GNOME Bugzilla – Bug 142995
'mouse preferences' (single vs double-click) for File Management and Desktop hard to find
Last modified: 2012-09-19 20:15:21 UTC
When I go to Applications->Desktop Preferences->Mouse, there is not an option for whether to use single- or double-clicks to open desktop items. I would like to be able to set my Desktop items to open with a single left-click. I don't know whether this option doesn't currently exist, or whether it is in a different preferences window.
It's in the File Management preferences window. I think that's probably a sensible place for it to stay.
Why is the File Management preferences window a sensible place to change the mouse behavior of desktop icons? I searched through the lists of preferences several times, and never thought to check "File Management".
hmm, it's because the things on your desktop are (normally) files. And the preference affects the whole of the file manager. Moving this to nautilus, because really it's a nautilus decision. And cc-ing usability-maint, they'll probably have an opinion.
A couple of possible solutions spring to mind... either change the title of the capplet to somehow convey that the desktop is included ("Desktop and File Management" or something), and/or add a menu item for the capplet to the desktop context menu.
I think I was really hoping for more ability to configure how mouse clicks work on the desktop--something like the "Keyboard Shortcuts" dialog, but for the mouse. After thinking about it, I decided that what I really wanted was to keep the "select with left-click, activate with double-left-click" behavior, but to have applications on the desktop activate with middle-click. It sounds like changing these things on the desktop would change them in the File Manager as well, which seems reasonable.
In response to comment 5: there is bug 137667 for more mouse button configurability. Re-titling to reflect the issue at hand.
Still valid in 3.1.4, however by default we don't use a "Desktop" concept anymore.
Given that we don't show the desktop by default I think it is pretty reasonable to have the nautilus click settings in the nautilus preferences dialog.