P: Support for native full-screen mode on macOS

[hijax_pl]

I must say that full screen apps is a wonderful idea. I can start in such a way some of the apple apps (safari, imail, numbers) - I like switching between them. It will be desirable to enable this option for Ligtroom & Photoshop (both CS and Elements) to behave in similar way under new Mission Control stuff...

[Boodlums _]

“or we can sit in the old days forever and intentionally accept all the other problems that existed without native full screen.”

What are these other problems? I don't use full screen at all (apart from watching TV shows or movies), and have no idea what problems you are referring to. Please enlighten me?

[Conrad C]

And needing to use the Application Frame kills it for me. IMHO the worst feature in Photoshop.

By @Lumigraphics 

That one’s interesting, because for many years now, the application frame has been the default, standard window style for both Windows and macOS, because you find it in Apple Photos, iMovie, Pages, Keynote, Safari, and modern third-party Mac applications that compete with Adobe. The problem is that Adobe has their own custom Adobe-style application frame code (also used in Illustrator and InDesign). It’s the lack of the standard Apple application frame that’s behind why Photoshop loses its document tabs in the new macOS full screen support; because in all apps that use document tabs in the standard Apple application frame (Pages, Keynote, Affinity Photo, Pixelmator Pro…), in full screen mode document tabs appear right there at the top of the screen like we expect them to.

[minty32211]

Adobe's application frame is a problem for integration regarding other third-party Mac apps that depend on the Apple Accessibility API (AX) as well. This isn't a strictly a full-screen feature or Adobe-specific problem, but it's in a similar class of issue to how Electron apps and other wrappers all develop their own idiosyncratic UI quirks, which is maddening when you're flying between multiple apps throughout the day and rely on system-wide hotkeys to keep everything navigatable. 

For an example, at the moment Finbar is the only app I've used so far that can pick up all of Adobe's menu bar items quickly, through which invoking a single hotkey + typing command is much faster than 1) setting an individual hotkey per Menu Item, which you will find that you rapidly run out of convienient hotkeys 2) you're not going to remember less often used commands 3) clicking through the menu bar is a pain in aggregate. Hence, it's really nice when a Mac app can be automated or triggered using the native API. 

[Lumigraphics]

Apple's application frame is nothing like Adobe's, and I'm not a fan. For Pages, as an example, there is no frame. Each docoument is in its own separate window. Web browsers are pretty much all tabbed. Photos has minimal editing, a frame makes sense there. Remember the original Mac OS had both unframed (MacWrite) and framed (Scrapbook and Control Panel) UIs, when they made sense. The document frame sucks in Photoshop while its tolerable in Lightroom, especially with dual displays.

Microsoft doesn't even use it everywhere in Windows. Word and Excel allow separate floating document windows.

[defaultc5k0o0z0c1i0]

@Boodlums _ They usually require screenshots to portray properly, so I'd ask you to look back a few pages when I (along with others) were posting about them. You leave the Desktop space and come back, and 1/4 of the window has tried very hard to escape into the void. You have to play cursor gymnastics to find the one tiny pixel Photoshop recognizes a window adjustment to get it to return. Another thing was if you used Photoshop's full screen mode, leaving the Desktop space and coming back later often caused the toolbars to try and re-render, but fail. I'd have to kill the full screen mode, re-apply all the toolbars, and full screen again. Got to a point where gave up on it altogether.

For everyone who doesn't prefer it, don't use it? I respect people have different opinions on this feature, that's why from the very start, we asked for the option. You can still absolutely opt out and continue to use Photoshop's built-in full screen mode. The hundreds of upvotes and likely large amounts of other silent users are going to be happy there's some uniformity in a feature Mac users have enjoyed for over a decade. This is a win no matter what.

[Lumigraphics]

The issue I have is that Adobe's development resources are obviously stretched thin. Time spent on one new feature both risks breaking something else (as we have seen repeatedly) and involves an opportunity cost that means something else isn't done.

Every feature you get (useful or not) means someone else doesn't get what they need.

[jane-e]

@Lumigraphics 

David, your last posts have been way off topic and you should start a new thread. This topic is "Support for native full-screen mode on macOS".

Jane

[Lumigraphics]

Actually this thread can be locked since its been implemented.

[jane-e]

@Lumigraphics 

Ideas can only be locked by Employees.

Jane

[minty32211]

You have a point about the limited nature of dev work. Fortunately, there are very clearly people who find this feature useful, and would have for over a decade! No need to chase the horse out of the barn.

Follow-up user reports can be placed in a new thread of course, but this thread feels useful to collect feedback as hopefully this feature is refined and improved. 

[PresentDayJosh]

Very glad this has been added! I have been waiting for this since I made the switch to Mac 9 years ago. There are 2 things I constantly rely on that are immediately noticeable and preventing total enjoyment of this view. 1. As someone else mentioned, yes the file tabs on top are missing and then 2. The tools, even when docked to the side, are rendering on top of the ruler. In non-full screen mode the ruler correctly renders to the right side of the Tools. Fix these two small bugs and I think many of us will finally have our dream Photoshop work environment on Mac!