How to prevent hovered thumbnail selection?

Software darktable
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Let’s say there’s more than one thumbnail in the lighttable, and one of them is explicitly selected by clicking on it once.
The tagging module is opened and the entry zone is selected.
This logically shows the tags that will have been associated with this photo, or nothing if no tags have yet been associated with the photo.

By moving the mouse over another thumbnail, the tagging module will then show the tags of that other photo (without having been clicked), not the previously selected.

If the mouse had been inadvertently moved, it’s likely that the tags then entered would not be appropriate, since we’re thinking of the selected photo, not the hovered one…

In the same way, when you want to pass a photo through the darkroom by pressing d, it’s the thumbnail hovered that will be taken, even if another thumbnail has been selected (clicked) before. And it’s the same with (almost?) all the keyboard shortcuts, colors, stars…

Is there any way to prevent this? That is avoid a photo selection by hovering but only by clicking? But still keep showing thumbnails overlays (according to setup).

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I don’t think there’s currently a way to change this behaviour though there is a lot of discussion on github and general agreement that it’s not particularly friendly UX for new users (though some experienced users like it a lot). See for example here.

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I agree with @manu , there should be an option to disable selection by hovering.

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There should be an option to enable it

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I agree, it should be opt-in. If you want it, you’ll look for it. But if it was on by default, you might not be aware of what’s causing the unexpected behaviour.

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The discussion has been going for years though, and not much movement on the dev, so don’t hold your breath.