Cut, Copy, Paste Nightmare

[jdow]

From: "Gordon Messmer" <yinyang at eburg.com>

> Tim wrote:
>> 
>> I find the Linux way of doing it a right pain in the bum.
> 
> There's no "linux way".

Stop typing right there. You have it exactly.

>  X offers you the flexibility to use multiple 
> clipboards, but doesn't force you to use any one, particularly not one 
> that's a pain.

Now you went and spoiled your simple exposition with fantasy. That's
a crying shame. Ah well.

>> First
>> -----
>> Linux:  I have some document with a word I'd like to replace.  I *have*
>> to delete the word, find and highlight its new replacement, paste it
>> into the document.
>> 
>> Windows:  Highlight the word to be replaced, and paste the new word over
>> the top of it.
> 
> Yeah, you can do that in X, too.  Use the clipboard (ctrl+c or "copy" 
> menu item) instead of the primary selection.  If you behave like you're 
> using Windows, you'll get the results that you want.

That works so little percentage of the time for me that it's worthless
advice. Worse it seems to be utterly unpredictable when it will and
will not work.

>> Second:
>> Linux:  I've highlighted some details from an e-mail that I want to put
>> into the email configuration.  I open up the configuration, and the
>> first editable data in it is already highlighted by the application.
>> It's now in the copy buffer, and I can't paste what *I* had previously
>> copied.
> 
> If that's true, it's a bug in the application.  The primary selection is 
> only supposed to be replaced if the user selects something.  If you open 
> a window and something is automatically highlighted, it does not also 
> magically replace the primary selection.

X-Windows is one huge bug. I prefer consoles for Linux.

{^_^}