The support for devices like camera, PDA, etc. was never the best.
But since newest DO I can copy (only right click, menu-copy never works) only the first selected photo from my Canon Powershot to PC.
Also deletion isn't possible on PDA, I have to use Explorer.
I don't understand why the support for devices like cameras ins't better (PDA will die), especially since DO supports foto-sharing services (which I never use).
Do you mean Cameras and PDAs which don't show up as generic devices but instead have their own custom views that Explorer/Opus hosts?
My experience is that those things don't work very well even in Explorer, but you're right that Opus is less compatible.
As I understand it:
Part of it is that there isn't much of an API for dealing with those things (so, for example, Opus doesn't always have a way of telling them the a toolbar button was clicked and they need to do something).
Part of it is that since Explorer is the only container anyone tests against it isn't enough for Opus to simply implement the documented interface; many of the 3rd party views rely on undocumented behaviours in Explorer. (Usually not on purpose but just because they got it working in Explorer and didn't even think "what if another container tries the operations in a slightly different order" or similar.) This is exactly the same problem I face when writing the ActiveX plugin since people only test their controls using Internet Explorer and if you do something completely legal, but different to IE, they crash or fall over.
In the past GPSoftware have been able to improve compatibility when people have told them example devices which cause problems, and (of course) when they have been able to get hold of the device to test against. That depends on the manufacturer, or a very keen user, lending them a device, obviously.
For cameras I always use a memory card reader to access the photos via a generic device and never the camera's own software. Even when the camera's own software does work in Opus as well as it does in Explorer, it still always sucks in my experience. (There seems to be a law of computing that all software/drivers for interfacing with portable devices must suck. ).
They work VERY well in Explorer (Vista) and unfortunately only there.
I don't want to use my card reader, because I often have to import pictures within a week (I'm working for a real estate agency) and I don't want to put the card out of the camera every time. Also most cameras have got a USB-connector to prevent destroying SD-Cards and the card-slot!
I import my photos via picture-import (Vista-autorun), but sometimes I need to preselect the photos.
I don't understand a (for me useless) sharing-services-support without the support for portable devices, esp. cameras!
Unfortunateley I cannot lend my Powershot IS and EOS to GP for testing
They're completely separate features and GPSoftware probably don't even know there is a problem with Canon camera software. They can't fix what they don't know about.
If you find photo sharing useless then ignore it. Flickr synching and ImageShack uploading have got nothing to do with how how compatible Opus is with 3rd party virtual folder shell extensions.
You should at least let GPSoftware know of the problem. Maybe they can find someone who can lend them a similar camera to test with.
In the past they've improved compatibility with several similar things once people let them know of the problems.
Nevertheless DO first is a filemanager which should handle files from different sources; file sharing services are just an option (in my opinion), but they still assume a camera etc. where the files come from!!!
As far as I know the access to special devices is via "Explorer plugin". Because errors occurs never in Explorer itself but in DO with several devices, the plugin itself must be badly implemented. So I think GP doesn't special devices to fix this. Also the support for these devices was better before DO 9.1 was released (as some other errors came back with these version like RAR-errors etc.).
I already reported this problem several times to GP.