Dan Ingalls Dan@SqueakLand.org wrote:
Hehe, a classic subject line ;-)
Tim Rowledge tim@sumeru.stanford.edu wrote: ...
I should mention that the current Squeak idiom (idiocy!) of using the select button to open a menu when on the main display is really stupid and can only be explained by the initial connection to Mac single button mice. Which is another dim idea.
You may think that a 1-button mouse is a bad idea (or can "dim" mean brilliant in Britain?),
Not so far as I know, but I've been away so long that I can hardly understand people when I do visit. What the hell does 'pants' mean, for example?
but it looks a lot more sensible if your other machine is a pen computer. I know you know this, Tim, but I just wouldn't want it omitted from this thread.
But a pen is completely and utterly different to a single button mouse! You use completely different actions, different muscle combinations... everything. With a pen you can sensibly use flick-gestures that could never work on any mouse I've seen. Pen based systems generally use quite small screens so having buttons across the top or a side is reasonable, a gesture can be used to get a menu, drag and drop can be done sensibly.
If anyone cares to offer suitable money I can happily return to UI research and write much more on the issues. Ghu knows there's been little enough progress in the two decades since I was at IBM UK.
tim -- Tim Rowledge, tim@sumeru.stanford.edu, http://sumeru.stanford.edu/tim Useful random insult:- Lights are on but nobody's home.