Your message dated Sat, 8 Oct 2022 13:33:12 +0200
with message-id <[email protected]>
and subject line Re: Bug#297768: xfig: "Save as" over an old .fig complains if
that .fig happens to be empty
has caused the Debian Bug report #297768,
regarding xfig: "Save as" over an old .fig complains if that .fig happens to be
empty
to be marked as done.
This means that you claim that the problem has been dealt with.
If this is not the case it is now your responsibility to reopen the
Bug report if necessary, and/or fix the problem forthwith.
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--
297768: https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=297768
Debian Bug Tracking System
Contact [email protected] with problems
--- Begin Message ---
Package: xfig
Version: 1:3.2.5-alpha5-3
Severity: minor
I tried to save over an existing file.fig
That file.fig happened to be a zero-length file.
Saving worked, but I was hampered because xfig popped up a message telling
me that the file was an invalid .fig file.
Such a message is of course necessary when trying to open a file for use,
but I wasn't doing that. I believe xfig tried to open it for reading
in order to provide a preview the way xfig usually does when selecting
filenames.
It'd be much better if the preview simply fail silently, or the error
message could be rendered in the window space set aside for preview
when this happen. There was no use for the message because _I_ wasn't
trying to use the file contents at all - I wanted to overwrite it
with something new. It was xfig itself who wanted a look at the
file contents, not me. An error message in such a case is only
annoying. Popups are bad user interfaces at the best of times,
but a chore when I not even have _use_ for the message.
Suggestion: Don't bother showing error messages about invalid files
when doing a "save as" operation, because the user are going to
destroy the file anyway. (Attempting a preview is a nice touch in
that it lets me see what I am bout to destroy - but if the preview
cannot be done just skip it.)
I must say that xfig is a great program, thanks for making and
packaging it. This is only a minor annoyance, hence the
minor severity.
Helge Hafting
-- System Information:
Debian Release: 3.1
APT prefers testing
APT policy: (900, 'testing'), (800, 'experimental'), (800, 'unstable')
Architecture: i386 (i686)
Kernel: Linux 2.6.11-rc3-mm1
Locale: LANG=no_NO.UTF-8, LC_CTYPE=no_NO.UTF-8 (charmap=UTF-8)
Versions of packages xfig depends on:
ii libc6 2.3.2.ds1-20 GNU C Library: Shared libraries an
ii libice6 4.3.0.dfsg.1-10 Inter-Client Exchange library
ii libjpeg62 6b-9 The Independent JPEG Group's JPEG
ii libpng12-0 1.2.8rel-1 PNG library - runtime
ii libsm6 4.3.0.dfsg.1-10 X Window System Session Management
ii libx11-6 4.3.0.dfsg.1-10 X Window System protocol client li
ii libxext6 4.3.0.dfsg.1-10 X Window System miscellaneous exte
ii libxi6 4.3.0.dfsg.1-10 X Window System Input extension li
ii libxmu6 4.3.0.dfsg.1-10 X Window System miscellaneous util
ii libxpm4 4.3.0.dfsg.1-10 X pixmap library
ii libxt6 4.3.0.dfsg.1-10 X Toolkit Intrinsics
ii xaw3dg 1.5+E-8 Xaw3d widget set
ii xlibs 4.3.0.dfsg.1-10 X Keyboard Extension (XKB) configu
ii zlib1g 1:1.2.2-3 compression library - runtime
-- no debconf information
--- End Message ---
--- Begin Message ---
Hi Helge!
On Sun, 02 Aug 2020, Roland Rosenfeld wrote:
> Seems, that I never fully understood your ticket before.
> Shame on me, that I didn't respond earlier :-(
> Today I read it again and tried out what you described.
>
> > I tried to save over an existing file.fig
> > That file.fig happened to be a zero-length file.
> > Saving worked, but I was hampered because xfig popped up a message telling
> > me that the file was an invalid .fig file.
> >
> > Such a message is of course necessary when trying to open a file for use,
> > but I wasn't doing that. I believe xfig tried to open it for reading
> > in order to provide a preview the way xfig usually does when selecting
> > filenames.
>
> I think that xfig tries to help you on selecting the correct file to
> overwrite. For this it presents the preview of the file you are
> overwriting (so you can decide whether it's it good idea to overwrite
> the selected file). If the file is empty or a FIG file (maybe someone
> used the .fig suffix for a different type of file), it presents you a
> popup telling you, that you selected a file that is not a FIG file.
>
> From my point of view this is a good behavior.
> Usually overwriting an existing file is not what you want especially
> if this file seems to be a FIG file but isn't. An additional alarm
> popup sounds like a good idea to me here.
>
> > It'd be much better if the preview simply fail silently, or the error
> > message could be rendered in the window space set aside for preview
> > when this happen. There was no use for the message because _I_ wasn't
> > trying to use the file contents at all - I wanted to overwrite it
> > with something new.
>
> Okay, you were knowing this, but is this the standard use case? Do
> you usually create an empty file to overwrite it? For me an empty
> file may be a hint that something went wrong before (maybe the disk is
> full, so the file wasn't written before?), so I like the additional
> hint, that something went wrong before. If I don't need the popup,
> it's easy to close it with one click.
>
> > It was xfig itself who wanted a look at the file contents, not me.
> > An error message in such a case is only annoying. Popups are bad
> > user interfaces at the best of times, but a chore when I not even
> > have _use_ for the message.
>
> I have use for this message :-)
Since I didn't get any response on this, I think that you follow my
argumentation that the message is feature, not a bug and close this
ticket.
Greetings
Roland
--- End Message ---
