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"Focus follows cursor" scrolling: OS X vs. Windows
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Posting Junkie
Join Date: Apr 2007
Location: Iowa, how long can this be? Does it really ruin the left column spacing?
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This is probably one of the most annoying parts about transitioning between Windows and OS X so often - on a Mac, the scroll wheel affects whatever item the cursor is currently over. In Windows 7, the scroll wheel affects the item last clicked, so if I'm going from window to window, I have to click in that window before I can scroll.
Who is right??
As an aside, in searching for what to call this, I found an app for Win7 that fixes the issue.
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Mac Elite
Join Date: Dec 2003
Location: I'll let you know when I get there...
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Any button pressed on the mouse should effect whatever is under the cursor, including the scroll wheel.
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Clinically Insane
Join Date: Jun 2000
Location: Union County, NJ
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Moderator
Join Date: Apr 2000
Location: Gothenburg, Sweden
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Do you have a link to that Windows app? Because I hate the windows behavior.
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The new Mac Pro has up to 30 MB of cache inside the processor itself. That's more than the HD in my first Mac. Somehow I'm still running out of space.
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Posting Junkie
Join Date: Apr 2007
Location: Iowa, how long can this be? Does it really ruin the left column spacing?
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Originally Posted by P
Do you have a link to that Windows app? Because I hate the windows behavior.
WizMouse. It's donationware, so far no nags or popups, and it works as described.
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Posting Junkie
Join Date: Apr 2007
Location: Iowa, how long can this be? Does it really ruin the left column spacing?
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So next let's talk about Windows' window snapping. Dragging a window to the side and having it snap on half the screen is awesome and I use it all the time. HyperDock and Flexiglass both add this behavior to the Mac, they both run $10. With a 27" iMac this is especially nice, as half the screen is the right size for most applications (Safari, Mail, Word, etc.).
And how about full screen snapping? I don't like OS X's "Full Screen" mode. It takes away the menu bar and limits my ability to multitask. I like the way I can maximize an application in Windows so that there's not an inch or two of wasted screen space around the edges. This is especially nice on small screens. I find OS X's green button inconsistent.
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Moderator
Join Date: Apr 2000
Location: Gothenburg, Sweden
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Thanks for the app link - it's probably only fair that I reply with one. BetterTouchTool includes the Windows 7 snapping features for the Mac.
Personally I think that the "drag to the side" snapping actions are good, the dragging the window size to the edge to expand is nifty, but the drag to the top to maximize is stupid. By my count, there are four ways to do that already (button in the window title bar, window menu, option-return on the keyboard, double-clicking the titlebar) and I frequently move a window to the top without wanting to expand it.
I think Apple made a mistake by hiding the menubar in Full Screen mode. The menubar is part of the application chrome and should be visible, even if you hide OS controls like the Dock. The green zoom button is "zoom to fit", not maximize, but option-clicking it is maximize.
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The new Mac Pro has up to 30 MB of cache inside the processor itself. That's more than the HD in my first Mac. Somehow I'm still running out of space.
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Posting Junkie
Join Date: Apr 2007
Location: Iowa, how long can this be? Does it really ruin the left column spacing?
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Originally Posted by P
Personally I think that the "drag to the side" snapping actions are good, the dragging the window size to the edge to expand is nifty, but the drag to the top to maximize is stupid. By my count, there are four ways to do that already (button in the window title bar, window menu, option-return on the keyboard, double-clicking the titlebar) and I frequently move a window to the top without wanting to expand it.
I think you're touching on what I see as one of the primary differences between Windows and OS X (and iOS and Android, really). Apple gives you one way to perform a task, it's usually intuitive and tends to "make sense." Windows/Android will give you several different ways to perform the same action - none of them especially good or well-designed, but you have the choice and that's what's important, right?
I see this in my wife's car, interface designed by GUESS WHO. I can adjust the climate control by:
1. Pressing the "buttons" on a capacitve-touch panel under the main screen
2. Navigating through the touch screen
3. Navigating through the gauge cluster screen via the steering wheel buttons
4. Voice commands
None of them are as simple as turning a knob from "1" to "2" or "red" to "blue" like basically every other legacy climate control system. But now I have CHOICES.
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Posting Junkie
Join Date: Apr 2007
Location: Iowa, how long can this be? Does it really ruin the left column spacing?
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Originally Posted by P
Thanks for the app link - it's probably only fair that I reply with one. BetterTouchTool includes the Windows 7 snapping features for the Mac.
Excellent. Any pop-ups/nag windows?
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Moderator
Join Date: Apr 2000
Location: Gothenburg, Sweden
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Not when I used it, although that was some time ago. It was very much a beta app at that stage, however.
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The new Mac Pro has up to 30 MB of cache inside the processor itself. That's more than the HD in my first Mac. Somehow I'm still running out of space.
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Posting Junkie
Join Date: Apr 2007
Location: Iowa, how long can this be? Does it really ruin the left column spacing?
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Installed it. Dragging to the right side of the screen moves me into the next Space. I'll have to play with the setup.
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Posting Junkie
Join Date: Apr 2007
Location: Iowa, how long can this be? Does it really ruin the left column spacing?
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Fixed. Had to go into Mission Control and close out the three additional desktops automatically created for me. It works as expected now.
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Mac Elite
Join Date: Dec 2003
Location: I'll let you know when I get there...
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I use an app called Grid (find it on the App store). Allows you to size windows in a grid like fashion using the keyboard.
It's free.
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Addicted to MacNN
Join Date: Aug 2006
Location: The deep backwoods of the PNW
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Originally Posted by boy8cookie
I use an app called Grid (find it on the App store). Allows you to size windows in a grid like fashion using the keyboard.
For any Windows users who want similar functionality to the above app, this works great: GridMove - DonationCoder.com
The focus-follows-cursor scrolling drives me crazy. Guess it's just a matter of whatever you're used to.
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Sell or send me your vintage Mac things if you don't want them.
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Posting Junkie
Join Date: Apr 2007
Location: Iowa, how long can this be? Does it really ruin the left column spacing?
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Originally Posted by shifuimam
The focus-follows-cursor scrolling drives me crazy. Guess it's just a matter of whatever you're used to.
Scenario: You open a new Windows Explorer window and go to one of the folders you have linked in the sidebar. You then want to scroll through the items in that folder. Unfortunately, the last place you clicked was the window's sidebar, so that's what your scroll wheel affects. You have to first click in folder's white space before you're allowed to scroll through that folder's contents.
That's your desired workflow?
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Mac Elite
Join Date: Jun 2006
Location: Pittsburgh
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Originally Posted by Laminar
Scenario: You open a new Windows Explorer window and go to one of the folders you have linked in the sidebar. You then want to scroll through the items in that folder. Unfortunately, the last place you clicked was the window's sidebar, so that's what your scroll wheel affects. You have to first click in folder's white space before you're allowed to scroll through that folder's contents.
That's your desired workflow?
Even worse is when you have two windows open: a document and a source material. You want to scroll through the source material, but type in the document if something comes up. You have to click back and forth. Very annoying.
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Posting Junkie
Join Date: Apr 2007
Location: Iowa, how long can this be? Does it really ruin the left column spacing?
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So here's a more general question, but one that applies to this situation. Can we call a workflow objectively "bad"? Is the idea that "it's just a matter of whatever you're used to" actually valid?
If your homepage is yahoo.com and you use Yahoo to search for Google, then click on the Google link so you can search Google for YouTube, is that as valid a workflow as any other if it's "what you're used to"?
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Mac Elite
Join Date: Aug 2005
Location: Vancouver, BC
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Originally Posted by Laminar
So here's a more general question, but one that applies to this situation. Can we call a workflow objectively "bad"? Is the idea that "it's just a matter of whatever you're used to" actually valid?
If your homepage is yahoo.com and you use Yahoo to search for Google, then click on the Google link so you can search Google for YouTube, is that as valid a workflow as any other if it's "what you're used to"?
I think everyone here would agree that such workflows can be considered objectively "bad", absolutely.
When my wife wants to do a google search, she will type in Google, then search from the Google home page even though she could have just entered her keyword(s) in the search bar. Drives me nuts.
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Posting Junkie
Join Date: Apr 2007
Location: Iowa, how long can this be? Does it really ruin the left column spacing?
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One of my favorite features that has come to Windows 10 is the ability to scroll an inactive window. Prior to Windows 10, and assuming you were not running a third party utility which enabled this, in order to scroll a window you had to first select it. Now, you can just move your mouse over any open window and use the scroll wheel to move whatever window you are over. You can do this on windows that are buried three or four deep – as long as you can see some of it you can scroll it.
http://www.anandtech.com/show/9543/t...dows-10-review
Fiiiiiiiiiiiiiinally.
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Posting Junkie
Join Date: Nov 1999
Location: Cape Cod, MA
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Call me crazy, but I feel like Tiger had that back in the early 00s
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Games Meister
Join Date: Aug 2009
Location: Eternity
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Yes, I I don't know when but it was definitely possible int he past.
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Addicted to MacNN
Join Date: Feb 2008
Location: Standing on the shoulders of giants
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CDE on Solaris, late 90s you whippersnappers.
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Moderator
Join Date: May 2001
Location: Hilbert space
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I hate, hate, hate that aspect of Windows, because I use scrolling in non-active windows to no end: e. g. when I write a LaTeX document, I often scroll around in other tex files or pdf files. So this is really a time saver. When I discovered this feature in the late 1990s in some Linux window manager (fvwm2, I think?), this was a halleluja, although they'd do it differently, because also the window focus would follow the mouse (whatever window the cursor is resting over is the active window). Of course, that's less wrong behavior, and the right one is really OS X's — one of the reasons I fell in love with the OS X GUI.
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I don't suffer from insanity, I enjoy every minute of it.
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Posting Junkie
Join Date: Apr 2007
Location: Iowa, how long can this be? Does it really ruin the left column spacing?
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I didn't have a scroll wheel until I bought a generic mouse for my iMac in like 2004.
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Moderator
Join Date: Apr 2000
Location: Gothenburg, Sweden
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Really? I went to university in -97, and they were standard in the computer labs by then.
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The new Mac Pro has up to 30 MB of cache inside the processor itself. That's more than the HD in my first Mac. Somehow I'm still running out of space.
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Posting Junkie
Join Date: Apr 2007
Location: Iowa, how long can this be? Does it really ruin the left column spacing?
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My middle/high school used Macs so it was all hockey puck mice for me. My university used Macs and PCs, so that would have been my first exposure to scroll wheels.
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Ham Sandwich
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Originally Posted by Laminar
This is probably one of the most annoying parts about transitioning between Windows and OS X so often - on a Mac, the scroll wheel affects whatever item the cursor is currently over.
Yes, and I prefer that. I hate that I have to click on the window that I want to scroll (e.g., a web page in the background) just because I have like 15 other windows on my screen for work. Otherwise I'd be in a clicking frenzy.
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Posting Junkie
Join Date: Apr 2007
Location: Iowa, how long can this be? Does it really ruin the left column spacing?
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Ooo, someone doesn't like my snarky comments.
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