Standardize mouse hover+ctrl for hover preview

Use case or problem

I think the page preview plugin is very useful.
However, If my note have a lot of [[links]], then the preview would constantly pop-up while I move my mouse.
The same problem apply for search pane and backlink pane.

Proposed solution

I would like to suggest to add an option for using ctrl+hover for page preview function ( standardizing ctrl+hover as the trigger for page preview).
And/or it would also be nice if toggle page preview plugin could be activate with hotkey or via ctrl+P.

Current workaround (optional)

The only work around now is to turn on or off page preview in setting.

Related feature requests (optional)

16 Likes

No need to press Ctrl while in preview mode, just put your cursor over the link.

1 Like

I just realized you edited the title again.
Thank you!

+1 for this feature.

This feature is useful for the search result panel and backlink panel. Without this feature, scroll down the search results or backlink lists is painful as the pop-up window keeps blocking the contents within the search result lists or the backlink lists.

4 Likes

As the automatically pop-up preview window activated by the Preview plug-in also affects the search results panel and backlink panel, which one do you think is better:

  1. start a new feature request for the preview window for search results panel/backlink panel
  2. reuse this post but change the title?
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Argentum’s comment was for the 1st version of this request, when the request feature wasn’t clear.
Everything is ok now! :smiley:

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Yes.
The preview plug-in which introduces the link preview function may also affect the search and backlink panel.
And your original suggestion on show hover preview only with ctrl+hover may also be applied to search panel and backlink panel.
So my suggestion is either we can reuse your post and slightly enlarge the scope to include the search/backlink panel into account, or I can start a new feature request based on your proposal.
Personally, I think we are talking about the same thing, so I prefer the first one.

I like your idea, i’ll edit the title and 1st post to incorporate this

Really appreciate for that!

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I am ambivalent about this request. On the one hand: yes, it is sometimes disturbing if a preview pops up once you “touched” a link with your mouse by accident (or simply by scrolling around). Yet, on the other hand, it would somehow complicate my workflow if I had to press “ctrl” repeatedly in the cases where I want to explore several previews in a list of links.

I just thought if it might be a better alternative to just add some delay (let’s say, one second…) before note previews pop up!?

What do you think about this?

Edit:

I actually thought that could be realized by pure css like:

.popover {
    transition-delay: 1s;
}

But that has no effect… :thinking:

1 Like

I do agree with you that each method will have its advantage and set back and its all depends on each person’s habit and preference.

For my use cases, I would like to consciously trigger the popup, rather than having it pop up while I am reading or reflecting. Hence, I would still prefer ctrl+hover.

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Emm, I think the idea you provided is inspiring.

Actually, what we requested here is a method to persistently disable the preview bubble and to triggger the preview bubble on demand.

So, another compromise, inspired by your idea, may be a method to persistently enable the preview bubble and to disable the preview bubble on demand. In other words, when you hold the ctrl/cmd, the preview bubble will not show up.

How do you like it? @GreenChocho

But that mean that you always need to hold your ctrl…
In my opinion, it is just like pressing ctrl+hover but with the addition of default hold your ctrl…

It’s generally a good thing, that I appreciate a lot, for software to be “snappy”. But in the case of the preview popover that appear while hovering internal links, I very often find it’s a hindrance :

  1. when there’s a list of links at the bottom of the window, the popover masks subsequent items of the list ; you can no longer see them, nor click them, nor hover and preview them…
  2. when one grasps a file [title] in the sidebar — the search results for example — the popover masks the editing pane and renders impossible to drop the filename as a link at the correct place.

Possible solutions could be :

  • A slight delay — like 1 second — before the popover appears. It would solve the problem 2, above, but not the problem 1.
  • The popover always following the “Ctrl/Cmd” logic, even in preview mode. This would solve both problems.

Both solutions could be “moderated” by a preference.

Thank you for your attention.

Olivier :-{)

4 Likes

Before posting my request, I did a search with popover and didn’t find this discussion. Anyway, you see that I wholeheartedly back your wishes and ideas, having stumbled on the same problem.

I think that a command (with a shortcut) that could switch on/off the zealous popover could be helpful if we can decide whether we are in “consultation/thinking mode” or in “heavy editing mode”. But I think I would generally prefer the standardised “ctrl/cmd” logic as proposed in the title of this thread, because my usage is not so much split into different modes. Maybe I’m not alone.

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Thank you for the explanation. I understand now.
It is a better idea to make ctrl+hover to preview as an additional option for the default behaviour of the current preview plug-in.

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This is definite friction in my workflow. Especially when working on the backlinks pannel and the navbar.

It would be much appreciated if the hover preview was an on-demand feature instead of a 0-1.

4 Likes

I agree, I would like to press Cmd/Ctrl at least in the search results and in the backlinks panel to see the preview.

1 Like

@GreenChocho @phlind @OlivierPS @Self In case you are still suffering the popover issue, I make a CSS snippet to add a guarding area in the searching pane, so that one can put the mouse safely in the guarding area and scroll freely without triggering the popover preview window.

/* my_search_result_margin */
.search-result-file-title {
  margin-right: 25px;
  margin-left: 20px;
}

.search-result-file-matches {
  margin-right: 25px;
  margin-left: 20px;
}

This is not the cure. However, with this snippet, I feel less distraction when working with the search result and the backlink pane. And I think I can wait for the feature to be implemented with less anxiety. :smiley:

Hope this one helpful.

1 Like

Hover search results popover only with Ctrl / Cmd + hover

Firstly, thank you Obsidian devs for making search results have a hover preview popover in the first place, this is excellent!

Much like the feature requesters in these posts, I am very pleased this exists now:

I would like to ask that the hover preview functions like edit mode rather than preview mode, i.e. only when you additionally press Ctrl / Cmd and hover do you see the note preview popover.

As I understand, it can be dependent on the theme in use whether or not you end up with a more obstructive or less obstructive behavior. Indeed the default / themeless Obsidian will place the popover slightly to the side, as to not obstruct the search results below the one being hovered over.

However, I find myself enamored with a theme that does not move the popover to the side.

That said, I would still prefer to only conjure the popover on demand - the same way I do when viewing a note in preview mode.

Proposed solution

I can imagine two different possibilities:

  • search result hover popovers only appear when Ctrl / Cmd + hover is used
  • a preference is added to Obsidian settings to allow selection of current or proposed behavior (maybe that could entail expanding the current core plugin “Page Preview” into one that has its own set of Plugin Options?)

Current workaround

My understanding is that one can adjust custom themes to behave similarly to standard / themeless Obsidian, but I do not know the specifics of this workaround.

Related feature requests

As per the intro, there are 2 features in the feature archive that also mentioned the idea of having a keyboard-shortcut element.

3 Likes