[Design] What should Copy and Paste mean in Chandler?

[Katie Capps Parlante]

Mimi Yin wrote:
> Reference: https://bugzilla.osafoundation.org/show_bug.cgi?id=5461
> 
> Copying items between Collections is essentially the same as DnDing 
> (Drag and Drop) items between Collections. It adds "the same item" to 
> the destination Collection.
> 
> *Q.* Can anyone think of any use cases for treating Copy and Paste 
> between Collections as "Add Duplicates of the Copied items to the 
> destination Collection"?

You are starting up 4 similar projects. You want to create a very 
similar task that lives in each project, but you actually want 4 
different tasks (they will have different statuses as they get 
completed, for example). You want to create one and then 'duplicate' the 
task in the other 3 collections.

> We also want to support Copying and Pasting items within the same 
> Collection. However, if we extend the model we've established for 
> Copying and Pasting between Collections, C&P within a Collection is 
> essentially meaningless. 
> 
> So, after chatting with Alec and Jeffrey briefly, we came up with the 
> following proposal:
> 
> Create a new Edit menu item called Duplicate (Cmd/Ctrl - D) which 
> creates a 2nd item that is essentially identical in every way with the 
> original item except that the 2nd item has a different UUID (and 
> different "date created", "created by" values as well).
> 
> And Copy and Paste is either:
> 1. Disabled when C&Ping within the same Collection; OR
> 2. If you Copy and Paste an event on the same calendar, it create 
> a recurring event with custom recurrence dates (e.g. Esther's scenario). 
> C&P within the same Collection would be disabled for non-event items.
> 
> If you don't want to create a custom recurrence, you can always use the 
> Duplicate menu item (Cmd/Ctrl - D) first and then Cut and Paste the 
> Duplicate.
> 
> The biggest downside of this approach is that Cmd/Ctrl - C is a lot more 
> common than Cmd/Ctrl - D, so users might accidentally create a custom 
> recurrence, when they really mean to Duplicate.

I like the proposal overall, and agree that the downside above is a bit 
of a risk.

> *Q. *What are use cases for using C&P to create a custom recurrence?
> + I'm a traveling salesperson. For the next 3 weeks, I'm going to visit 
> the same client and I take the same flight out on Monday morning and the 
> same flight back on Friday evening.
> + Esther's scenario: Scheduling an irregularly re-occurring board 
> meeting 18 times a year.
> 
> *Q. *What are use cases for Duplicate?
> + I am having a meeting with the same people in the same location about 
> a different topic tomorrow. I want to Duplicate today's meeting item and 
> re-title it for tomorrow's meeting.
> 
> Do other people have use cases? Which scenario is more common in 
> calendaring? Custom recurrence or Duplicate?

I think the duplicate case is going to look something like: I have a 
meeting that is a little bit similar to some other meeting (some of the 
same people), but not really related in any way. I copy/paste and then 
delete some names, add some others. The copy/paste is just a way of 
saving some typing, not implying any relationship at all between the 
meetings.

Cheers,
Katie