GNOME Bugzilla – Bug 153508
Folders should return on mount
Last modified: 2012-08-27 12:23:03 UTC
Okay, I'm not sure if this is where to file this feature request, so move it where is needs to be. I love that when you umount a filesystem in Nautilus it closes all the open folders, saving you the hassle of having to do so. This got me to wondering whether the opposite couldn't be implemented to - that is, when you mount a filesystem, any folders that were open at umount are re-opened, leaving things as they were just before umount. This seems like a really obvious extension of the whole spatial idea. As a bonus this would also mean that when all folders have been shut before umounting, then on remounting no folders would appear. This would address the issue of where a filesystem is mounted, but there's no need for a folder to open (as access to the files will be made from elsewhere) and you find yourself having to clsoe the folder just to avoid cluter even though you never use it.
I guess this would also fix the request that remounting (ie mount -o remount) should not close windows displaying things within that mount point. See Debian BTS bug 254487 [1] [1] http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=254487
Usability squad, do you think it is a good idea to keep around a list of windows that refer to a volume or drive and reopen those when remounting?
Just to pick some random numbers; lets say you mount 1 new device every 6 months for 8 years and they all have more than 3 folders with more than 200 files ... How much would this "cache" grow over the years? If it's not a problem storage/memory wise, I don't see any reason not to remember the states. Or maybe we already do remember the states, we just don't re-open the windows ? In any case, I like the idea :-) Would this fix the issue mentioned in comment #1? What Nautilus would get would be a "umount" followed by a "mount" signal, so what it would really do is "flash" the windows ?
My first hunch is that if this was the default behaviour, it might be annoying more often than it would be useful, at least for non-removable media. It's rare that I want to open the same set of folders twice in succession whenever I mount my network shares in the office, for example, but it would be annoying to have to close all their windows prior to unmounting to prevent them all opening again next time. My other hunch is that this sort of thing feels like it might be related to session management somehow (rather than a general on/off preference), but I'm not quite sure how...
I'd like to see restoring folders after computer shutdown. Regarding question that it is impractical to reopen all folders. It's simply a point of view. Someone works with fixed set of folders, someone opens a folder and forget about it. Also to prevent restoring folders' windows someone can hit "File/Close all folders". E.g. I don't like the duty to close folders but I'd like to see recently accessed folders in some list like in "Opened windows" Gnome panel applet. Maybe some "recently accessed folders" list will be useful. Like a history in a web browser when the list is too big it will be truncated.
My preference is that on a re-mount, Nautilus recall the initial folder that I specified when I created the network shortcut (e.g., from Ubuntu's Places | Connect to Server dialog).
This seems to only make sense in spatial mode.