Focus search textbox on "replace start menu search (experimental)"

[pushnovn]

Unexpected behavior for "replace start menu search (experimental)" feature on Win11.

Expect:

• Press Win to open "Start"
• Start typing
• "Start" closes
• Toolbar opens with all text already typed AND focus on the search input field
• Continue typing on Toolbar without additional mouse clicks, etc.

Result:

• Press Win to open "Start"
• Start typing
• "Start" closes
• Toolbar opens with already typed text AND NO focus in search input field
• Focus returns to the previous background UI element (for example, browser)
• Toolbar remains opened and blocks the view, it's even possible to click on other "background" apps, type something, minimize/toggle windows, etc.
• Toolbar closes after some time or on a random event (not sure when exactly)
• Also Toolbar can be manually focused (clicked on it) in order to continue search (but it's inconvenient)

What can be done if this is considered an issue:

• Focus input field immediately after Toolbar is opened
• OR wait until the user presses Enter, and only then replace "Start" with Toolbar
• OR both (according to the user's choice)

Any of the above options should be switchable in the Preferences. Also (in case of the first option), the user may be fast enough to type a few characters while switching "Start" => Toolbar, so it's probably better to listen to the user's input the entire time the Toolbar window opens, and add the typed keys to the search text after the Toolbar finally opens and gets focus.

[pushnovn]

UPD:
The behavioral described in the post doesn't always happen, but it does happen from time to time.
Probably when you type something too fast (not always) or computer is busy with heavy processing (not always as well).

[srwi]

Hi @pushnovn, thanks for taking the time to write down your ideas/observations. The feature has been quite unstable for some time and was not really meant to be a future-proof solution (hence the "experimental"). It probably needs a complete rewrite at some point. It is tracked in issue #471.