[emark]

I declare Shenanigans on Mail app.

In Mail, but not in Safari, (or ANY other app I'm aware of) to make a font larger the NEW keyboard shortcut is:

(Cmd - Shift - =) though they write it (Cmd - +) in the menu, and, true, Shift-= is plus....
So, Apple is correct in terms, but violates ages of experience and makes for a one-handed key combo that requires more effort than need be.

What is wrong with the two-key combo as it's always been, and still is in most apps??? good ol': (Cmd - =)?????

I was furiously typing (Cmd - -) and watching text shrink, and couldn't invoke the reverse other than using the mouse/menu "bigger" command....very frustrating until I added the shift.

This one change has me boiling. OK, some might say I'm nit-picking, but if this is a signal of things to come, I want out!!!!

If this interests you, please add your thoughts to this thread at the Apple Support Discussions area,


link


thanks for your consideration.

[Thor]

Hmmm... I've been using e-mail since ca. 1994, and I don't believe I've ever had to increase the text size in my e-mail programs after setting the size in the preferences.

*shrug*

(not intended to belittle your frustration)

[emark]

Originally posted by Thor:
Hmmm... I've been using e-mail since ca. 1994, and I don't believe I've ever had to increase the text size in my e-mail programs after setting the size in the preferences.

*shrug*

(not intended to belittle your frustration)

Thanks. I probably didn’t articulate my points well abvove, so I’ll try again....

The most important point is this:

(1) the change is an UNWARANTED, NONBENEFICIAL VIOLATION of a commonly used USER INTERFACE (de facto) STANDARD on this platform routinely used by Apple (on other software, as well as by independent developers. This is one of Apple's latest creations and is taking this turn w/ the UI that is, as far as I can see, w/o ANY benefit. If it happens here, where next, Safari, Text-Edit??

(2) I perhaps am not using it properly, but was unable to use the keyboard shortcuts in the System Preferences to alter this.

(3) I don’t know if you’re using Apple’s mail included w/ Panther, but regardless, maybe you can talk me through it. I would appreciate it if you could spell it out for me....seriously.

When I look at the “Fonts & Colors” preference pane, I am able to set the Message List Font and its size, and a Message Font for composition and its size. Further I see a Fixed Width font for plain text messages. I have played w/ these previously.

While they affect composition of new messages, they do not change the minimum size of incoming RTF or HTML messages - which is my concern in the short run, with regard to this application.

I am aware of mail clients that work in a plain-text only fashion by preference, or in totality...which I acknowledge is safer, and perhaps more efficient way to work....however, I am interested in reading the html mail versions of mail, and I would like to scale the mail in the preview frame—whilst preserving the authors original relative font sizes....((ie not just changing fonts smaller than a particular size to another, but keeping the asthetics of the message by scaling the sum of the document, and I am unaware of any mail app doing that automatically....))

Please, if there is a way in Apple’s mail, let me know. but, the far more important point is #1.

[dtriska]

I hate how Apple doesn't respect its own key combo in Safari. If I wanted the text to get bigger, I'd hit cmd-+. Cmd-= is for OmniDictionary. Now I have to stretch over to the number pad since Apple can't program its key combo properly.

[cpac]

why not just put the text-bigger button in the appropriate toolbar?

I do.

[emark]

Originally posted by dtriska:
I hate how Apple doesn't respect its own key combo in Safari. If I wanted the text to get bigger, I'd hit cmd-+. Cmd-= is for OmniDictionary. Now I have to stretch over to the number pad since Apple can't program its key combo properly.

Perhaps you can elaborate....Omni Dictionary came around (and is used by far fewer people) than IE, Mozilla (and variants).

Safari is at least consistent w/ "Cmd - =" for scale font bigger....

Your point is to suggest that while these major programs have done something successfully (most would say) in unison, ergo "de facto standard", for years, let's change it for omni-dictionary??? I can't speak for others, but I don't see that movement gaining support, and is the point of my post...unless you're doing it for kicks? jokes on me, right? very funny.

[Thor]

Aaah... I see.

I think that HTML e-mail is the devil's spawn, and I wish I could disable it completely in Mail (or at least set the default behaviour to display a plain text alternative). It also pisses me off when companies FORCE me to receive HTML mail without a plain text alternative--- that's simply rude.

Please have a look at:
http://www.expita.com/nomime.html

That being said, I still have never needed to adjust the font size of any HTML e-mails that I receive.

Most HTML e-mails are generated by bulk mailer programs, and are certainly not using HTML coding standards, anyway (witness the use of font tags, etc.).


I hope you have submitted feedback to Apple on this... I agree that a change like this should probly not be made for no good reason.

I think the best you'll be able to do is to customize your toolbar and put the "Text Bigger" and "Text Smaller" buttons up there.

Netscape 4 used cmd-shift-] and
cmd-shift-[ for text size.

[emark]

Originally posted by cpac:
why not just put the text-bigger button in the appropriate toolbar?

I do.

Many people tend to find proficiency in keyboard shortcuts.

it is fine, and for mouse-only browsing a great advantage vs. the menus, but is not, unto itself a solution or improvement to proper execution to keyboard shortcuts....
it's not even close timewise...but yes, an important function who's existence is not challenged nor changed by the topic.

[dtriska]

Originally posted by emark:
Safari is at least consistent w/ "Cmd - =" for scale font bigger....

No, Safari isn't consistent. I look in the View menu and I see "Make Text Bigger" is cmd-+. Yet, when I press the key combo cmd-=, which is a shortcut for OmniDictionary under Services, Safari makes the text bigger.

Either Apple respects its own key combinations, or it should change the entry in the View menu. If Apple wants cmd-=, then they should take it and force OmniGroup to use a different combo. But, Apple shouldn't say it's using one and then use another combo. It's inconsistent.

[emark]

Originally posted by dtriska:
No, Safari isn't consistent. I look in the View menu and I see "Make Text Bigger" is cmd-+. Yet, when I press the key combo cmd-=, which is a shortcut for OmniDictionary under Services, Safari makes the text bigger.

Either Apple respects its own key combinations, or it should change the entry in the View menu. If Apple wants cmd-=, then they should take it and force OmniGroup to use a different combo. But, Apple shouldn't say it's using one and then use another combo. It's inconsistent.

They are consistent in OPERATION of keyboard shortcut.

I hadn't even noticed the inconsistency w/ literal translation of the pull-down menu, as I don't use it....never had to look, as it's operation is consistent w/ ALL other browsers I'm familiar w/ on the mac platform, and, many text-editors and other mail clients.

unfortunately, apple does in text-edit follow the same key combos, vs Appleworks, where they follow MS's Cmd-Shift-. and Cmd-Shift-. But 3rd party text editors, like Tex-Edit follow the browsers lead.

Maybe, my suggestion is wrong. Perhaps they should stick w/ the combination they use in Mail and Tex-Edit for everything....but whatever it is, I wish they would define a common list of tasks and assign system wide shortcut reservations...even if w/in a user's own environment they have a system preference control to change for themselves...at the peril of conflicting w/ individual programs....which isn't exactly what is there now....

Since the key combo is so simple, and, since so many people use a browser vs. any other product, it is my suggestion that they follow through w/ that easy to remember and strike combination.

[dtriska]

I don't care what combo Apple uses in Safari, as long as it makes it consistent with the menu listing. If the menu says cmd-+, then cmd-= shouldn't be used. If Apple decides to use cmd-= instead, then OmniGroup will switch their combo to something else. That's fine. But having such an inconsistency on Apple's part is stupid.

[Laurence]

This is strange, but just today I realized that Safari is requiring command shift = to enlarge text as well. I know it wasn't like this a few days ago...

I did just get the security update and a few other updates from Apple recently. Now I am running Safari 1.1.1 (v100.1)

Anyone else notice this behavior?

I never needed this command in Mail, but use it all the time in Safari... this is really annoying!

[emark]

Originally posted by dtriska:
I don't care what combo Apple uses in Safari, as long as it makes it consistent with the menu listing. If the menu says cmd-+, then cmd-= shouldn't be used. If Apple decides to use cmd-= instead, then OmniGroup will switch their combo to something else. That's fine. But having such an inconsistency on Apple's part is stupid.

Agreed.

and as far as a change of behavior in Safari, I am using the same version, and have run all updates, and do not notice the same....

[Rickster]

Interesting... back when we first ran into this issue a few years ago, there wasn't a supported way to make a menu item with an ambiguous keyboard shortcut like that. I guess they found one for Safari, after all these years of telling us that the Shift-required-for-plus behavior is intended and "better"...

[dtriska]

I just want to be clear. I'm still on 10.2.6 with Safari 1.0 v85. If I press cmd-= (the equal sign beside the delete key), Safari makes the text bigger.

However, if I press cmd-= (the equal sign on the number pad), OmniDictionary is activated via Services.

[emark]

You are no doubt going to say I'm full of it, in fact this has me wondering????

my powermac is now ONLY taking "Cmd-Shift-+" in Safari for growing text.

My iBook, viewing the same pages, from the same version of Safari, works as I've described above....Not only does this get my goat, the timing is a bit freaky...

Have to think back and look at apps and see if I could've done something to change it, and install, update, preference, etc....

very, very odd....

[emark]

OK, Same machine, 5 minutes later....rebooted, and Safari is back to working as it always has for me, the "Cmd-=" combination is active in Safari...

This isn't halloween or april fools, is it????

Tell me this isn't time to declare Shenanigans??????

I'm going to fashion cloves of garlic into a necklace when I finish this post...

[dtriska]

Yeah, OS X has introduced a whole bunch of weird stuff like this.

In my case, trying to access OmniDictionary via Safari (using the number pad =) will sometimes not work at all. The computer beeps at me. If I relaunch Safari, magically the key combo works again. Stuff like that really has me pining for the days of OS 9 when these inconsistencies didn't exist.