Created attachment 6300 Screenshot of xfcedesktop menu What happens: In the context menu (xfdesktop --menu), on Create Document, the template files appear before the "Empty file" option. The problem: While templates are very useful, I find myself creating empty files more often than any other format (and I believe this is a common thing). But with each template I add, I have to move my mouse more rows each time I want to create an empty file. I end up not doing many useful templates due to that increased annoyance. Suggestion: NT = number of template files If empty file came up before the template files: - It would be faster to create common empty files, reducing mouse movement by NT rows - Each template file would only require increased mouse movement by 1 row In my opinion, this would make it a lot more practical to have multiple templates without the burden of increasing cost of interaction for the most common action.
Thanks for your report. Your screenshot actually shows the file manager thunar and its context menu which was adapted by xfdesktop in 4.12. Changes to the menu structure should be discussed with the thunar maintainer first, so I will reassign this feature request.
I do not know how many people actually use this feature and see this as a problem, but an easy solution is to enumerate the template files or give them a prefix so that a certain order is kept. You might need to create another template for an empty file of course, e.g. call it "0 text file". You will very likely rename it afterwards, so except for prettiness the template name should not really matter.
I understand the work around is easy. But I feel like this would be a small usability enhancement. I don't know if it'd be difficult to implement or not, as I'm not familiar with the code. It just seems to me a small design flaw, to have an uncommon action come before the most common one. Even if no templates are installed, the user still has to go through an unavailable option ("No templates installed"). Thank you for both replies. Keep up the good work :)
Thinking about it again... If we change this, then what about people who do not like the "empty file" always at the top of the list and prefer their own templates to it? They'd have no way to change it. The way it is now they can still decide. So better put the user preferences first. Therefore, I am closing this won't fix.