Re: Cut-Copy/Paste behavior

RB:

All software has its annoyances.  Using Linux, we are annoyed by
inconsistencies in the cut and paste buffers between applications.  That
situation is getting better, but it's not perfect.  However, you will
note that it is possible to do whatever you want, it's just that the
solution may differ depending on the applications you use.  
Using windows, you are annoyed by the blue screen of death and constant
virus and worm attacks and the need to apply weekly patches and virus
scanner updates and having to reboot your machine when stuff just stops
working and ...

So application developers are slowly converting their applications to
use the desktop cut and paste buffers, although that job is made more
difficult by the fact that there are multiple desktop choices. The whole
point of this list is to find things that are annoying and any possible
workarounds for them and, in parallel, to point them out to the
developers so that they can fix them.
 
Calling people names doesn't help anyone and only makes you look bad. 
When Dee-Ann writes her book, she's not going to find anything useful in
your posts, but then nobody else found anything useful in them either. 
Please limit your replies to useful suggestions (I'm dreaming there) and
complaints (much more likely, but so far, we've seen only name-calling).

On Wed, 2003-09-10 at 03:35, Reilly Burke wrote:
> On Tue, 9 Sep 2003, Lawrence MacIntyre wrote:
> 
>  >> I use Evolution for email.  If I have two compose windows open, and I
>  >> select text in one with Control-C, then highlight text in the other with
>  >> the mouse, and then paste it with Control-V, it replaces the selected
>  >> text (note that you MUST use Control-V here, if you use the middle
>  >> button, it simply inserts the text instead of replacing the selected
>  >> text).
> 
> Ken Arromdee replied:
> 
> Using the middle mouse button has more differences than just inserting the
> text instead of replacing it.
> 
> 1) In Evolution, type "aaaaaaaaabbbbbbbbb".
> 2) Highlight some a's and use ^C or use "copy" from the menu.
> 3) Highlight some b's and left-click on the mouse.  This unhighlights the
> text and copies it into the cut buffer.
> 4) Move the cursor to the end of the line.
> 
> At this point, if you press ^V or use "paste" from the menu you insert a's,
> but if you middle-click you insert b's.  This is strange.
> 
> Now try it in this order:
> 1) In Evolution, type "aaaaaaaaabbbbbbbbb".
> 2) Highlight some b's and left-click on the mouse.  This unhighlights the
> text and copies it into the cut buffer.
> 3) Highlight some a's and use ^C or use "copy" from the menu.
> 4) Move the cursor to the end of the line.
> 
> At this point, both ^V and middle-click do the same thing.
> 
> Furthermore, this example involves no currently highlighted text.  When you
> add that into the mix it becomes apparent that Linux is using three buffers:
> 
> Buffer 1: copied to by ^C or the "copy" menu item
> Buffer 2: copied to by highlight/left-click *and* by ^C (or copy)
> Buffer 3: Whatever text is currently being highlighted
> 
> ^V or the "paste" menu item pastes buffer 1.
> Middle-click pastes buffer 3 if it has contents, otherwise buffer 2.
> 
> 
> 
> This behavior is not remotely reasonable.  Using the mouse produces the 
> effect
> noted before: you can't copy text from one window, highlight in a 
> second, and
> then paste the text from the first.  Using ^C and ^V only works because the
> cut and paste system that uses ^C and ^V uses a separate buffer that behaves
> differently from the one associated with the mouse.
> 
> Mozilla has a separate problem in that it doesn't even implement the 
> "correct"
> behavior described above.  In Mozilla, middle-click pastes *only* buffer 3
> and completely ignores buffer 2.
> 
> ___________________
> 
> Thank you, Ken Arromdee, for taking the time to figure out something 
> useful in this really annoying Linux defect.  It's a shame that we have 
> to push our way through so much belligerent claptrap from Linux 
> defenders to find out what the heck is the real nature of a Linux defect.
> 
> The really, really annoying part of all this is having to listen to 
> half-baked explanations from geeks who don't really give a crap about 
> office users of how we're all using the wrong ctrl-technique, or the 
> wrong 3-button mouse.  The next question is likely: who's responsible 
> for this mess?  However, since this forum is simply about expressing our 
> annoyances, we can probably let it go since Ken Arromdee has clearly 
> shown that this is a real, honest, genuine annoyance, and that is all 
> that's required.
> 
> Now will the Linux defender geeks please finally shut up about how 
> everyone else is using the wrong method, and "This is not an annoyance 
> but a feature?"  Next annoyance, please.
-- 
    Lawrence MacIntyre     865.574.8696     [email protected]
               Oak Ridge National Laboratory
High Performance Information Infrastructure Technology Group

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