Paste wants to overwrite at least one character

ryofurue

Hi,

If I'm not hallucinating, I think this problem was fixed some time ago, but now it's back for some snapshots (I'm currently using 1.10.829.3).

Suppose you want to "insert" the text in the clipboard at the cursor position. The context menu function "Paste" can't exactly do that: It overwrites one character before the cursor. For this reason, you have to artificially insert one blank before the cursor, before you paste the text.

I remember seeing this problem reported a long ago but I don't know what has happened to the bug. I may have filed a bug report myself, but I don't remember.

MacOS Sierra with all latest updates installed.

ryofurue

A moderator seems to have moved my posting to this Mac-specific forum, which I guess means that this problem is known to be Mac-specific. Is that correct?

Ryo

iAN CooG

there were fixes about this in snapshot 1.10.845.3, try it

ryofurue

@iAN-CooG said in Paste wants to overwrite at least one character:

there were fixes about this in snapshot 1.10.845.3, try it

Thanks for the information. I've tried it, but it's not fixed!

I type some text here in this text box and try to paste the contents of the clipboard by right-clicking on the text cursor. Then, the "word" before the cursor is highlighted as soon as I click, and so, pasting results in overwriting the "word". When there are blanks before the text cursor, the last blank is selected as the "word" and overwritten; when there is no blank, the actual word before the cursor is highlighted and overwritten.

Exactly the same think happens in the address box.

My conclusion is that Vivaldi still lacks the capability of "inserting" the contents of the clipboard. It always overwrites part of the existing text.

luetage

I can replicate this, but I think highlighting the word, when right clicking it, is intended and actually useful.
Anyway, I would strongly suggest to use cmd v instead of right click paste, if your workflow allows it.

ryofurue

@luetage said in Paste wants to overwrite at least one character:

I can replicate this, but I think highlighting the word, when right clicking it, is intended and actually useful.

I can't rule that out, but I don't see why such a behavior should be intended.

As far as I know, no other applications do it that way. Other browsers, text editors, word processors, command terminals, you name it.
To highlight a word and overwrite it is already available in this standard way: Double click on the word, right click on it, and paste. That is standard: other browsers, text editors, . . .
It's a strange design to deprive the capability of "inserting" text from the mouse.

For these reasons, I'm 99.99% sure that this is a bug and the developers likely know it. I posted this only because I thought the problem was once fixed and wanted to know its present status.

Anyway, I would strongly suggest to use cmd v instead of right click paste, if your workflow allows it.

It's good to know that that works on Vivaldi.

iAN CooG

I don't know, works for me.

xyzzy

I'm not sure whether this is a bug or a feature.

If I launch TextEdit, type in thisisabug, double-tap on the word not somewhere and copy it, position the cursor before the letter a, and paste, I get: thisis not abug. I can paste with Command-V, Edit / Paste, or right-click Paste and they all work the same.

If I copy not by selecting three letters (instead of double-tapping) and paste it as I did before, any method, the result is thisisnotabug.

However, I can't do the right-click Paste in Vivaldi within a text box of a web page (like I'm doing now typing this response) because that click first selects thisisabug in its entirety. Safari actually behaves the same way too.

With Safari, if I type this is a bug into a text box, position my cursor after the letter a, before or after the space, right-click on the cursor, and paste, the right-click highlights the space and "eats" it after I paste.

All I can say is that Safari and Vivaldi seem to work the same in this regard, perhaps following a web convention that's different from standard macOS behaviour.

ryofurue

@xyzzy said in Paste wants to overwrite at least one character:

I'm not sure whether this is a bug or a feature.
[. . .]
All I can say is that Safari and Vivaldi seem to work the same in this regard, perhaps following a web convention that's different from standard macOS behaviour.

Thanks! That surprises me and you are mostly right. In the address box of Safari, the right-click-paste behavior is the same as that of macOS, but in the text box (like this one) on a webpage, the behavior is the same as Vivaldi's.

What's going on? Is the text-box behavior the web standard?

If that really is a standard, it's a strange one: Why deprive of the capability of inserting text? where overwriting is already possible with other means. (I'm not talking about keyboard shortcuts.)

Even on the web, Google Docs offers the "correct" right-click-paste behavior: You can insert, instead of overwriting, the clipboard text with right click.

What you call the standard macOS behavior is not just macOS behavior. Before moving to the Mac, I was a long-term Unix/Linux user. The right-click-insert-text was always available.

xyzzy

@ryofurue Re: pasting into Safari's address box, I noticed that too but didn't want to muddy the waters. Apple is usually very consistent with how their native widgets behave, and this case is no exception. The issue that your thread topic is about has more to do with how things are handled and rendered within the browser core and how web applications behave, not the native widgets, but your point is still very relevant.

It's also not surprising that Vivaldi and Safari browser cores share similar behaviours (and quirks) because they're essentially based on the same code set -- Vivaldi uses Blink... which is based on Safari's engine, WebKit... which, in turn, is based on KHTML.

As for the text boxes themselves, many of them, like the one I'm typing in now, are executed as JavaScript and are called from libraries; they follow their own conventions -- some try to emulate native platform conventions, others do not.

As for the behaviour in other parts of Vivaldi... Vivaldi uses web technologies to render its UI not native widgets, so its UI breaks with macOS platform conventions in a bunch of annoying little ways. In my opinion, Vivaldi's really needs to fix this.

Getting back to the main issue, it's still debatable what's a bug or a feature; it really depends on where you're doing the "right-click paste" and the code that's processing it.

ryofurue

@xyzzy said in Paste wants to overwrite at least one character:

Getting back to the main issue, it's still debatable what's a bug or a feature; it really depends on where you're doing the "right-click paste" and the code that's processing it.

Thank you for your clear description and summary of the problem!

In my opinion, whether not it's a bug is not a useful discussion. What's the best design? --- is more useful and interesting.

It is clear that if two conflicting behaviors coexist on a single system, the user is irritated. Right-click-and-paste has become a muscle memory to some users.

Now, my question is: What happens on Windows and Linux? As far as I remember, Linux's prevailing behavior for the right-click paste is the same as that of macOS.

If this inconsistency between the OS and Vivaldi is a Mac-specific problem, then it would be less likely to be changed because the developers would have to patch their code only for macOS.

The rest of this posting of mine is a digression:

As for the text boxes themselves, many of them, like the one I'm typing in now, are executed as JavaScript and are called from libraries; they follow their own conventions -- some try to emulate native platform conventions, others do not.

That means that even on a single browser, such conventions can be different from webpage to webpage . . . Ugh. We are more than 10 years into the 21st century and still suffering from such "trivial" issues. We've been copying and pasting text using the mouse for tens of years, right?

luetage

@ryofurue To be perfectly honest, I don't know anyone who copy/pastes with mouse. It just takes so much more effort than doing it with the keyboard, and I think for most users this is a non issue. Nevertheless, I hope this will be settled/fixed for you -- to each their own way!

ryofurue

@luetage said in Paste wants to overwrite at least one character:

@ryofurue To be perfectly honest, I don't know anyone who copy/pastes with mouse. It just takes so much more effort than doing it with the keyboard, and I think for most users this is a non issue.

Do you think so? I'm not doubting your personal experience, but why then do you always find the "Copy" and "Paste" items in the right-click menu? Do you think they are there just by inertia? (That is possible.)

There are reasons why shortcuts aren't ideal. When my wife uses my Mac, she does Cntr+V trying to paste the text, only to find that it's Cmd+V on Mac . . . In contrast, the context menu is ubiquitous: Mac, Linux, Windows. That's why I can copy and paste on Windows. You can always rely on "Copy" and "Paste" in the context menu . . . until you find this problem with Vivaldi (and Safari) . . . that is.

Having said that, for myself, I think it's time for me to learn to use the Mac set of shortcuts, because I've switched to it for 3 years now and I'm unlikely to go back to Linux . . . probably . . . maybe.

Digression: This is another instance of backwardness in our computational environment. Why can't we all use our own preferred sets of shortcuts and mouse actions regardless of the platform? The customizability of the OS is so limited.

Nevertheless, I hope this will be settled/fixed for you -- to each their own way!

Exactly. I would argue that quirks are uncool whether or not they hit many users, and Vivaldi has to be cool.

luetage

@ryofurue You can easily exchange the ctrl and cmd keys if you like it better. No reason to change habits (although the cmd key is really well placed )
Click the apple icon in your top left corner and then system preferences. Click keyboard and then on the "Modifier Keys" button. There you can set the control key to command, and likewise the command key to control.

xyzzy

@ryofurue said in Paste wants to overwrite at least one character:

Thank you for your clear description and summary of the problem!

Thanks for the kind words. I tried to be succinct, but after reading the thread from top to bottom, I definitely could have worded things better and been MUCH clearer and more precise.

In my opinion, whether not it's a bug is not a useful discussion. What's the best design? --- is more useful and interesting.

As far as applications behave, I firmly believe that like it or not, you have to respect the platform. Don't try to "improve" it. Apple publishes Human Interface Guidelines (HIG) that essentially describe how to design applications so that they behave consistently and use native widgets consistently; follow those guidelines and your application will look and feel like a "proper" Mac application.

Vivaldi took a platform-agnostic approach to their UI. It allowed them to innovate faster. They've implemented concepts like "Tab Stacks" that are not supported by native widgets on any platform, and made the design decision to use web technologies to render their UI consistently across all platforms. All platforms get new features at the same time and no platform is left behind.

Vivaldi still fits into macOS by emulating platform conventions and using native widgets where necessary. The designers and developers also strive to get the little details right like applying gradients consistently and putting the close button on the left side of a tab. However, the emulation isn't perfect and this can be really, REALLY annoying at times.

It is clear that if two conflicting behaviors coexist on a single system, the user is irritated. Right-click-and-paste has become a muscle memory to some users.

Whether you're a Command-V person, an Edit/Paste person, or a right-click/Paste person, on macOS, these methods should work identically on all applications.

As for the overall look and feel, if your application uses native widgets, your application will behave like other applications on the platform. If you decide to go your own way and do your own thing, your application will feel alien to at least some degree.

I've used macOS in my examples but my points apply equally to Windows, your Linux Desktop of choice, or any other OS. If an application deviates from platform conventions, it can be very irritating.

It's easy to make the case for platform consistency but I don't think it's practical or realistic to apply that reasoning to the Web.

ryofurue

@xyzzy said in Paste wants to overwrite at least one character:

In my opinion, whether not it's a bug is not a useful discussion. What's the best design? --- is more useful and interesting.

As far as applications behave, I firmly believe that like it or not, you have to respect the platform. Don't try to "improve" it.
[ . . . ]
I've used macOS in my examples but my points apply equally to Windows, your Linux Desktop of choice, or any other OS. If an application deviates from platform conventions, it can be very irritating.

It's easy to make the case for platform consistency but I don't think it's practical or realistic to apply that reasoning to the Web.

I don't know what you mean by "the platform" or what you mean by "the Web".

A few years ago, the Chrome engine made this change.

"Old": Right-click-paste inserts the clipboard text.
"New": Right-click-paste overwrites the existing word. It's now impossible to insert the clipboard text without touching the keyboard.

It seems this change is made only for the Chrome engine of macOS. (I don't know about Linux.)

On Windows, even the Chrome browser uses the "Old" behavior above.

Even on macOS, Firefox uses the "Old" behavior.

Even on the Chrome browser of macOS, Google Docs uses the "Old" behavior.

Even on the Vivaldi of macOS, its address field uses the "Old" behavior.

Now, is this change really "intended" (by design)? I cannot see what kind of intension deliberately introduces this glaring inconsistency.

All evidence suggests that this is just an overlook, i.e. a bug.

You argue that "the Web" can be different from desktop applications. I would agree if the anomaly has any benefits and if the anomaly applies consistently to all "Web" applications.

Even in that case, it's not "the Web", it's only certain parts of Vivaldi and Chrome and Safari of macOS which deviate from the norm.

xyzzy

@ryofurue I think the last time that I used right-click/Paste was almost 3 years ago when I tested the behaviour in different scenarios for this thread. I also wasn't necessarily defending Vivaldi; just trying to explain why there might be differences in behaviour depending on the context.

I don't know what you mean by "the platform" or what you mean by "the Web".

By "the web", I would be referring to how things work in the viewport portion of the browser; the actual web page itself. This could also be site-specific JavaScript code or a web application that Vivaldi just executes.

By "the platform", I would be referring to how things work when you interact with other parts of Vivaldi's UI that would normally be implemented with the native UI components that the operating system provides. In that context, I would expect Vivaldi's behaviour to be consistent with how things work in native macOS applications.

Getting back to the issue in question... if you feel that there is a bug in Vivaldi on macOS, particularly where Vivaldi's behaviour differs from Safari and Chrome, then I would encourage you to file a bug report.

Thanks!

ryofurue

@xyzzy said in Paste wants to overwrite at least one character:

if you feel that there is a bug in Vivaldi on macOS, particularly where Vivaldi's behaviour differs from Safari and Chrome, then I would encourage you to file a bug report.

I did, but the developers have refused to fix it, saying that it's an intended behavior, citing your posting three years ago!

I think they are wrong in believing that this behavior is intended.

To make sure that we understand the problem: It is impossible to insert the clipboard text at cursor position on some of the text boxes on Vivaldi with the mouse only. This change was made about three years ago. And it's only on Mac.

If this is the "intended" change, who intended it for what purpose? Now it is impossible to insert the text with the mouse only. Who gains what by this change? Why is this change made only for Mac? If this were really an intention, what explanation would be there?

I'm sure that this is an omission by somebody, not an "intention".