in
my mental stack of visited folders.
When I press alt+left (or the back button) I expect it to "go to the
previous visited folder", just like the help text says it will, always.
In practice, it might go to the previously visited folder, or it might
not, depending on what the previously visited folder happened to be.
One situation where this comes up a lot:
I navigate to a subfolder in Thunar, do some file management, and leave
the window open while doing something else for a while. When I return
to the Thunar window, perhaps minutes or hours later, I see what folder
it's displaying and decide to take a look in its parent folder. When
I'm done there, and want to go back where I just was, I press the back
button, only to find that it does nothing.
Adding to the confusion, I see that the back button is disabled, while
the forward button is now (surprisingly) enabled. I press the forward
button, and it takes me back to my previously visited folder! This
inconsistency is even more mystifying when the toolbar is hidden, as it
often is for those of us who prefer keyboard shortcuts to reaching for
the mouse.
Alternatively, if I remembered which folder I had come from, I could get
there by aiming with the mouse or fiddling with the arrow and enter
keys. What a hassle.
Every time this happens, I spend a few seconds wondering why Thunar
failed to follow my command, and when I remember this special case
behavior, I feel like Thunar has tricked me.
Lessons that I'm still re-learning after six months of using Thunar:
1. The back button doesn't always go back in history.
2. The forward button sometimes goes back in history.
3. The back and forward buttons do not behave like those in my web browser or
any other app I use.
4. The only way to predict when the back & forward buttons will work as
expected is to memorize the commands I happened to use to reach current folder.
Even if that was hours ago.
system details:
xubuntu hardy
thunar-0.9.0-4ubuntu2
** Affects: thunar (Ubuntu)
Importance: Undecided
Status: New
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thunar swaps behavior of forward / back (next / previous) buttons
https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/234217
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