[6.5] Restyle the Image Chooser (BL-17002) by hatton · Pull Request #8460 · BloomBooks/BloomDesktop

hatton · 2026-10-09T20:50:54Z

[Claude Opus 5.5 from Hatton's machine during preflight]

Problem

BL-17002 raised two things about the Image Chooser: the search box was undersized for the dialog, and the preview of the selected image sat in a wide checkerboard "letterbox" even when the picture had no transparency. More generally, the results and details pane wasted space: results sat in three fixed columns with gaps, and the image details were centered text under the preview.

Fix

This PR pins a restyled bloom-image-gallery (bloom-image-gallery #22) and adds the strings it needs.

Search: the field stretches across the results column, with a compact square search button.
Results: rows that fill the width, each image at its true shape; the selected image gets a ring and a check mark. When the first page of results doesn't fill the grid, the grid loads the next page itself (scrolling was the only trigger, and there was nothing to scroll). Art of Reading, which returns every match at once, answers later pages with nothing, so its results never repeat.
Preview: the checkerboard is on the picture itself, so it shows only through transparent parts and an opaque photo has no patterned margins.
Sidebar: narrower, small section headings, a tinted highlight on the selected source.
Details pane: fixed width; dimensions, file size, illustrator/photographer, copyright and license as label/value rows, then a "View on <site>" link. With nothing selected it shows the source's About section.
Strings: Common.Dimensions and Common.FileSize added to BloomMediumPriority.xlf (translate="no"). "License", "Copyright" and "Illustrator/Photographer" reuse existing translated strings.

Screenshots

Both taken in Bloom at the same window size: Openverse, "butterfly", same image selected.

Before:

After:

Risk Evaluation

Low. The change is confined to the Image Chooser dialog. The newest logic is the automatic next-page request; it only fires while the grid isn't full, and stops after a page that adds no images, so the worst case is one extra empty request at the end of a short list. The gallery's analytics hooks (BL-16716), preview-failure message (BL-16597) and localization table (BL-16861) are kept. The lockfile diff is large because pnpm rewrote the whole file in its own format (2-space indents, single quotes), which master already has and .prettierignore requires; the content change is only the gallery's commit hash and tarball integrity.

Ecosystem Impact

No effect on books, published output, or older Bloom versions: the dialog only changes how images are found and chosen. Two new strings reach Crowdin once they are switched from translate="no". Depends on bloom-image-gallery #22; this PR pins that branch's commit, which stays reachable after #22 merges.

E2E Coverage

None. No end-to-end test on Version6.5 opens the Image Chooser. The screenshots above come from driving the dialog in a running Bloom. The automatic next-page request has not been seen to fire live: in that window the first page always overflows the grid.

Notion Test Suite

None.

Preflight report: https://bloombooks.github.io/dev-process-artifacts/deciders/bloomdesktop-bl-17002-gallery-visuals.html

Ref: https://issues.bloomlibrary.org/youtrack/issue/BL-17002

🤖 Generated with Claude Code

This change is

Devin review

Moves bloom-image-gallery to 2b0e840, which restyles the Image Chooser: a full-width search field, results in rows that fill the width at each image's true shape, a narrower sidebar, and a details pane that lists dimensions, file size, illustrator/photographer, copyright and license as rows. The details pane adds three strings, ImageLibrary.Dimensions, ImageLibrary.FileSize and ImageLibrary.SelectImagePrompt, to BloomMediumPriority.xlf. Its "License" label reuses Common.License. The lockfile change is only the commit hash and the tarball integrity, keeping the file's existing formatting. Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5.5 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>

Moves bloom-image-gallery to 41c08a8: the results grid asks for the next page itself when the first page doesn't fill it, and Art of Reading drawings (which have no reported size) are no longer cropped to square tiles. Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5.5 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>

…become Common strings (BL-17002) Moves bloom-image-gallery to 38f63ce: - The checkerboard behind the selected image's preview now covers only the picture, so an opaque photo no longer sits in a patterned letterbox. - Art of Reading no longer shows duplicates when the grid asks for a second page. - The grid tells a new search from more pages of the last one by an explicit count rather than by the first image. The new Dimensions and File size labels are not specific to the Image Chooser, so their ids are Common.Dimensions and Common.FileSize. Both are still translate="no", so nothing has reached Crowdin under the old ids. Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5.5 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>

hatton · 2026-10-09T21:27:21Z

[Claude Opus 5.5 from Hatton's machine during preflight] Consulted Devin on 2026-10-09 up to commit 483a3d7. Three rounds. It raised the same gallery bugs through this PR's pin (all fixed by pinning the corrected gallery, each with its own thread, all now marked resolved by Devin), plus two Investigate flags: pagination at short final pages (handled by the gallery fix) and the PR description lagging behind the checkerboard work (description updated). Nothing is open.

Gallery commit 854e8c7 drops the prompt from the Image Chooser's details pane. Its string, ImageLibrary.SelectImagePrompt, was added on this branch and never sent to Crowdin, so its XLF entry is removed too. Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5.5 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>

hatton

@hatton reviewed 3 files and all commit messages.
Reviewable status: 0 of 3 files reviewed, 5 unresolved discussions.

hatton · 2026-10-09T22:41:18Z

[Claude Opus 5.5 from Hatton's machine during preflight] Consulted Devin on 2026-10-09 up to commit efe3ec7. It reviewed the change since 483a3d7 (dropping the details-pane prompt) and raised one Investigate flag: the PR description still promised that prompt. The description is fixed and the thread is resolved. Devin still marks its three earlier bugs fixed, and no bug is open.

hatton and others added 2 commits October 9, 2026 14:50