Description: Create Any table in an Impress slide, insert some content in the cells. Than try to select some of the cells, for example a row/column or any subset of adjacent cells. Or try to select all the table cells with ctrl+a, or by mouse dragging. In all cases, Cell selection does not seem to work in the usual fashion (similar to writer tables for example). By dragging the mouse in various directions you sometimes get some selection, but it is generally not what you expected and therefore not useful. Formatting Impress tables with this unresponsiveness becomes practically impossible. Steps to Reproduce: 1. in an impress slide, create a table 2. try to selects some cells with a mouse dragging operation, or with the shift + arrows keys. You do not obtain the expected selections, and most of the times you get no selection at all. 3. Now click in a cell so that the cursor is clearly blinking in it. then use the command "select all" in the edit menu. THe text inside the cell when the cursor is gets selected; however the repetition of the same command does not result in the selection of all cells. Actual Results: Selecting cells in impress tables is difficult if not impossible with mostly unexpected results Expected Results: Cell selection should work in the standard fashion Reproducible: Always User Profile Reset: No Additional Info: Cell selection in Impress tables was painfully slow but working in release 6.1.4 that I tried to check if this was a regression. It seems to be. By the way, working with tables in Impress have always been a real pain for the slow response to any command/operation. But this now is very difficult to workaround, one is tempted to use a writer table and then insert the OLE object into the impress slide
With a long session of fiddlin with the table I had to format, I found an (awkward) method to select a row/colomn: - start with the mouse pointer from the first cell of the row/column, and try dragging the mouse to the second cell. - nothing happens at the moment; but if you do nothing else after this and click again on the first cell, it unespectedly becomes selected (this does not happen if you just drag the mouse from cell one to cell two: you have to stop draging, go back with the mouse pointer on the first and click on it: there it goes) - now you leave the mouse alone (don't try dragging along cells again or you selected cell goes unselected and you get nothing!), move to the keyboard and use the classic Shift+right of down arrow to complete the selection of the row or column. Finding myself in the need to edit some tables for a presentation, this workaround turned out to be VERY useful. However it is in the meantime a clear proof of how awkward selecting cells in the Impress tables is now: any average computer user would be put off in two minutes with this headache... and alas move to other software. Thanks
Well now using 7.2.1.2 the problem seems to be gone. I will mark this as resolved and write if there are any further difficulties. Now cell seems to be selectable in the usual fashion.
Status Fixed means a known fix, so here it's just WFM. This is not reproduced in general, but some have this problem, bug 136199.
> Well now using 7.2.1.2 the problem seems to be gone. I will mark this as > resolved and write if there are any further difficulties. Now cell seems > to be selectable in the usual fashion. I can confirm that selecting cells feels more reliable in LO 7.2. However on LO 7.1 I had this issue all the time. Let's hope this got fixed somehow in 7.2, even though I could not find any commit directly related to this issue. > By the way, working with tables in Impress have always been a real pain for > the slow response to any command/operation. But this now is very difficult > to workaround, one is tempted to use a writer table and then insert the OLE > object into the impress slide In spite of cell selection now working again, I have to agree with Andy that working with tables in Impress is a total pain. The default formatting is not nice (white and grey); resizing the table is not a good experience; the auto-formats are outdated and cannot be changed; having to double-click the table to select a cell is not a good UX; just to list a few issues. Table editing in Impress/Draw is in need of some love by developers to make its UX more compatible with what most users (specially new ones) would expect coming from other office suites.
Best way to proceed is to search all existing bugs, see what't there and what's not, write clear proposal in a new bug for issues that don't exist, and put NeedUXEval for user experience change. Just pay attention that it's clear and reproducible.
I am sorry to bother again, but the problem with table cells selection surfaced again, and perhaps I have found the situation where it arises: It happens when you copy a group of cells from a Calc spreadsheet and paste it into impress. You get a table with exactly the odd behaviour I described previously. It seems the problem disappears if and when you save the impress file, close it (I am not sure if you have to close all instances of LO or just the impress app where the file was open) and re-open it again: now selecting cells is doable. Even if this is obviously a quite easy workaround, I think such a mishap would put an average new user severely off. So I am reopening the bug. Advice by Timur on the best way to proceed with the variuos problem the impress table UI has is surely sound, but of course it takes quite some time to do that... right now I do not really hate time enough to spare. Please keep in mind that I typically create bug reports while working, often quite frantically, when I come upon some difficulty in getting my job done and the cause looks like it is a LO bug of some kind. Thanks anyway
Hi Andy, Could you please attach a screencast showing how to reproduce the problem ?
Created attachment 176192 [details] A short video where I show some frantic efforts at table selection in Impress In this video I have a table in an impress slide (lower part of the slide). In the first half of the video I am trying to select some cells of the table via mouse dragging, in various direction without any success. Please notice that every time you see the mouse moving I am keeping the left button pressed (I am attaching the slide itself so that you can check it for yourself). After some time, I show that I can select a row or a line pressing caps+arrows; and then further on you can see that some partial mouse dragging selection may happen, but it sometimes stopas in the middle of the table and stubbornly refuses to extend further, or the mouse dragging operation suddenly give way to a change of position of the table by dragging, instead of going on with the cells selection. Have fun yourself...
Created attachment 176193 [details] An impress file with the slide shown in the previously attached video
Selecting an individual cell with mouse works the same in Impress as in other modules: Set mouse in cell, hold mouse button down, drag to neighbor cell and back.
Dear Andy, This bug has been in NEEDINFO status with no change for at least 6 months. Please provide the requested information as soon as possible and mark the bug as UNCONFIRMED. Due to regular bug tracker maintenance, if the bug is still in NEEDINFO status with no change in 30 days the QA team will close the bug as INSUFFICIENTDATA due to lack of needed information. For more information about our NEEDINFO policy please read the wiki located here: https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/QA/Bugzilla/Fields/Status/NEEDINFO If you have already provided the requested information, please mark the bug as UNCONFIRMED so that the QA team knows that the bug is ready to be confirmed. Thank you for helping us make LibreOffice even better for everyone! Warm Regards, QA Team MassPing-NeedInfo-Ping
Dear Andy, Please read this message in its entirety before proceeding. Your bug report is being closed as INSUFFICIENTDATA due to inactivity and a lack of information which is needed in order to accurately reproduce and confirm the problem. We encourage you to retest your bug against the latest release. If the issue is still present in the latest stable release, we need the following information (please ignore any that you've already provided): a) Provide details of your system including your operating system and the latest version of LibreOffice that you have confirmed the bug to be present b) Provide easy to reproduce steps – the simpler the better c) Provide any test case(s) which will help us confirm the problem d) Provide screenshots of the problem if you think it might help e) Read all comments and provide any requested information Once all of this is done, please set the bug back to UNCONFIRMED and we will attempt to reproduce the issue. Please do not: a) respond via email b) update the version field in the bug or any of the other details on the top section of our bug tracker Warm Regards, QA Team MassPing-NeedInfo-FollowUp