As the Places plugin is deprecated, the Directory menu plugin should try to somewhat replace that. There are two major issues that I think are worth thinking about, plus one smaller. 1) Allow disabling subdirectory browsing. Opening a directory in the "root" of the directory menu is way too hard. 2) Allow user to select GTK bookmarks as the root. The reason I (still) like the Places plugin more is that it shows GTK bookmarks. The plugin is completely controllable by me and it is also consistent with Thunar (I use the GTK bookmarks in Thunar also). 3) Add "Icon and label" mode It is easier to hit the plugin, which I use considerably much, when you can add a title. This is also an accessibility issue for those who aren't that familiar with Linux/Xfce.
i basically agree with all that pasi has mentioned already, but i wanted to add one more comment to point 1): in firefox there's the possibility to either click an item in the (condensed one-button) menu or open/show the submenu. i haven't looked into the code so i'm not sure whether this is just an ugly hack, but that might also be an alternative mode for showing subdirs.
Yeah, I suppose the Firefox method would work as well. Subdirectories just do not make much sense if you are using the GTK bookmarks. Generally all the proposed enhancements are meant to make using the plugin as easy and quick as possible, so you can get to Thunar to really work with the files (which I think is one of the most important features for the plugin)
Bookmarks will be another plugin, I'm not going to stuff different purposes into a single plugin. In bug #7484 there was already asked to open a directory with double-click, disabling this sounds kinda weird and more to abuse the plugin as bookmarks. A label mode does indeed sounds logical since more plugins have this.
Okay, great to hear there is going to be a Bookmarks plugin. Is there any ETA for that? And yes, I agree that it makes more sense to leave the directory plugin browsing as is if you also are going to create an another plugin. Icon and label mode is nice for any plugin that opens a menu though.
Closing since there are already bugs for the issue, or not suitable for the directory plugin.