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Bug 552093 - Icon view with high zoom level has lots of space between icons
Icon view with high zoom level has lots of space between icons
Status: RESOLVED FIXED
Product: nautilus
Classification: Core
Component: Views: Icon View
3.4.x
Other All
: Normal major
: ---
Assigned To: Nautilus Maintainers
Nautilus Maintainers
: 580266 626838 629536 667113 679184 700761 702137 702138 702325 723536 725990 731901 740231 (view as bug list)
Depends on:
Blocks:
 
 
Reported: 2008-09-13 10:38 UTC by Crieloue Gilles
Modified: 2015-04-25 18:38 UTC
See Also:
GNOME target: ---
GNOME version: ---


Attachments
Icons with standard size : waste of space (56.71 KB, image/png)
2008-09-13 10:40 UTC, Crieloue Gilles
  Details
In order to show how much this is stupid.. (135.32 KB, image/png)
2008-09-13 10:44 UTC, Crieloue Gilles
  Details
Now a mockup (163.32 KB, image/png)
2008-09-13 10:55 UTC, Crieloue Gilles
  Details
Unused space at 200% zoom (77.53 KB, image/png)
2011-10-17 20:57 UTC, John Strandberg
  Details
wasted space in Nautilus (166.21 KB, image/png)
2012-01-13 02:47 UTC, Mark
  Details
Zoom bug in images directory (105.03 KB, image/png)
2012-06-24 15:04 UTC, nodiscc
  Details
Zoom bug on 1024x600 netbook fullscreen (121.48 KB, image/png)
2012-06-24 15:06 UTC, nodiscc
  Details
Still there folks (164.01 KB, image/png)
2013-02-08 21:30 UTC, Crieloue Gilles
  Details
Fix icon padding in high zoom levels by removing pixels_per_unit updates (1.22 KB, patch)
2014-07-26 20:50 UTC, Florian Richter
none Details | Review
Only scale grid-width for lower zoom levels (1.77 KB, patch)
2014-07-27 14:30 UTC, Florian Richter
none Details | Review

Description Crieloue Gilles 2008-09-13 10:38:16 UTC
I (and many others) wonder WHY there is SO MUCH waste space around the icons !
4 icons take a AMAZING place ! There is as much space for NOTHING between the icons than the icon size itself !
The icons are too small when i want a graphical organisation of the directory, so i put a bigger zoom. And here... the amazingly wide waste space goes bigger again !
Why ? is it a gtk bug ? we can't avoid those ugly spaces ?
I'm sure we are many thinking the same way.
It makes this (yet really good) file manager look so old/deprecated that it make me feel sad.
We just CAN'T choose the icon size right now since it's ugly making their bigger.

Other information:
I'd like to put pictures in order to show how it's ridiculous..
Comment 1 Crieloue Gilles 2008-09-13 10:40:56 UTC
Created attachment 118645 [details]
Icons with standard size : waste of space

See.
Comment 2 Crieloue Gilles 2008-09-13 10:44:20 UTC
Created attachment 118646 [details]
In order to show how much this is stupid..

You have to see this one.
Here i made a 400% zoom (because the icons aren't made for a smaller size..
Look at all the waste space ! (everywhere ; between the icons, at the top of the icons view, on the left..everywhere)

And unbelievable : there is not enough space for the two icons in the window, so the icon goes the line after !
Comment 3 Crieloue Gilles 2008-09-13 10:55:38 UTC
Created attachment 118648 [details]
Now a mockup

And now a mockup showing how thing could be so much better. No more waste space.
I have a 1920x1200 monitor and i keep finding nautilus taking too much space.
Please consider it.
Comment 4 hannes janetzek 2009-10-13 04:44:41 UTC
hi. have you considered using preferences -> Use compact layout? I'm no nautilus developer btw.
Comment 5 Cosimo Cecchi 2010-09-17 18:38:39 UTC
*** Bug 580266 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Comment 6 Cosimo Cecchi 2010-09-17 18:39:17 UTC
*** Bug 629536 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Comment 7 Cosimo Cecchi 2010-09-17 18:39:32 UTC
*** Bug 626838 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Comment 8 Nick 2011-10-04 19:19:04 UTC
This bug is a major issue when at 400% zoom! 

When at 400% zoom, the Nautilus window presents only 1 column of icons despite the fact that there is literally five inches of empty space to the right of the single-column of icons. That is, at 400% zoom icons are not showing side-by-side even though there is plenty of available space.

Can you guys fix this soon, please!
Comment 9 Bob Orinski 2011-10-11 18:58:38 UTC
Gnome Developers, could you at least fix the 400% zoom bug Nick described above, pretty please?

I've been putting up with this bug for a long time. It's really annoying only being able to have one column of icons at 400% zoom.

Would really appreciate a fix. This bug has been alive for over 3 years now.
Comment 10 John Strandberg 2011-10-17 20:57:16 UTC
Created attachment 199273 [details]
Unused space at 200% zoom

This bug is not confined to 400% zoom.

I've attached a screenshot of a window at 200% zoom. 4-columns could easily fit into the window, yet only 1-column of icons is displayed. I'd be happy if just 2-columns showed in the window shown.

How on earth has this bug gone unfixed for over three years? Are any developers ever going to fix this?
Comment 11 Mark 2012-01-13 02:47:40 UTC
Created attachment 205157 [details]
wasted space in Nautilus

I'd like to see this fixed too, Gnome. Fixing this bug should be a top priority.

As you can see from my attached screenshot, practically all my Nautilus viewspace is turned into blank space because of this bug.
Comment 12 Cosimo Cecchi 2012-01-17 14:21:15 UTC
*** Bug 667113 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Comment 13 nodiscc 2012-01-17 14:46:18 UTC
Confirming nautilus 3.2.1-2+b1 from Debian repos is affected by this bug.
Comment 14 nodiscc 2012-06-24 15:04:20 UTC
Created attachment 217123 [details]
Zoom bug in images directory

Bug 552093 is still present in nautilus 3.4.2-1 in Debian repos.
Attaching a screenshot of wasted space in a directory containing images.
Comment 15 nodiscc 2012-06-24 15:06:10 UTC
Created attachment 217124 [details]
Zoom bug on 1024x600 netbook fullscreen

An attachment showing the wasted screen space in a directory containing documents, on full screen on a 1024x600 netbook display.
Comment 16 nodiscc 2012-07-31 20:25:10 UTC
Increasing severity and adding the ui-review flag. This is definitely a major problem as: 
 * the icon view is the default in nautilus
 * this renders the zoom feature totally pointless/unusable.

(see the screenshots!)
Comment 17 William Jon McCann 2012-08-24 21:26:26 UTC
*** Bug 679184 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Comment 18 nodiscc 2012-09-26 22:56:11 UTC
Did you just release GNOME 3.6 without fixing this? I sense this horrible bug in the screenshots at http://www.gnome.org/news/2012/09/gnome-3-6-released/
Comment 19 William Jon McCann 2012-09-26 22:59:30 UTC
There is no way to fix it without a rewrite of the icon view. That is on the roadmap for next cycle.
Comment 20 Timo Reimerdes 2013-01-17 13:13:54 UTC
If this cycle should have happened by now - this change has been forgotten, hasn't it?

I can not find out how to make nautilus use a tollerable icon-spacing at +200% zoom - and thats normal on a ux32vd (13" with 1920x1020). Considering the recent "resolution hype" this might become even more usual in the future.
Comment 21 Crieloue Gilles 2013-02-08 21:25:47 UTC
Still the same issue (Gnome-Shell 3.7) in files…
Comment 22 Crieloue Gilles 2013-02-08 21:30:30 UTC
Created attachment 235545 [details]
Still there folks
Comment 23 Crieloue Gilles 2013-02-08 21:32:57 UTC
I have the feeling that it's because when the zoom gets bigger, the names are not truncated anymore and take then too much place.
That's why another column can't appear in the wasted blank space.
Maybe it's the truncate policy with bigger zoom that should be worked on ?
Comment 24 William Jon McCann 2013-02-08 22:19:30 UTC
See Comment #19. However, we are no longer planning to replace the canvas view this cycle. GtkIconView just doesn't scale well enough.
Comment 25 António Fernandes 2013-05-21 07:33:29 UTC
*** Bug 700761 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Comment 26 António Fernandes 2013-06-13 10:45:18 UTC
*** Bug 702137 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Comment 27 Cosimo Cecchi 2013-06-13 15:10:59 UTC
*** Bug 702138 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Comment 28 António Fernandes 2013-06-15 13:02:19 UTC
*** Bug 702325 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Comment 29 t.ask 2013-12-11 13:05:29 UTC
Five years later we still see this bug :( Do you have any plans to fix this bug soon?
Comment 30 André Klapper 2013-12-11 14:05:30 UTC
I'm not sure who "you" is, but providing patches could speed up fixing.
Comment 31 William Jon McCann 2013-12-11 14:52:53 UTC
Of course there are plans to fix it. It is just hard. We've written an entirely new widget GtkFlowBox to help. We just need a way to hook it up to a data model. Work is ongoing. If you wish to help, ask in #gtk+.
Comment 32 careca 2014-01-12 12:37:47 UTC
I commit to this bug.

Damned projects that wish to "re-write" an already working application, but can't comply to available features anymore, making lives of users worse than before.

If your target is to have "mean to play the developer role", than please, at least prove that you are capable of that.

Whole Gnome 3 project prove that programmers has become unreliable, and future of IT-world is very dark...
Comment 33 André Klapper 2014-01-12 13:24:16 UTC
careca: If you have nothing technical to add and specifically about the topic "Icon view with high zoom level has lots of space between icons" but in general about GNOME or how bad the world is, please go to a forum or your blog. 
It is offtopic here and not welcome. Stick to the topic in bugtrackers, please.
Comment 34 careca 2014-01-13 18:06:38 UTC
Ok André,
So here we go:

I looked around and found nautilus configuration in "hidden" in dconf.
(As in many other cases, Gnome development means, everything must get hidden, if there may even be a way of configuring anything...)

So...
Under: org.gnome.nautilus.icon-view

I had DEFAULT configuration for iconview set.
That is:
-------------------------------------
caption                 ['size', 'date_modified', 'permissions']
default-zoom-level      standard
text-ellipsis-limit     ['3 ']
thumbnail-size          64
-------------------------------------

After changing playing around a bit I changed the thumbnail-size to '128'px.
As a result, it seemed to have solved the issue, so that at any zoom-scale spacing of thumbnails got reasonable, giving you a good layout.

EASILY one can notice that the problem rely on the "width of file-name field", which must be changed accordingly depending on thumbnail size, to avoid increasing spacement. 
It seems, handling of "width of file-name field" is  anyhow faulty (at least) for some of the thumbnail sizes e.g. '64'px.

Maybe now you can help us faultfinding in this direction.

regards
Comment 35 António Fernandes 2014-02-03 15:31:39 UTC
*** Bug 723536 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Comment 36 António Fernandes 2014-03-09 17:53:43 UTC
*** Bug 725990 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Comment 37 Asif Ali Rizvan 2014-03-09 17:55:40 UTC
a picture speaks louder than words, so does a video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DSqtxwtub1I&feature=youtu.be
Comment 38 António Fernandes 2014-06-28 20:07:16 UTC
*** Bug 731901 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Comment 39 Luc Pi 2014-06-29 18:02:12 UTC
Yes, obviously the padding shall not be zoomed with the icon size...

The view is basically completely unusable with an icon size bigger than the default. It's really hard to believe that some attention is put to some details while this is still lagging behind. It just seems that the developers are not using any zoom. Or what?

I have been using the compact layout for years, until... it was removed (!)
Why that was removed before this was fixed is beyond my understanding.

After a short look – though I am not really a developer – there does not seem to be an easy way to adapt zooming without touching the padding. The code is full of magic values and other oddities, probably part of a great architecture plan.

If you are in despair like me,
you can try to change the value of STANDARD_ICON_GRID_WIDTH from 155 to 100 in [1] (or play with it to find a better value). This will improve (but not fix) the view at higher zoom level. The padding will still scale but not that much. Also, as it is said in a comment above the padding seems to be tight to the label's size. For these icons with a larger label, the padding will be larger than from the others. 


[1] https://git.gnome.org/browse/nautilus/tree/libnautilus-private/nautilus-canvas-container.c


--- nautilus-3.10.1.orig/libnautilus-private/nautilus-canvas-container.c
+++ nautilus-3.10.1/libnautilus-private/nautilus-canvas-container.c
@@ -98,12 +98,12 @@
 #define CONTAINER_PAD_TOP 4
 #define CONTAINER_PAD_BOTTOM 4
 
-#define STANDARD_ICON_GRID_WIDTH 155
+#define STANDARD_ICON_GRID_WIDTH 100
 
 /* Desktop layout mode defines */
 #define DESKTOP_PAD_HORIZONTAL         10
 #define DESKTOP_PAD_VERTICAL   10
Comment 40 Florian Richter 2014-07-26 20:50:12 UTC
Created attachment 281792 [details] [review]
Fix icon padding in high zoom levels by removing pixels_per_unit updates

I tracked this down to the pixels_per_unit property of eel_canvas. I don't see a reason why this property must change with the zoom level (e. g. the font size isn't effected). However I'm not sure, what actually should happen when zooming.
Comment 41 Florian Richter 2014-07-27 14:30:14 UTC
Created attachment 281818 [details] [review]
Only scale grid-width for lower zoom levels

I digged a bit deeper and found out where pixels_per_unit is actually used. I updated the patch to fix the problem more at the root. Now the patch disables scaling of the padding for the higher zoom levels. The rational is: The padding on standard zoom level is fine and if icons become bigger, you don't need more space to seperate them. For the smaller zoom levels, you want to see more icons and the space between them should shrink.

I'm open for further suggestions.
Comment 42 António Fernandes 2015-04-25 18:37:42 UTC
This has been fixed in the context of bug 737190. Better spacing for all zoom levels is available in the latest release (version 3.16).
Comment 43 António Fernandes 2015-04-25 18:38:34 UTC
*** Bug 740231 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***