Possible to change list selection behavior when deleting items?

I still can't get used to it and was wonderingi f it could be changed.
I find that in Mail and iTunes when I use the delete key to delete an
item, that the system selects the item before the one I deleted and not
the one after it. I'm used to it moving froward I guess from Windows
and frankly feel that makes more sense. Is there a way to change this?
It seems to be global behavior, but I'd be willing to change it per
app if needed. I use this a lot in mail and in iTunes when deleting
podcast episodes I'm not interested in. I now select the last one in
the list and work my way up, but I;d rather start at the top, arrow
down, hit delete and so on.

Thanks,
John

In article <2008071811132816807-raggionospam@optonlinenet>,
raggio <> wrote:

> I still can't get used to it and was wonderingi f it could be
> changed. I find that in Mail and iTunes when I use the delete key to
> delete an item, that the system selects the item before the one I
> deleted and not the one after it. I'm used to it moving froward I
> guess from Windows and frankly feel that makes more sense. Is there
> a way to change this?

When I delete something in mail, it selects the next item, below it; the
only time it selects the item above it, is when I delete the last item.

--
Donate to the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society; help send Michelle to the marathon.
<http://www.active.com/donate/tntdms/tntdmsMSteine>

In article <michelle->,
Michelle Steiner <> wrote:

> In article <2008071811132816807-raggionospam@optonlinenet>,
> raggio <> wrote:
>
> > I still can't get used to it and was wonderingi f it could be
> > changed. I find that in Mail and iTunes when I use the delete key to
> > delete an item, that the system selects the item before the one I
> > deleted and not the one after it. I'm used to it moving froward I
> > guess from Windows and frankly feel that makes more sense. Is there
> > a way to change this?
>
> When I delete something in mail, it selects the next item, below it; the
> only time it selects the item above it, is when I delete the last item.

From a very quick test here, it looks like Mail selects the "next" item
based on the current sort field. The order of the sort controls whether
that item is above or below the deleted item. So the simple answer for
the OP is that he can reverse the sort, such that more recent (or
whatever) items are at the bottom. But I don't think there's a way to
have it just move visually down regardless of the sort.

--
"Harry?" Ron's voice was a mere whisper. "Do you smell something ... burning?"
- Harry Potter and the Odor of the Phoenix

Michelle Steiner <> writes:

> In article <2008071811132816807-raggionospam@optonlinenet>,
> raggio <> wrote:
>
> > I still can't get used to it and was wonderingi f it could be
> > changed. I find that in Mail and iTunes when I use the delete key to
> > delete an item, that the system selects the item before the one I
> > deleted and not the one after it. I'm used to it moving froward I
> > guess from Windows and frankly feel that makes more sense. Is there
> > a way to change this?
>
> When I delete something in mail, it selects the next item, below it; the
> only time it selects the item above it, is when I delete the last
> item.

The use of "above" and "below" is confusing to me. I keep my inbox
ordered by date received, but there are two ways to do that (ascending
and descending).

In response to John, in either case, when I delete a message, Mail
moves me to the chronologically next message forward in time. I think
that is the behavior that I would want, since somehow it matches
reading messages in the order in which they are received.

Does Mail do something different for you, John?

Maybe your problem is as simple as you have your inbox organized by
date, but so that the latest messages are at the top. You know you
can switch that behavior by clicking on the "Date Received" field at
the top of your display of your mailbox, right?

In article <>,
Doug Anderson <> wrote:

> > When I delete something in mail, it selects the next item, below
> > it; the only time it selects the item above it, is when I delete
> > the last item.
>
> The use of "above" and "below" is confusing to me.

I'm referring to directions related to the top and bottom of the
monitor. When I delete a message, regardless of the sort order, the
next message selected is the one immediately closest to the bottom of
the monitor.

--
Donate to the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society; help send Michelle to the marathon.
<http://www.active.com/donate/tntdms/tntdmsMSteine>

In article <uce- >,
Gregory Weston <> wrote:

> From a very quick test here, it looks like Mail selects the "next"
> item based on the current sort field. The order of the sort controls
> whether that item is above or below the deleted item.

You're right; I always have my messages sorted by date sent, with the
oldest messages at the top, so when I delete a message, the one below it
is selected. If I reverse the sort order (as I just did, to try it),
the message above the deleted message is selected.

--
Donate to the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society; help send Michelle to the marathon.
<http://www.active.com/donate/tntdms/tntdmsMSteine>

On 2008-07-18 12:24:20 -0400, Doug Anderson
<> said:

> Michelle Steiner <> writes:
>
>> In article <2008071811132816807-raggionospam@optonlinenet>,
>> raggio <> wrote:
>>
>>> I still can't get used to it and was wonderingi f it could be
>>> changed. I find that in Mail and iTunes when I use the delete key to
>>> delete an item, that the system selects the item before the one I
>>> deleted and not the one after it. I'm used to it moving froward I
>>> guess from Windows and frankly feel that makes more sense. Is there
>>> a way to change this?
>>
>> When I delete something in mail, it selects the next item, below it; the
>> only time it selects the item above it, is when I delete the last
>> item.
>
> The use of "above" and "below" is confusing to me. I keep my inbox
> ordered by date received, but there are two ways to do that (ascending
> and descending).
>
> In response to John, in either case, when I delete a message, Mail
> moves me to the chronologically next message forward in time. I think
> that is the behavior that I would want, since somehow it matches
> reading messages in the order in which they are received.
>
> Does Mail do something different for you, John?
>
> Maybe your problem is as simple as you have your inbox organized by
> date, but so that the latest messages are at the top. You know you
> can switch that behavior by clicking on the "Date Received" field at
> the top of your display of your mailbox, right?

I have my inbox sorted by date received in descedning order so the
newest stuff is on top. If I delete the very top item then the
selction goes to the previously second item which is now on top. This
"feels" right as it moves down the list and is essentially what I was
looking for in the original post. Now it gets a little odd if I
select the second or lower item and then hit delete. In this case it
selects the item above the one that I deleted. It's easy to try. Send
yourself three or five test messages and then delete them as described
above. I feel like there should be an option to "select next in list
when deleting", or "select previous in list when deleting".

BTW, I think my issue in iTunes is the same as I sort podcasts by
Release Date in reverse order.

Thanks,
John

In article <barmar->, Barry
Margolin <> wrote:

> It seems strange that you read the newest message first. Doesn't it get
> confusing if you have multiple messages in a thread, and you read the
> reply before the message it was replying to?

I've always had my mail progs set to display newest at the top.

--
Woodworking links and more at http://www.woodenwabbits.com
--------------
I kill all messages from Google Groups. See http://improve-usenet.org for
details.

On 2008-07-18 22:24:49 -0400, Barry Margolin <> said:

> In article <180720082011038875%dave@N_O_T_T_H_I_Sbalderstone. ca>,
> Dave Balderstone <dave@N_O_T_T_H_I_Sbalderstone.ca> wrote:
>
>> In article <barmar->, Barry
>> Margolin <> wrote:
>>
>>> It seems strange that you read the newest message first. Doesn't it get
>>> confusing if you have multiple messages in a thread, and you read the
>>> reply before the message it was replying to?
>>
>> I've always had my mail progs set to display newest at the top.
>
> And then I would expect you to read them from the bottom up, in the
> order they were sent or received. And Apple's behavior would support
> that.

I agree that it would act strange if there were replies to a message.
In that case I have mail group by conversation anyway. This is not
that big a deal, but I was curious to see if there was an option to
change it. It would be especially handy in the iTunes case where I
want to scroll through the list of podcasts and delete some. Consider
this scenario. There are 10 episodes and I start the selection at the
top. I arrow down two as I want to keep the top two and then delete
the third. After I delete the third the second one is selected. I now
have to arrow down again to move on. To me, I've already gotten past
that one and have decided to keep it. Why should I have to skip it
again? In this case I may very well try sorting in the opposite order.
In the case of mail I like to keep the newest on top especially if the
list gets long.

Thanks,
John