Idea for the scroll bars...
How come they don't make it so you can click-drag anywhere along the scroll track to get the scrolling action, rather than require you to "acquire" the actual scroll bar first, before dragging? I think this would be a good feature- especially for laptop users. Obviously, it is less crucial a nature in setups that have a mouse, let alone a mouse wheel. It just seems to me you have all that room to distinguish the action of a scroll bar, but only a fractional patch of it is really "active" to enable the scrolling function. Why not make the whole area an active drag-scroll area? You could still have the scroll bar in there because I believe it still serves a visual cue purpose that you can indeed drag the entity to cause some action. However, I feel it would be a useful tweak to just make the whole scroll track dragible.
...or how about if I press-hold some sort of modifier key, then the trackpad assumes a virtual mousewheel mode? So you can drag up and down on the trackpad, and it will scroll whatever is in the active window? I could settle for that, if the track drag idea seems too untraditional.
...or how about if I press-hold some sort of modifier key, then the trackpad assumes a virtual mousewheel mode? So you can drag up and down on the trackpad, and it will scroll whatever is in the active window? I could settle for that, if the track drag idea seems too untraditional.
Comments
Is that what you're looking for?
It's annoying to me enough to actually consider getting a mini-mouse to complement my laptop, but I think elegance and function can be maintained if the feature I described were to be implemented instead.
I still feel there should be additional refinements built-in for trackpad users. I think it makes sense to make that space on the screen useful for something, rather than just to denote the movable space around a scroll bar. This is essentially using this space as a virtual trackpad rather than a virtual slider analogy. It's an advancement in technology in the virtual domain, I guess (if that makes any sense).
I think this is a great idea. Of course, it's not helpful if you want to scroll very far, because if you grab the belt high you can't get much higher because of screen limitations, and the same goes for the down low. But for incremental movement, it'd be good.
BTW Sidetrack IS THE BOMB!! It's the click-wheel for laptops(c). I don't know how I ever lived without it.
--B
When working with large documents, scroll-bars, as currently implemented, offer nearly instant access to all parts of a document/window contents. There are numerous ways of scrolling forward and backward but only one way of jumping to an arbitrary point anywhere in the document/window.
One of the hardest parts of interface design is balancing the needs of many different users. With scroll-bars, I don't think we can trade jump scrolling for an additional way to envoke contiguous scrolling. Too many users rely on this functionality.
Originally posted by dfiler
What you describe would be benneficial to some users while detrimental to others.
True. But just as the "System Preferences > Appearance > Click on the scroll bar to: Scroll to here" is optional, so could this be. The user's preference could also be served by making Option + click do one or the other. This feature doesn't need to limit the user's options, but instead be yet another option in the System Prefs.
--B
I also agree that this sidetrack app looks to be a nifty feature! You haven't encountered any kernal panics, have you?
I don't think it would be too difficult to have the computer distinguish between a click and a drag-click in the scroll track. Additionally, there is also the possibility that is simply an extra feature that can be enabled or disabled in a preferences menu. (ah yes, you beat my post
Originally posted by Randycat99
You haven't encountered any kernal panics, have you?
Nope. *knocks on wood* --Using Jaguar on 300 MHz ibook.
[I don't think it would be too difficult to have the computer distinguish between a click and a drag-click in the scroll track.
Also true.
--B
Now, just to see if I can do it, I'm going to create the "conveyor belt" control, and see if I can adjust the nib in a copy of an existing application to use it instead of the original scroll bar.
Getting addicted to Cocoa, XCode and Interface Builder...
However, I'm not convinced that offering this as an option is a good idea. Simply making things optional does not make every 'feature' a good idea.
Feature creep is responsible for much of the bad UI out there today. If everyone get's their pet feature, then soon we'd have bloated systems that everyone configures differently. Apple and third parties would then have to support this myriad of configurations. This is one of the reasons that Windows is hard for MS to extend and maintain. Every change affects an ungodly number of features such that bugs are significantly harder to find, let alone remedy. The situation is even worse for third parties, every new feature interacts with other features, all of which must play nicely with each other before releasing a new or updated program.
I don't mean to belittle your idea Randycat99. I certainly don't consider it a bad UI proposal. Yet, the Mac OS GUI is exemplary partially because of Apple holding feature proposals to a higher burden of proof.
In this particular case, it is my opinion that the feature would ultimately be detrimental to the platform. It complicates software development and the life of users who use public machines. Those who might benefit from it already have numerous choices by which to accomplish the same task, many of which are highly efficient.
Originally posted by dfiler
Feature creep is responsible for much of the bad UI out there today....the Mac OS GUI is exemplary partially because of Apple holding feature proposals to a higher burden of proof.
tchwojko, I think this sounds like a double dare!!
No, really. I love Sidetrack but understand why it'll always be 3rd party. It's a nuance that the average user won't be able to get a handle on, and is directed towards people a little more adept with their machine. But if you can make an interesting freeware item, that would make everyone happy, including dfiler because it is basically the best way to achieve that burden of proof. Will it interfere? Kernel panics? Will there be a broad interest in such a geeky, nuanced change in the interface?
It shouldn't have to be Apple that has to take the initiative. They've got too many considerations. Let's see it, tchwojko.
And that's my preachy post of the day.
--B
I use a trackball with a scroll wheel, so it's really of no use to me anyway...
The benefits of Sidetrack scream to me for one thing, though- larger trackpads would really set it off.