"Find Next Word from Caret" or "Select and Find Next"

Mark Olson

In the (likely) event that the number of votes in the poll winds up being very small, I’d like to explain why I prefer “Select and find next”: it can select the next instance of whatever is currently selected, even if it’s not a word. Also, the command selects the text that it finds, so obviously the description of the command should reflect that important fact.

Lycan Thrope

@Mark-Olson ,
As I’ve never used this, I had to fire it up and try it, and realized that this connotates a different action than “Find Next”, as I could not find a way to actually make it use the word or number I had just highlighted after another one, without using the Select and Find Next to actually select the highlighted word that I wanted to Find Next, so I now know what it does and agree with keeping it as is, as it fully explains what it actually does. Interestingly, I discovered that just putting the caret next to a word or number, and using Select and Find Next actually selected the word and found the next one.
Thanks for highlighting the question and pointing out something I haven’t used before, but now know I can. :-) Learn something everyday around here.

donho

Here’s the reason of this poll:

What “Select and Find Next” command does is:

If there’s a selection, then it does exactly what “Find Next” command does.
if there’s no selection, then it
A) selects the whole word where the caret is,
B) does “Find Next” action
that’s why this command is call “Select and Find Next”.

However, in the “no selection” situation, users don’t see A), but see the result as B).
That’s why I think it might be a better naming for Find Next Word from Caret - to emphasize the command feature under “no selection” situation.

Mark Olson

@donho

Thanks for clarifying what the feature does. Like @Lycan-Thrope , I don’t use this feature myself, and only did so out of curiosity when you created the poll.

Your description gives me some concern that the current implementation is a little bit too complicated, and could lead to confusion for users in the future. Maybe there is an argument for making it so that this feature does nothing unless something is selected? I don’t have a personal preference either way.

Ekopalypse

I use Find next and Select and find next quite often, but for some reason never thought about the naming. Both jump to the next position of the (implicit!?) selection of the next instance. I actually used Select ... whenever I selected only a part of the word and Find next whenever I want to find the “whole” word.
For the poll, for me, Select and find next is the closest. But neither really explains what it does straight away. But sometimes a user just needs to run something to see and understand what something does. Not always an action/command can explain 100% with a few words what it does.

Alan Kilborn

IMO, leave it the way it is. There is little value (but there is risk) in changing something that no one has EVER complained about.

Consider:

No selected text, caret inside the word foo, Wrap around uncheckmarked.

Command is invoked but no other foo exists. After command runs foo is left selected.

Thus Select and Find Next makes sense (the select happened, then the find happened but was unsuccessful).

If the command is called “Find next word from caret”, user might wonder why the word got selected.

@Lycan-Thrope said:

I discovered that just putting the caret next to a word or number, and using Select and Find Next actually selected the word and found the next one.

This is how the “word at caret” concept works – the caret doesn’t have to be inside the word; it can be “touching” either end of the word in order to grab and use that word.

@Mark-Olson said:

Maybe there is an argument for making it so that this feature does nothing unless something is selected?

IMO the true value in the command is that it uses the word at the caret if there is no selection.

Requiring a selection first kills the utility of it, not to mention that a change of that nature would demand that the command be renamed.

@Ekopalypse said:

I use Select and find next whenever I selected only a part of the word and Find next whenever I want to find the “whole” word.

I don’t quite understand this, as according to @donho 's first bullet point: “If there’s a selection, then it does exactly what “Find Next” command does.”

So, @Ekopalypse , it seems like you could simply do Find next for either of the cases you describe.

Something no one has mentioned yet in this thread:

Note that the Select and find next/previous commands are governed by the Find dialog settings for “whole word”, “case” and “wrap around”.

Just sayin’ … if we’re wondering what might confuse users about these commands (and I don’t think the names of the commands do)…

And, of course, more reading from the user manual about these commands: https://npp-user-manual.org/docs/searching/#:~:text=Find Previous commands.-,Select and Find Next,-(Ctrl%2BF3

PeterJones

I had originally voted to change, but once I started seeing some of the arguments, I removed my vote; and the more I’ve thought about it, the more I’m in the camp of “Select and Find Next” as the best without getting too wordy.

“Find Next Word from Caret” could easily be misinterpreted as “find the next whole word after the caret, no matter what that word is”.

In my opinion, the most accurate name would be “Find Next Based On Selection/Word”, but that’s way too long to be reasonable. And thus, “Select and Find Next” is a reasonable compromise – especially since it’s been that way for years, and people have learned what it means, even if they didn’t 100% understand it at first.

dinkumoil

I voted for letting it be like it is simply because the current name describes what it does in a sufficient way. Moreover, users got used to its current name, so it could irritate some of them.

BTW, I thought it could be useful to post an exact description of the 3 pairs of search function provided by Noptepad++, the two in question here (even @donho described them not correctly because “Find Next” and “Find Previous” select the search result too) and the yet unmentioned “Find (Volatile) Next” and “Find (Volatile) Previous”.

Find Next / Find Previous

Immediately after Notepad++ has been started, without a selection “Find Next” and “Find Previous” both do nothing. Even if one selects a word and tries to “Find Next” or “Find Previous”, they do nothing. If the caret is placed to a word, they do nothing, too.

The reason is that these functions are like shortcuts of the equivalent buttons in “Search and Replace” dialog (they even use the settings of this dialog, e.g. regular expression search, find only whole words, and so on).

Only after the “Find what” input field of “Search and Replace” dialog has been filled with a search term and the “Find Next” button of this dialog has been pressed once, “Find Next” and “Find Previous” find the next/previous occurence of this term. They set the caret to the end of the search result and select it.

If the “Find what” input field has been filled with a search term and the caret is set to another word NOT EQUAL to this search term, “Find Next” and “Find Previous” both search for the term filled into “Find what” input field.

Select and Find Next / Select and Find Previous

Immediately after Notepad++ has been started, “Select and Find Next” and “Select and Find Previous” both fill the “Find what” input field of “Search and Replace” dialog with the word that has been selected or is under the caret and search for the next occurence of this search term. The search result gets selected and the caret is set to its end. If there is no selection and no word under the caret, they both do nothing.

Subsequently using “Select and Find Next” or “Select and Find Previous” deselects the first search result, searches for the next occurence of the search term, selects it and places the caret to its end.

If one decides to use “Find Next” or “Find Previous” intermediately, both work as described above, i.e. the result is the same like using “Select and Find Next” or “Select and Find Previous”.

“Select and Find Next” and “Select and Find Previous” use some of the settings of “Search and Replace” dialog (e.g. find only whole words, but NOT regular expression search).

Find (Volatile) Next / Find (Volatile) Previous

Immediately after Notepad++ has been started, “Find (Volatile) Next” and “Find (Volatile) Previous” search for the word that has been selected or that is under the caret, select the search result and place the caret to its end. BUT they don’t fill the “Find what” input field of the “Search and Replace” dialog with the search term. That’s the reason why there is the “Volatile” in their names. If there is no selection and no word under the caret, they both do nothing.

If one decides to use “Find Next” or “Find Previous” intermediately, both do nothing as the “Find what” input field of the “Search and Replace” dialog is still empty.

If one decides to use “Select and Find Next” or “Select and Find Previous” intermediately, both work as described above, i.e. they fill the “Find what” input field of “Search and Replace” dialog with the search term so that it is also possible to use “Find Next” and “Find Previous” subsequently.

“Find (Volatile) Next” and “Find (Volatile) Previous” don’t use settings of “Search and Replace” dialog.

Conclusion

If in “Search and Replace” dialog regular expression search is activated already, it is possible to enter a regular expression into the current document, use “Select and Find Next” or “Select and Find Previous” (press whatever keyboard shortcuts are assigned to them) in order to fill the “Find what” input field (of the still invisible “Search and Replace” dialog) and then use “Find Next” to do a regular expression search without opening the “Search and Replace” dialog.

donho

Thank you for your vote and opinion.
The command label will be remained (“Select and Find Next”).
:)

mkupper

Sometimes a creepy person sits near you, edges closer and closer, and whispers, do you want to touch my caret?

That seems to explain Notepad++'s search functions. It does not matter if the creep is to your left or right.

donho

@mkupper said in "Find Next Word from Caret" or "Select and Find Next":

Sometimes a creepy person sits near you, edges closer and closer, and whispers, do you want to touch my caret?
That seems to explain Notepad++'s search functions. It does not matter if the creep is to your left or right.

You just made my night :D

https://twitter.com/Notepad_plus/status/1832921210239225984