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Bug 202257 - Configurable folder tree sorting
Configurable folder tree sorting
Status: RESOLVED FIXED
Product: evolution
Classification: Applications
Component: Mailer
3.4.x (obsolete)
Other other
: Normal enhancement
: ---
Assigned To: evolution-mail-maintainers
Evolution QA team
: 208733 217104 218470 234539 245101 272875 469169 485436 599609 (view as bug list)
Depends on:
Blocks: 215576 245101
 
 
Reported: 2001-04-20 23:20 UTC by Dan Winship
Modified: 2019-03-15 12:00 UTC
See Also:
GNOME target: ---
GNOME version: Unversioned Enhancement



Description Dan Winship 2001-04-20 23:20:03 UTC
The sorting of folders within a storage should be configurable.
A tree should be alphabetical until the user touches it, and after that,
new folders should probably appear at the bottom of the list.

This would allow people to group their mail folders separately from
their contact folders, for instance, and also to put Inbox/Drafts/Sent
at the front and other folders after them, or whatever the user happens
to want to do
Comment 1 Dan Winship 2001-09-05 17:23:07 UTC
*** bug 208733 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Comment 2 Petter Sundlöf 2001-11-21 15:01:30 UTC
I'd like to vote for this one. It shouldn't be that hard?
Comment 3 Gerardo Marin 2002-04-07 21:46:53 UTC
*** bug 217104 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Comment 4 Toni Willberg 2002-06-06 18:02:29 UTC
I'd like to also see this feature soon.

It's very annoying that INBOX is somewhere in middle of looong folder
list.
Comment 5 Fadi Adlouni 2004-10-11 13:36:11 UTC
please support this feature.
i have a big list of inboxes, i want to sort my important ones to show
at the top,
i don't want to see at the top the sent/trash/draft which are folders
i don't usually look at.
Comment 6 Karsten Bräckelmann 2006-02-06 16:24:59 UTC
*** Bug 218470 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Comment 7 Karsten Bräckelmann 2006-02-06 16:25:09 UTC
*** Bug 234539 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Comment 8 Karsten Bräckelmann 2006-02-06 16:27:05 UTC
Inheriting "Blocks bug" from duplicate bug 234539.
Comment 9 André Klapper 2006-03-30 14:21:53 UTC
updating version number.
Comment 10 André Klapper 2006-08-12 14:41:39 UTC
*** Bug 272875 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Comment 11 André Klapper 2006-08-12 14:41:51 UTC
*** Bug 351025 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Comment 12 Uno Engborg 2006-08-12 15:32:59 UTC
(In reply to comment #11)
> *** Bug 351025 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
> 

This bug and 351025 touches two different issues.
This bug seam to be about ordering folders within an account,
bug 351025 is about ordering of the accounts.

If you want to kill two birds with one stone, fine by me.
Just wanted make things clear
Comment 13 Kandepu Prasad 2007-08-22 13:35:29 UTC
*** Bug 469169 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Comment 14 André Klapper 2007-10-15 22:57:26 UTC
*** Bug 485436 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Comment 15 Akhil Laddha 2007-11-05 09:56:46 UTC
Enhancement request in OpenSUSE also
https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=219756
Comment 16 Matthew Barnes 2008-03-11 00:29:28 UTC
Bumping version to a stable release.
Comment 17 Akhil Laddha 2009-10-26 05:11:36 UTC
*** Bug 599609 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Comment 18 Matthew Barnes 2009-10-28 19:03:01 UTC
Any proposals for how the user would go about reordering folders?  Drag and drop is out, because that metaphor is already used for moving folders to other folders and we can't overload it.  Only thing I can think of is to convert the folder subscriptions dialog to a more general "manage your folders" dialog.
Comment 19 Patrick OCallaghan 2009-10-28 21:02:16 UTC
Firefox bookmarks are re-ordered using d-n-d and seem to be able to manage both dropping a bookmark between two others and dropping one into a further level of folder.

If that's not viable, there's already a dialogue for folder subscriptions (on IMAP). Perhaps that could be generalized in some way.
Comment 20 Matthew Barnes 2009-10-28 21:39:22 UTC
The difference is Firefox doesn't kick off a potentially long running network operation if you miss your drop target by a couple pixels.  Plus, reordering folders would not be reflected on the server-side, whereas moving a folder into another folder is.  Mixing metaphors like that is always a recipe for confusion.

Revamping the subscription dialog is sounding like the way to go.  That thing needs some love anyway.
Comment 21 Patrick OCallaghan 2009-10-28 23:02:24 UTC
Point taken. I agree that the best way seems to be via the sub dialogue.
Comment 22 lduperval 2009-10-29 03:00:57 UTC
My bug was marked as a duplicate, but I'm not sure we're talking about the same thing.

Thunderbird has a feature where you can right-click on a folder and mark it as a "Favorite." The folder pane cycles between the following:

- All folders
- Unread folders
- Favorite folders
- Recent folders
- Some other one I forget about

In my case, it would be sufficient to have something that ressembles the Search Folders and call it "Favorit Folders" and put them at the top of the account list. In my case, I am not necessarily looking for a general "sort the tree" approach, just a way to make the most commonly used folders more preeminent.

I think I have another bug open, though, for sorting accounts only, not folders within accounts.

L
Comment 23 Patrick OCallaghan 2009-10-29 05:11:23 UTC
There are clearly several ways of achieving much the same desired result: letting the user have some control over how folders are presented in the list. The TB design is useful in some situations and would avoid having to allow general reordering. I think just three alternative views would be enough:

- All (including Search folders)
- Favourites (i.e. marked as such with a folder property)
- Search folders

and really the Favourites view isn't that essential since you can always use Search folders as a standin. Of course a minimalist design could just support Search folders and nothing else, but I'm guessing we don't want to scare away *all* the users :-)
Comment 24 lduperval 2009-10-29 11:53:24 UTC
Oh! Yeah, that actually works for me. Now, if we could move search folders at the TOP of the list...
Comment 25 Patrick OCallaghan 2010-06-16 21:01:58 UTC
New proposal:

Two folder lists: All and Search. All is the same as the current folder view, Search can be reordered by the user. Since Search folders are entirely local to the client, this shouldn't have any server implications.
Comment 26 Matthew Barnes 2010-06-19 17:14:30 UTC
What do you think about adding a couple tabs beneath the folder tree labelled "All Folders" and "Search Folders"?  In the "All Folders" tab you can either right-click on a folder or open the "Folder" menu and select "Add to Search Folders" as a quick and easy way to add the folder to the "Search Folders" tab.

Also, I've been toying with the idea of adding a second special search folder called "All Inboxes" which would combine the Inboxes of all your enabled accounts into one view, and would keep itself up-to-date as you add and remove accounts.
Comment 27 Patrick OCallaghan 2010-06-19 17:40:03 UTC
(In reply to comment #26)
> What do you think about adding a couple tabs beneath the folder tree labelled
> "All Folders" and "Search Folders"?  In the "All Folders" tab you can either
> right-click on a folder or open the "Folder" menu and select "Add to Search
> Folders" as a quick and easy way to add the folder to the "Search Folders" tab.

Presumably the search criteria could then be edited. Would the search folder version have an editable name (I assume so)?

However let's not forget that people want to be able to order folders (Search folders in this case) other than lexically, and not just by prepending "aaa-" or whatever to the name.

> Also, I've been toying with the idea of adding a second special search folder
> called "All Inboxes" which would combine the Inboxes of all your enabled
> accounts into one view, and would keep itself up-to-date as you add and remove
> accounts.

Sure, why not. I'm not a fan of unified inboxes but some people seem to like it. There's also the "Favorite folders" tab a la TBird.

However this is all candy. Having just the search folders tab would be a great start.
Comment 28 Matthew Barnes 2010-06-19 18:56:47 UTC
(In reply to comment #27)
> Presumably the search criteria could then be edited. Would the search folder
> version have an editable name (I assume so)?

Sure, my thought was it would just be a quick way to create a trivial "Match All" search folder for one particular folder.  After that you could rename it, change the criteria, whatever you want.

> However let's not forget that people want to be able to order folders (Search
> folders in this case) other than lexically, and not just by prepending "aaa-"
> or whatever to the name.

Splitting search folders off into their own tree view means we could play by a different set of rules than the ordinary folder hierarchy.  Don't see why search folders couldn't be reorderable.
Comment 29 Patrick OCallaghan 2010-06-19 19:51:10 UTC
(In reply to comment #28)
> (In reply to comment #27)
> > Presumably the search criteria could then be edited. Would the search folder
> > version have an editable name (I assume so)?
> 
> Sure, my thought was it would just be a quick way to create a trivial "Match
> All" search folder for one particular folder.  After that you could rename it,
> change the criteria, whatever you want.

OK. At some later time maybe we can consider a rather more ambitious idea: support "conversations" via easily-defined search folders. Ditto for defining search folders (or even real ones) associated with mailing lists, e.g. it would be nice to be able to post to a list I'm focussed on without having to look up the address or reply to a thread. That's OT for now of course.

> > However let's not forget that people want to be able to order folders (Search
> > folders in this case) other than lexically, and not just by prepending "aaa-"
> > or whatever to the name.
> 
> Splitting search folders off into their own tree view means we could play by a
> different set of rules than the ordinary folder hierarchy.  Don't see why
> search folders couldn't be reorderable.

Go for it :-)
Comment 30 Milan Crha 2011-09-13 12:41:56 UTC
*** Bug 245101 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Comment 31 Milan Crha 2011-09-13 12:46:32 UTC
Let's do not mix thing together and keep this bug for "Configurable folder tree sorting", especially for sorting folders inside an account (for configurable account sorting is bug #351025). There should be opened/found a new/other bug report for the unified Inbox (or how would you call it) and those other tabs for folder view, as proposed above.

I suppose it's obvious, but anyway, this folder inside an account sorting would work for the level itself, for sibling nodes only. It's natural, I believe.
Comment 32 Milan Crha 2011-09-13 13:18:55 UTC
Thinking of it subscription dialog cannot be used for this, because:
a) NNTP accounts shows there all folders, not only subscribed and it shows
   them in a hierarchy, where folder tree is showing them flat.
b) exchange accounts are showing in the subscription dialog only public
   folders, and no user folders.

Thus a new dialog for this might be invented. What about Folder->Edit Sort Order... menu option, somewhere below Unsubscribe menu item?
Comment 33 Matthew Barnes 2012-05-13 15:26:53 UTC
This got implemented in Evolution 3.4.  Closing as FIXED.
Comment 34 Matthew Barnes 2012-05-13 15:30:17 UTC
(In reply to comment #33)
> This got implemented in Evolution 3.4.  Closing as FIXED.

No sorry, I read this wrong.  Evolution 3.4 allows accounts to be reordered.  Folders within an account are shown alphabetically with Inbox at the top.
Comment 35 Ángel 2017-05-04 23:47:44 UTC
This was requested again on https://mail.gnome.org/archives/evolution-list/2017-March/msg00138.html

Regarding the question at comment 32, that placement seems fine.
Comment 36 Milan Crha 2019-03-15 12:00:22 UTC
Let it be in Folder->Edit Sort Order. It opens a dialog with currently selected folder preselected, then use drag&drop to reorder folders on their levels.

Created commit 9fbf6aaaca in evo master (3.33.1+)