No distinction between complete and incomplete files or folders
Affected version
- Nightly flatpak: Can't test it because I can't install it because my /home is out of space right now
- Other: Pop!_OS 21.10 | GNOME Files 40.2 (also checked on Fedora 37 / GNOME Files 43)
Use cases
This is 2 problems in one.
1) Lack of Direct Visual Feedback For Files Still Copying/Moving/Processing (which misleads the user)
Right now, in GNOME Files, there's no visual distinction between a regular complete file/folder and an incomplete (copying or moving) file/folder. They look the same. You would have to know beforehand to look at the size difference and that the progress wheel at the headerbar is related to a particular file you're looking at.
While files/folders are being copied or moved, the new files/folders in the new location look like regular complete files/folders. But they are not, they are still in the process of copying or moving, they are still incomplete. So, when I copy and paste files/folders, since they look like regular complete files, it quickly makes me assume, as my first intutition, that the files/folders have finished transferring and are ready for renaming or other changes, which leads me to renaming or making other changes to files/folders that are still in the process of copying or moving, which sometimes gives me an error, sometimes it just keeps going and I have no idea whether the copying/moving failed or corruption happened or not.
There is a progress wheel at the headerbar, which indicates that files/folders are being copied or moved, but that progress wheel is far removed from the files/folders themselves, and displays no relationship to them, which make it very easy to miss it every time. There's no direct visual feedback on the files/folders themselves and no connection between the files/folders and the progress wheel at the headerbar.
As I work in video production and I'm constantly copying and moving lots of large files all the time, this lack of direct visual feedback that a file or folder is still being transferred puts me in constant anxiety that I will rename or make a change to a file or folder that's still transferring and I'll get an error or — worse and serious — corrupt files (when moving).
2) Changes to Files/Folders Still Moving/Copying Are Allowed (which leads to errors)
Copying/Moving files are not locked for changes.
With the copying/moving file/folder looking like a regular file/folder — meaning: with no direct visual feedback telling me that a file is still being copied or moved — my impulse is to think it's OK to rename or make other changes to the file/folder. Despite the file/folder still being copied or moved, GNOME Files will let me rename or make other changes to the file/folder, giving me an error between the time I make these changes and the time it stops the copying/moving. To make it even more confusing, sometimes I get an error, sometimes I don't. Seems random.
Available features and workarounds
There are no workarounds that I know of. Every time I copy/move folders/files, I have to keep looking at the progress wheel at the headerbar to make sure, and click on it to check since at the very end it's hard know whether the transfer has finished or whether there is still a few percent left.
Difficulties and insufficiencies
- It's unintuitive and not discoverable, as the lack of relationship between the progress wheel and the files/folders gives you no indication that they are connected;
- It creates confusion as the incomplete files look just the same as the regular complete files;
- It does not prevent user from causing a predictable error such as renaming the incomplete file;
- Creates anxiety for the user, especially in fast-paced work, because the user's intuition is to rename a file that looks like any other regular file, but that will raise an error or maybe even corrupt files (at least that's the impression you have when you realize you just renamed a folder that was still in the process of moving).
Suggested enhancements
Files mockup I made:
In-line progress wheel in addition to the headerbar progress wheel.
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While the copying/moving is happening, the newly created folder(s)/file(s) on the new location should not be available for Renaming or other Editing operations, maybe not even opening. The filename and icon should also look faded, to indicate that the folder(s)/file(s) are not yet ready for changes/opening/renaming. At the end of the filename, a circular progress icon (just like the one on the headerbar) to indicate that the copying/moving operating is in progress (This is how Finder in macOS does it);
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Keep the circular progress button on the headerbar as well, so we also have the centralized place to see all file transfer operations, with their respective speeds, estimations, and cancel buttons.