GNOME and Mozilla Discuss Proposal to Disable Middle Mouse Paste on Linux
https://linuxiac.com/gnome-and-mozilla-discuss-proposal-to-disable-middle-mouse-paste-on-linux/Open linkView original on discuss.tchncs.de191
Comments99https://linuxiac.com/gnome-and-mozilla-discuss-proposal-to-disable-middle-mouse-paste-on-linux/Open linkView original on discuss.tchncs.de
I use middle click paste all the time, but the title is misleading and clickbaity. At least on GNOME's side they're discussing about disabling it by default, not completely. While this is annoying as long as the setting isn't going away I'm fine with that and I understand the reasoning behind it.
Reminds me of LWN and the end of the Rust experiment.
I can't tell you how many times I've accidentally pasted random private stuff from that goddamn middle click into WEB PAGES! Things that can read whatever text you type without having to explicitly submit anything. It's a horrible thing for a new user to discover by accident. It's such an unexpected feature to new users, and no one gets told about it, ever. You simply discover it by accident.
This is a good change, not having it on by default.
To all the haters of this idea, god forbid we make Linux less weird by default for people migrating from Windows.
All that said, I have learned to love select-to-copy and middle-click paste. Especially in the terminal.
Until this article I didn't even know you could middle-click paste.
I've done it countless times by mistake in Discord when trying to scroll through a channel..
This. Only correct comment in the entire thread. Rest are people who probably don't even use computers and have no idea what a mouse is.
And that is the exact reason that was given in the gnome merge request. A user being able to accidentally paste a bunch of text they didnt even know they'd copied incredibly design.
Highlight->Middle paste has been my friend for decades now. Using it from SunOS in the 90-s to now has been a great feature. It's the quickest way to copy and paste while I'm working fast with text or data entry.
I love having both clipboards be functional. The latest rounds of tools that have stopped being as compatible with it has been no end of problems in my workflow. I'll copy with the keyboard, highlight some text and then paste both clipboards somewhere else.
No, using the keyboard here isn't as fast, don't bother making that argument, especially since ctrl-c means different things in different places on Unix style systems. Left hand stays home row while the right is forced to leave for the mouse since it's a GUI.
I've had to deal with many tools that don't respect keyboard cut/paste as well. Add in that some tools like putty or git bash on windows have ctrl-ins for paste?
Panning in CAD/design is usually click and hold middle or even a two button system (freecad), so trying to take a middle click for that isn't buying uniformity.
The copy/paste world is already fractured enough. Keep the highlight/middle click working so we can go fast. I might be a dinosaur, but I'm a fast dinosaur.
reading these comments had me wondering if i was the only dinosaur around. lol
https://piefed.social/comment/9549428 They don't want to disable it, just not make it on by default.
As a new migrating user looking to escape Bill Gates bullshit middle click paste was really confusing as I wanted middle click to remain consistent with screen panning, like panning a camera in blender or panning a canvas in gimp. Had to run through a few guides to disable middle click paste. I was surprised there wasn't an option to enable/disable globally. Having an option will help other noobs like myself ditch Mac/windows for Linux and maintaining a familiar workflow.
Don't you touch my middle paste!
It would be fucking GNOME
Please don't fuck a gnome, that's very impolite
The essence of the article:
The functionality will be there and can be enabled. The reasoning:
To have it as ab option, great. I believe KDE already has this? Computers should work the way the user wants it, so a middle click should do what the user wants it to do.
Removing it completely would be insanity
Mozilla are still using Phabricator?! That stopped being maintained in 2021…
But why? Then the users thinks "huh, weird" and goes on.
I've seen that countless times with people that are less technical.
It's very easy for a user to accidentally paste private or sensitive information somewhere dangerous if theyre unaware of this feature.
The FreeDesktop specification refers to this feature as an "easter egg", and something like this should absolutely not be an easter egg.
This change would mean disabling it by default and adding a settings entry that actually explains it, making sure users are informed before they can accidentally use it.
Then that could be solved by displaying a message the first time GNOME is launched, not by disabling it. This will just break workflows for quite a lot of people.
It will break their workflow for a few seconds before they change the setting back. Or they could read the changes before installing a major update and change it before even doing anything.
Maybe in the future it will be added to the initial setup guide along with stuff like choosing if you want mouse acceleration, but I really dont think its that big a deal.
"read the changes before installing a major update"
As if people have the time to read the changelogs for every single package all the time... 🙄
This is pretty important on a server to avoid disruptions and outages, but people have other things to do.
And once it is no longer on and has become a setting, they can just remove the setting and force people to drop gsettings and then remove it completely.
They could also instead ask people on first launch. Some people enable telemetry, so they will find out how many people prefer to keep it, which I bet will be most.
Obviously I dont think people need to read every change log for every piece of software. I do think its a good idea to read the release notes for a major update of your DE thought, since its the piece of software that is going to effect you the most.
What reason do they possibly have to do this? The setting already exists and is feature complete. It doesnt require maintenance. They also noted in the merge request that many RHEL users use it, so RedHat has a financial incentive not to remove it.
They could also just make it a setting. I really dont think it makes a big difference. They can also still use telemetry to see how many users enable it. Based on this thread, I really doubt it will be most.
The first time startup wizard should be kept relatively short and minimal. This just seems like a very unnecessary thing to include.
This is one of the most useful things in Xorg, and prior to that in X11. If you (generic you, not anyone in particular here) don't know about it it's because you come from too long time on "my users are stupid" operating systems. It's one of those things that once you have it in muscle memory you use it without even thinking about it.
Have I mis-pasted things? Yes. Have l pasted my password in an IRC channel? Yes. Would I stop using it because once every few months I make a mistake? Not at all.
Make it configurable, if you must, but leave us old timers work the way we have done for 30 years or more. There are already some software/ toolkits that disable it, so it is likely doable on a per-app basis.
Gratuitous "old man yells at clouds" rant: people should be forced to use a VT52 for one year before being granted GUI privileges, especially if you work with network hardware.
I'll crawl back in my cave now.
It seems to me that having a mouse button defaultly paste the contents of the keyboard without the inclusion of a modifier key is just a bad idea.
As you said, you have pasted the wrong thing by accident because it's one button press.
It just seems to me that by default pasting text should not be done by a single button press anywhere where your hand rests, like a mouse or the center of a keyboard. I'm not saying people shouldn't be able to make it's a configurable option, options are good, but it is not a good default.
It already is configurable, theyre just defaulting it to off. You will be able to turn it back on.
X11 is the last version of Xorg, not sure what you meant there.
It was configurable and will stay configurable. The intent is to change the default.
Personally I support the change, but that might be because of my adhd making me click on the mouse wheel every 0.1 seconds.
It's been some time... Before Xorg there was Xfree86, and before that the various implementations by the other Unix vendors. Does that make sense?
Yeah, I just had some misconceptions Xorg and X11. A few googling sessions later I'm all caught up though, I think.
Thank you for pointing that out in a calm way, on the internet.
X11 is a protocol that Xorg implements
I like my middle paste, so long as it isn't gone for good I'm happy. Having 2 clipboards is also nice
Why is this a thing? I've never wanted a feature less..
Because it is awesome. So useful, and fast.
Middle paste, like many features, can be used to increase productivity. It's normal. A better question would be why doesn't Windows have it? It makes no sense to dumb down Linux to the level of Windows, just when people are leaving Windows because the user experience is so bad. Sure, make it an option in Settings. So people can continue to use it if they want. But there are many things worth utilising to save clicks on both Windows and Linux. Get to know them, if you want to get on with things.
People can't and won't use it because it sucks. Middle mouse click is for two things:
See how they're both navigation related? Because the mouse is a navigation tool, not a text tool.
A keyboard is a text tool, all pasting should reside on the keyboard. Eagle-eyed readers may notice that there are actually letters on all the buttons they keep mashing at random, those letters are a hint that the keyboard may be used for text-related operations.
Windows sucks now, but it won desktops for a very good reason initially and as Linux is making inroads into personal computing, there are no reasons it can't learn lessons from why that was the case.
Old Linux GUIs suck and the user experience in general absolutely sucks on anything before Debian 8. Gnome classic was nuked because it sucked, and new Gnome was an improvement in every way, and it was only very recently that KDE got to a similar level of polish.
No one is saying the feature should be completely removed, just like KDE's insane defaults of "Peek at desktop" in the bottom right instead of "minimize all windows", it just needs to be hidden somewhere because 99% of users don't expect a computer to work this way and with good reason.
Leave the legacy toggle in for people who cut their teeth on OSes made by companies that went bankrupt shortly after making them and expect all computers to work like that until the end of time.
Heck - just for them, create a separate clipboard that always holds the user's nudes and dedicate left mouse click to a shortcut that emails them to their dad for all I care, because it's how it worked on a random hack of AmigaOS they used in the 1800s, I don't care, just leave us out of it.
Damn I'm using that I hope they don't remove it!
I occasionally use middle mouse paste, but I switched my partner over from Windows recently and they were used to scrolling by holding MMB and dragging which seems to be the default on Windows...
I expected there to be a toggle to turn off middle mouse paste but there just wasn't. I had to go into multiple different places to disable it and enable autoscroll for all their apps. I ended up installing a hacky tool that would just clear the clipboard whenever MMB was pressed.
If anything can make this process easier, I'm all for it.
good (also they're proposing a toggle that's off by default)
Toggle is the nicest way to go for any feature that has stayed for a long time and has a dedicated user base.
On point 👌
They shove Onedrive down your throat until your rectum starts to bleed ffs
TIL middle mouse paste.
I discovered this feature on my 1st Linux distro in early 2000s, was like "Huh, that's interesting" then tried Ctrl+V, and then adopted both into my daily workflow. Whenever Bitwarden autofill doesn't work or unavailable by the site security settings, I copy my pass into the clipboard and select my username and paste both in a single action
That's the real linux user story.
We come for the speed, flexibility, FOSS values ... but we STAY for the middle mouse paste.
It'd be so easy for them to just add "by default" to the end of the title.
Fun thing is that I didn’t even know that existed.
Then I tell you something that might either blow your mind or be useful in future (or just being fun fact):
On Linux there is the regular copy/paste clipboard, which you already know how it works. But then there is this primary clipboard called primary selection too, that is independent from normal clipboard. Text will be copied to primary selection when you select a text (in example in Firefox). Just by selection the text with the mouse is enough and it will not affect the normal clipboard. Then you can middle click the text from primary clipboard.
Read more here: https://tronche.com/gui/x/icccm/sec-2.html#s-2.6.1
It's cool, but I cannot count the amount of times I was confused by that and accidentally pasted after switching, I would be glad if it became configurable.
It's actually surprising that this is not configurable already. At least in a GUI.
The reaction that I see here explains why, I guess.
Well fuck me. That's kinda neat.
Shame it doesn't subsequently work with ctrl+v, because that would be even cooler.
Once you're used to it, you can use the two separate clipboards independently. Say you wrote a sentence like, "one two five four three", you can correct it by selecting "three", cutting with Ctrl-X, then selecting "five" (meaning it is now in the selection buffer), hitting Ctrl-V to paste "three" from the clipboard, and then finally middle-click where you need to paste the "five".
I guess one could create shortcuts to a tool like
wl-copyandwl-pasteto either copy or paste content to primary selection (or regular clipboard for that matter). So in that case a simple script could run the command and in your desktop environment you setup a shortcut to run the script.Yes its hacky, but in Linux nothing is impossible. :-) (unless it is...)
on some apps; it works with ctrl-shift-v. so ctrl-v for the clipboard, and ctrl-shift-v for the cut buffer.
In most programs, you can paste the primary selection with Shift+Insert
My god, you just blowed my mind!
Kinda curious why would X11 have that many clipboards to begin with. Different people implemented their personal macros perhaps…?
Middle click was standard initially in Unix world, then Microsoft Office came with it's Ctrl-C, and users now expect every text editor to support Ctrl-C to copy (and not abort the active command like all terminals do).
i dont understand why this is a conversation. shouldnt we just have the option to turn it on and off?
The option is there, the news is that GNOME changed the default value.
ah ok. thanks
next they will remove the copy history?
When was that ever a thing?
Looks like Gnome needs an external clipboard, I thought it was just part of most linux WM. shows what 25 years can teach you if you you never venture out too far.
I don't understand how one can accidentally paste with the middle-click, but I can see in this thread that it happens. I was very much against this change but now I need to see stats. Are there any?
I use a lot of graphics programs which use middle click drag to pan around. Figma for example constantly pastes whatever random text I forgot is in my clipboard
Happens all the time.
But why? It hurts noone to have that enabled.
It messes with click to scroll, or just pastes things when all you want is to activate a window or something
Why would you activate widows with middle clicks? I'm fine having the toggle button, I'm not against that. I just dont see the harm in leaving it as paste as default.
Not sure but old habits die hard.
The only times something got pasted with middle click was accidental and then it doesn't even take what's in the clipboard, which is also annoying if you're in the habit of selecting text randomly when you read.
It will hurt less being disabled
Sure, if you grew with that feature and use it, it doesn't hurt you. For others though, this is pain, it fucking hurts to keep accidentally paste stuff all over due to a legacy feature.
I've literally used Linux for over 5 years without ever noticing middle click did anything unusual until a colleagues showed me he could magically paste things with the mouse and I had to ask how he did it. Now I use it frequently and love the feature. I just don't understand how you "keep accidentally paste stuff all over" when I've never heard any of my Linux friends and colleges ever mention anything about it and like me they were supprised and happy when I showed them the feature as well.
Accidental paste mostly happens to me on my multi monitor setup where a window use MMB for other stuff like panning and I accidentally move on another screen.
Post literally describes who and how it hurts. You need to read.
I did read it. I still do t understandthe issues. Most normal people do to my knowledge not even know they can middle click. And on most laptops three finger middle click is usually disabled by default. Having issues with "confusion" is to me a made up problem.
If you've never accidentally pressed the mouse wheel while using your mouse you must just not use computers very much, especially not for work
I dont belive that your argument adds much to the discussion.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem
I don't believe ur mom adds much to the discussion xD
Finally!
From time to time I have to be reminded that this exists.
It can be re-enabled with the following command (source is the Merge Request linked in the article):
Can imagine some distros will override the GNOME default here.
There's nothing to discuss. Just disable that shit already.
I might switch away from GNOME if this passes. I've lost enough QoL features/UI degradations already with no option to go back.
They only discuss to disable it by default, not removing the functionality.
That's at least an improvement, I didn't think GNOME had it in them to add more user-defined options.
Would they kindly discuss using Super+C and Super+V for copy paste instead ? It's the only thing I miss from macOS.
You can add shortcuts yourself in gnome, no ?
Yes but that doesn't always translate to every program. But also, I use Plasma anyway x)
If you add the shortcut at the DE level it definitely should work in every program. Idk if Gnome actually let's you bind copy and paste though.
Awful, one of the first things I disable along side 1 click folder opening.
Do any DEs still have 1 click folder opening by default?
Making something not the default then removing it because it isn’t widely used (because it’s now disabled by default and users have to know it exists and then turn it on) is the gnome way.
Make no mistake, they’re trying to remove features they don’t like. There are lots of people involved in free software because they didn’t get to be in control of nonfree software.
Gotta make everything into a conspiracy theory huh?
Fucking finally
I hope everyone else follows soon. If you like it when you are trying to open a link on a new tab and your system randomly decides to spew a selection from another app into a random text box you are free to configure that yourself. Remember to configure in a cilice wrapping your thigh while you are at it, it's unix-compliant and has been around for centuries.
I have long found it more useful what the middle mouse button does on Windows (start scrolling) and hope that becomes widely adopted, even outside browsers, on Linux one day too. Good step in that direction.
What? No way. I despise their captive scrolling stuff. Every time I get forced onto a windows system I forget that middle mouse is a weird scrolling mode and end up wandering randomly up and down pages until I realize what happened.
Yeah, good idea... After all, who needs copy and paste at all? Better remove it at the root....
/ssssssss
Former Mac user here: Middle click should expose all windows, as the good lord intended.