GNOME Bugzilla – Bug 579681
Support ctrl+= for zoom in, and keypad for zoom in/out
Last modified: 2020-11-20 19:52:42 UTC
Reported in Ubuntu: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/gnome-terminal/+bug/354447 "In gnome-terminal the 'View --> Zoom In' menu item lists the key binding of "Ctrl++" in the same way as Mozilla Firefox does. However, on for example a pc105 keyboard (en_GB variant), you technically need to either use 'Shift+Ctrl+=' or 'Ctrl+KPLUS' (the numpad +) to cause it to zoom in. So the referenced keybinding can be slightly confusing to the novice user. Mozilla Firefox resolves this by also binding 'Ctrl+=' to the same function so users can easily discover the feature without much thought. As such, most users have a learned response of holding Ctrl and hitting the - and = keys to zoom in and out. Gnome Terminal should probably do the same to make it easier to discover the feature."
This can be done by adding an accelerator-only action.
Created attachment 140272 [details] [review] add accel only actions Adds accelerators that implement Ctrl = and Ctrl Keypad+ for zoom in, and Ctrl Keypad- for zoom out. The latter two are requested in bug 143579
I don't think this is the right solution, since in the keybindings editor, the user could use other accels for ZoomIn/Out where the extra accels this patch adds don't make sense.
I forgot about zoom keybindings being configurable. In this case not only the extra accels (keypad + and -) would be wrong but <Ctrl>equal too should be conditional on Ctrl+ being the zoom in key. Is there simple way of aliasing certain accelerators for others? In this case telling ctrl= to behave always like ctrl+ .
*** Bug 143579 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
See also Bug 607205 (wider scope / general usability of zoom) * suggests changing the wording in the menu * suggests implementing a mousewheel zoom * suggests implementing a 'reset zoom level' ala firefox (CTRL 0)
*** Bug 647319 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
This problem appears in other Gnome programs which have zoom in/zoom out operations: gnome-character-map, gnome-maps, and gnome-help. I would say having non-symmetric shortcuts for zoom in/zoom out (Ctrl+SHIFT+= and Ctrl+-) is VERY inconvenient.
I also found that SOME Gnome programs accepts both Ctrl+= and Ctrl+SHIFT+= for zoom in: evince, evolution, eog, shotwell, epiphany (aka Web). I believe this should be Gnome-wide standard shortcut, which should work in ALL applications where zoom in/zoom out operations are applicable. In sake of usability, zoom in shortcut should NOT require SHIFT, e. g. it must be Ctrl+= (Ctrl+Shift+= can be an alias). BTW, another useful shortcut which also should be Gnome-wide is Ctrl+0 to reset zoom factor to its default value. Thus, it is not a problem of gnome-terminal, but a problem of overall Gnome usability and should be raised appropriately.
I attached a patch to https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/gnome-terminal/-/issues/313 for the alphanumeric versus numeric keypad part.
I have also attached a second patch to support Ctrl+= for zooming in: https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/gnome-terminal/-/issues/313 Let's close this in favour of the GitLab issue.