Thanks for the suggestions folks, but what I am looking for is this:
1. I would like the default behavior for double-clicking an image file to show the file in a popup window, which would allow me to resize, or show full screen, maybe even have controls to perform various operations on the image, like print, or rotate, etc... This popup would not cause the MC main window to iconify.
2. Allow the window which shows the image thumbnails, to be split (just like the playing now window), and have thumbnails below and the larger image above.
3. The slide show function should not be activated with the <play> button. The reason is that it becomes confusing when you want to play background music along with a slideshow. Also, it allows more specific control over a slideshow, and the music.
I am now using MC to govern my entire photo database as well as video and images. MC's ability to search and catalog media files is un-matched. However, it is not the best solution for viewing images. With these changes, I believe it would be. Does anyone out there have an opinion?