Tobias B. Besemer [:BesTo] (QA) Reporter
	Description • 23 years ago

Address-Cards should have a separate task so you can jump from one opened to
another to copy selected texts.

	Boris Zbarsky [:bzbarsky]
	Comment 1 • 23 years ago

confirming rfe

	scottputterman
	Comment 2 • 23 years ago

I'm assuimg when you say different task you are saying they should not be modal.
 I agree. I don't see any reason to make them modal.  I'm adding Jennifer in
case she knows any reasons.

	jglick
	Comment 3 • 23 years ago

None that i can think of. 

One question. What happens when the user has Cards open and then closes the AB 
window? Do the Cards remain open? I think so. If the user changes data on an 
open card, OK's it, the AB should be correctly updated even though the AB window 
isn't open anymore.

	johann.petrak@gmail.com
	Comment 4 • 23 years ago

I think that this is a bug, and a major one, not an enhancement: 
having the ac modal keeps
users from pasting in data from other windows where all the info 
usually is already present and this is a severe loss
of functionality and makes using address cards close to unusable.

	Ninoschka Baca
	Comment 5 • 23 years ago

*** Bug 49832 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

	jglick
	Comment 6 • 23 years ago

128124 is related. Mailing Lists modal/non-modal. Problem with making them 
non-modal is what happens when a Card or Mailing List is open and the user 
returns to the Address Book and deletes a Card or Mailing List that is currently 
open? We would need to ensure that users can't delete cards (disable the 
button/menu) or Mailiing Lists when they are open (or deleting cards that 
belong to an open Mailing List). Or the open Card/Mailing List would have to 
know that it was deleted and go away? That might be confusing.

	(not reading, please use seth@sspitzer.org instead)
	Comment 7 • 23 years ago

relates to #128169 (the same bug, for the mailing list dialog)

	(not reading, please use seth@sspitzer.org instead)
	Comment 8 • 23 years ago

in addition to #115904 (for new / edit card) there is #128169 (for new / edit 
mailing list.)

the goal is to make those windows modal to just the addressbook.

on win2k, that's already the case.  the new card dialog is modal to 
addressbook, but I can still use browser.

(maybe this is a platform specific toolkit issue?)

	Gavin Treadgold
	Comment 9 • 22 years ago

Should the window be modal at all though? Surely locking can handle the issues
relating to deleting a card whilst editing it, opening it flags it as locked,
and if an attempt to delete it is made, the user is informed that it cannot be
because it is open for editing. Coming from Outlook I know it can manage this,
including if you close the main Outlook window the Contact window remains open.
By making it modal to the AB, I cannot open two cards and copy and paste shared
information such as organisation from one card to another. Should a new RFE be
created such that the new/edit card dialog not be modal at all?

	(not reading, please use seth@sspitzer.org instead)
	Comment 10 • 22 years ago

mass re-assign.

	timeless
	Comment 11 • 21 years ago

Seth that bug contradicts this bug. And you clearly morphed this bug far beyond
the request of the reporter. If you want the opposite behavior then close the
bug, don't morph it to mean something that is against the original request.

	Mike Cowperthwaite
	Comment 12 • 20 years ago

*** Bug 179457 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

	Mike Cowperthwaite
	Comment 13 • 20 years ago

Note that the dupe (bug 179457) has the beginnings of a patch which may be 
useful if someone wants to address this problem.

	Mike Cowperthwaite
	Comment 14 • 20 years ago

See also bug 135126.

	Mark Banner (:standard8)
	Comment 15 • 19 years ago

*** Bug 264851 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

	Mark Banner (:standard8)
	Comment 16 • 19 years ago

*** Bug 276326 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

	Mark Banner (:standard8)
	Comment 17 • 18 years ago

*** Bug 345532 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

	Wayne Mery (:wsmwk)
	Comment 18 • 18 years ago

(In reply to comment #13)
> Note that the dupe (bug 179457) has the beginnings of a patch which may be 
> useful if someone wants to address this problem.

check neil's comments in bug 179457 before taking bug

	Wayne Mery (:wsmwk)
	Comment 19 • 17 years ago

Mark, would this also resolve this thunderbird issue - when a card is open for edit from the AB window, ctrl+2 or Tools|address book fails to focus address book window?

	Wayne Mery (:wsmwk)
	Comment 20 • 16 years ago

I haven't done a usability survey, but I would have to think this is very close, if not the #1 address book pain.

Every time I want to add AB information to a new contact from 3-pane (having done right-click in a message header, "add to address book") the only way to cut paste information is to close the contact, open AB pane, change to proper AB, find the contact, edit contact, then go back to 3-pane to get the info.  

This is a brain dead process - not a good UI model to force upon users.

	Bryan Clark (DevTools PM) [:clarkbw]
	Comment 22 • 15 years ago

Something like this would be great to have.

	Mark Banner (:standard8)
	Comment 23 • 15 years ago

(In reply to comment #22)
> Something like this would be great to have.

Agreed.

Just to be clear though, I think the work is slightly more than just making the dialog non-modal. We should also consider what to do with cards that are open, but get deleted or moved between address books.

	wazz
	Comment 26 • 15 years ago

I had thought or hoped opensource software had matured.  Apparently not.  This issue has been around for almost 10 years and nothing done about it.  This is the second of these that I know to have been around since 2001. Microsoft is lovin' it.

	Simon Bock
	Comment 27 • 14 years ago

Agree with #26.
In all software products, it is easier to make dialogs modal than to think about side effects... please go for it, the effort to make this user friendly will be worth it.

Easier than "the right thing" (with the problem outlined in #23) could be to allow activation of clipboard-use in the window I opened the "add to address book" out of - at least I can paste the name & postal address, then. Consider this if totally un-modal is too complex.

	gaehlers
	Comment 28 • 14 years ago

A new address card can be created directly from the main TB window (select a received mail, click onto an address in the header, edit contact, edit details).

This window is then modal to the main TB window, a real workflow killer! And this also shows that editing a contact without open Address Book doesn't seem to be a problem at all.

	M Lopez-Ibanez
	Comment 29 • 14 years ago

Another user case:

I want to add some information from one contact to another. Currently I cannot open two windows to edit two contacts at the same time because the edit contact dialog is modal.

	M Lopez-Ibanez
	Comment 30 • 14 years ago

(In reply to comment #23)
> Just to be clear though, I think the work is slightly more than just making the
> dialog non-modal. We should also consider what to do with cards that are open,
> but get deleted or moved between address books.

The same question arises when opening an email in a different window, since the user can go to the list of emails and delete the email, or move it to a different folder. It seems to me that the answers should be pretty similar to those already existing, no? Of course, someone has to implement it and I don't see many volunteers here.