
Dear oXygen folks, I have just purchased an academic license to oXygen, with 1-yr maintenance. Maybe this is a good time to express some of my wishes for Oxygen that have held me back from purchasing till now. I'm using version 5.0, so maybe some of this is fixed in 5.1. #1: Better directory-browsing functionality in File-Open dialog. This is a major reason why I still often use XMLSpy instead of oXygen. When you press Ctrl+O, the Open dialog that appears isn't the native Windows File-Open dialog, and doesn't meet expectations in some significant ways. I'm sure this is due to Oxygen being a cross-platform Java program. But I would hope that that doesn't mean the interface has to be inferior. a) Can't follow shortcuts. My code base is located several directories deep, so to get there, in XMLSpy I first open c:\mount.lnk, which is a shortcut to the actual codebase. When I select mount.lnk (e.g. double-click, or press Enter) the dialog stays open, but displays the folder that the shortcut points to. In Oxygen, it apparently attempts to open "mount.lnk" as a file, with no useful result. So I have to navigate the whole path by hand. b) File/folder name completion. As I start typing the name of the file, a native Windows dialog would suggest possible completions, and let me select using the up/down arrow keys. Oxygen does not. c) Type-to-find doesn't autoscroll. If you put focus in the pane of the Open dialog that lists all the files, and you type letters, the selection moves to the file/folder that begins with those letters; but if the newly selected file/folder happens to be one that is not showing on the screen (e.g. it's off to the right because there are too many files to show at once), the pane doesn't auto-scroll. Manual scrolling is required, which detracts from the ergonomic benefit of type-to-find. d) Pressing Enter after typing a folder name doesn't remove the folder name from the "File name" field. E.g. if you are in c:\Program Files and you type Apache Group and press Enter, the dialog shows the subfolders of c:\Program Files\Apache Group, but leaves "Apache Group" in the File name field. (Expectation: Apache Group would disappear, since it is not needed relative to the folder that is being shown, i.e. Apache Group.) So if you continue typing the name of a subfolder, you get "Apache Group\cocoon" in the File name field, and if you press Enter/OK, you will not see the contents of the cocoon subfolder. (Instead it will apparentlyl try to open c:\Program Files\Apache Group\Apache Group\cocoon.) e) If any of the above behavior leads to attempting to open a file that doesn't exist, Oxygen still closes the File-Open dialog and tries to open the file; thus I lose the File-Open dialog and have to hit Ctrl+O again. It would be nicer if the File-Open dialog would (beep or something and) stay open unless you click Cancel. f) (This is more icing on the cake...) In a native Windows file-Open dialog, you can perform other operations in the dialog, such as renaming or deleting files. This is often handy: e.g. if you want to save the file you're working on to a filename that already exists. In Oxygen you can't do this. That's probably enough for now. Lest I sound overly negative, let me say that the benefits of Oxygen have outweighed its limitations enough that I was willing to pay for it, vs. the free XMLSpy Home Edition. For example, the responsiveness to problems posted on this list has been a good selling point. I hope to see Oxygen improve to the point where I use it without having regretful thoughts about what I left behind. Lars