For my net column on core77.com, I writing about Apple's recent change in
the user model for scrolling (in their release of the "Tiger" OS).
The choice of scrolling user model is this: moving the scroll bar can either
move the text or the window. If it moves the text, one scrolls up to move
the text up. If it moves the window, one scrolls down to move the text up.
The original model for Apple's trackpads was that two-finger movements of
the fingers down mover the window down: they have just changed this so that
now it is the text that moves down. My suspicion is that the scrollbar will
disappear, or perhaps remain primarily as a visual indicator of where one is
in a long text.
The reason for the change is, presumably, consistency, now
that gestures are becoming the standard way of moving text around on
multi-touch screens, and multi-touch will become standard on all systems in
the next few years, either through touch screens or touchpads (or
more likely, both).
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Who remembers the early fights about this model? Can anyone remind me of how
we ever decided upon the moving window model rather than the moving text
one? The transition will cause much confusion, I am certain, and I want to
get the original rationale right. In my opinion there is no correct answer
to the choice: it all depends upon one's mental model. But now, the' mental
model for Apple users will have to switch to that of moving text not
windows. Microsoft is now releasing a touch/gesture mouse: what model will
they adopt? (see Microsoft TouchMouse http://bit.ly/ownFlf).
(The earliest published paper i can find is in 1983, but as late as 1995 the
argument was still going on. Does anyone remember the way we ended up with
the current model?)
Thanks
Don
[log in to unmask] www.jnd.org
http://www.core77.com/blog/columns/
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