smathot/qnotero

search box keyboard input does not work under OS X

Opened this issue · 4 comments

iandennismiller commented

I've installed Qnotero under OS X using the following process:

mkvirtualenv qnotero
wget http://files.cogsci.nl/software/qnotero/qnotero_0.48.tar.gz
sudo mkdir /usr/share/qnotero && chown $USER /usr/share/qnotero
vi setup.py # comment out the .desktop icon
python setup.py install
qnotero

When I attempt to search, it appears that no keyboard input is recognized. Control characters like esc, space, tab, or enter also do not work.

After launching, I can get to preferences, then use the chooser to find my Zotero library. I am able to use the mouse to click to 'UI focus' the search box, and I can click away resulting in the search box losing focus. When I click outside qnotero, the whole interface disappears. I have a book icon in the menu bar that I can use to reveal qnotero again

In other words, it looks like most of the rest of the functionality is present on OS X. Great work! Are there any suggestions for ensuring keyboard input is robust across platforms?

smathot commented

Thanks for your feedback!

I am able to use the mouse to click to 'UI focus' the search box, and I can click away resulting in the search box losing focus.

Does that also mean that you can actually type and search then? Or does it only appear to receive the focus but still not respond to key presses?

When I click outside qnotero, the whole interface disappears. I have a book icon in the menu bar that I can use to reveal qnotero again

That is fine: As soon as the mouse leaves Qnotero, the window should disappear.

Are there any suggestions for ensuring keyboard input is robust across platforms?

I imagine that the lack of response to key presses has something to do with how keyPressEvents are handled, perhaps in libqnotero/qnoteroQuery.py. But since I don't have a Mac myself, I cannot really say anything more specific about it, II'm afraid. If you do find out how to fix this, please submit a patch!

iandennismiller commented

Does that also mean that you can actually type and search then? Or does it only appear to receive the focus but still not respond to key presses?

No, there is no indication that keypress events are recognized by the app. Text does not appear as I type, search does not work, etc. The only way I know it has focus is because the GUI textbox border changes colors slightly. However, as a result, I know mouse click events are reaching the app.

I imagine that the lack of response to key presses has something to do with how keyPressEvents are handled, perhaps in libqnotero/qnoteroQuery.py

Thanks for the pointer. I'll try to take a look there to see if I can figure out keyPressEvents.

HughP commented

I am another would-be OS X user. This looks interesting.

iandennismiller commented

I never fixed the problem, but I found a workaround using an Alfred workflow:

http://hackademic.postach.io/zotquery-an-alfred-workflow-for-zotero

It does what I want: keyword search from the desktop, previews list of results before opening zotero, and upon selecting a result, it loads zotero and focuses the document.

I'm confident it was a small library-level cross-platform incompatibility, but I never did find the issue.