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The Secret Behind the iPod Scroll Wheel

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the didn't-know-there-was-a-secret dept.

Grump sent in a story saying "Ask any iPod user what they like the most about their device, and most will probably mention the scrollwheel. Here is the story behind the company that makes it (hint: it's not Apple). Great not just for the history, but insight as to both how Apple's design process works, and how the scroll wheel itself works."

29 of 350 comments (clear)

  1. Nothing really new there... by Pig+Hogger · · Score: 5, Interesting

    25 years ago, Tektronix graphic terminals had scroll-wheels for cursor movement (this was before mice became widespread). And Hewlett-Packard had an innovative scrollwheel that was usable in both directions (in conjunction with the cursor keys) on the 9836 series desktop computers.

    1. Re:Nothing really new there... by Aphrika · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Pong had scroll wheels of a sort for cursor movement too - translating rotational into linear motion. I think that was around 30-odd years ago. Since then we've had the early 80s consoles and jog dials.

      However, I find it quite interesting how old ideas are reborn - if someone said 10 years ago that there'd be a big rotational dial on the front of the biggest selling music player in 2004, I wouldn't have believed them... same with analogue controls on synthesizers which have recently made a comeback.

    2. Re:Nothing really new there... by Pig+Hogger · · Score: 2, Interesting
      I have a very old (15 years) Sony Tuner that has a scroll wheel for choosing between the preset stations (up to 30). And it does the cute trick of the faster you spin the faster the choices go by.
      Was it Marrantz who had a tuner with an electromagnetic brake that slowed-down the tuning wheel wherever a station signal was stronger???
    3. Re:Nothing really new there... by catwh0re · · Score: 4, Interesting
      Another more recent (but before the original non-touch wheel iPod) are in B&O home phones, where you scroll your list of phone contacts on a very small touch-sensitive scroll wheel... and select your contact with a centre button.

      The only difference in the apple design is that it's significantly larger.

      On a design perspective, nothing is original, it's design brilliance however to know when to use already created design elements in contrast to making a new one (MS can you hear me?) It's also no trick that the ipod is the same dimensions as a cassette. The ipod mini.. same dimensions of a business card. (The design ethic here is: Why pick shapes that people aren't already used to having?)

    4. Re:Nothing really new there... by pthisis · · Score: 3, Interesting

      In the days of rotary phones, the dialed number was detected by the amount of time it took the dial to return to the resting position. (Number of pulses sent as it made the trip, actually, I believe.)

      As someone who still has a rotary phone...

      It just hung up the phone briefly, once for 1, twice for 2, ... 10 times for 0.

      If you have pulse service in your area still, you can dial the phone by just hitting the hangup button repeatedly--it's not too tough to get the timing down.

      --
      rage, rage against the dying of the light
    5. Re:Nothing really new there... by ChicagoBiker · · Score: 5, Interesting
      Amazingly, because of this system, perceived "higher priority/class" area's were given lower numbered area codes because they were quicker to dial on the rotary phone and would cause the user less aggravation and time (1 taking the shortest amount of time and 0 taking the most).

      It's why New York is/was 212 and Chicago 312, etc.

      909 would be considered the most unimportant place on the planet for the time.

      The really privliaged and status hungry would beg, steal or borrow to attempt to get an old 5 digit number like 1-1111 or 1-1221.

    6. Re:Nothing really new there... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Interesting

      So close...

      It was actually because it took the mechanical switches the phone company used back then less time to make a circuit connection to route a call to a popular area. Each number dialed made another connection in the final circuit, and they have to complete serially. Back then, there was an appreciable wait as the circuits were connected to get you a channel to your destination.

      The phone company could not really care less about the time saved by one person dialing, but the time saved routing millions of calls to New York City every day was significant.

    7. Re:Nothing really new there... by Angostura · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Some timing, yes - but the system was remarkably insensitive. I used to force the rotary dial back when impatient, and with no problems. In fact it is very hard to force the dial back too fast.

      I too vote myth, for this story.

  2. Fingerprint Touchpad by Lord+Grey · · Score: 4, Interesting

    The company that designed the scroll wheel is Synaptics. They have another product called the Fingerprint TouchPad that is basically a tiny fingerprint scanner/authentication device. I've always thought that this kind of device would be great if it was integrated into something I have hold to use, such as my cell phone or mouse. Biometric security isn't absolute security, but it can be one level of security that is nearly invisible if implemented correctly. Neat stuff.

    --
    // Beyond Here Lie Dragons
  3. Up and Down vs Round and Round by wedding · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Volume goes up and down, but we're all used to round nobs for that. I can think of very few instances where a up-down lever is used to control a device instead of a circular mechanism.
    Car stereos, but that's relatively recent, what else?

    1. Re:Up and Down vs Round and Round by moonbender · · Score: 4, Interesting
      It depends on the situation which controller makes more sense.

      Circular controllers:
      • can control an unbounded parameter (just continue turning)
      • can control a bounded parameter with arbitrary precision, e.g. one turn of the wheel doesn't have to go through to whole scale (ie. radio station tuning)
      • set the parameter relative to it's last value
      Up-down controllers:
      • can not control unbounded parameters at all
      • offer a precision limited by their size
      • offer reference on where you are on an absolute scale (and thus a specific position always correlates to a specific value)
      That said, up-down controllers can be made to emulate the behaviour of circular ones. You can make an up-down controller simulate relative behaviour by automatically returning the "knob" to the neutral position after the user is done. That way, the up-down controller can be used to set the current value +/- a certain range, and with enough phases the user can control an arbitrary range.
      Obviously this is very easy on the computer, and fairly difficult with real devices. I've seen it done a couple of days ago in ChaosPro, a fractal generator. It's not the way you'd expect a scroll bar in a computer to work, though, but it's a lot better than the various virtual circular controllers some applications insist on using - circular controller really don't lend themselves well in computer GUIs, I think.
      --
      Switch back to Slashdot's D1 system.
    2. Re:Up and Down vs Round and Round by operagost · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Faders on recording consoles.
      Joysticks.
      Light dimmers.
      Gearshifts.

      --

      Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
  4. Yeah... by Blue-Footed+Boobie · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Cool little article, although, I have heard of synaptics before - actually L-O-N-G before. Anyone who installed Linux on an old HP laptop can tell you that!

    --
    DAMN YOU OCTODOG! DAMN YOU TO HELL!
    1. Re:Yeah... by GlassUser · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Cool little article, although, I have heard of synaptics before - actually L-O-N-G before. Anyone who installed Linux on an old HP laptop can tell you that!

      Yep, I remember getting a little standalone synaptics touchpad in 1996 as a novelty from a local computer junk store (microcache for anyone in Houston who knows of them - they bought the enron E monument at auction and have it in a small shrine now).

      Any way, some people totally loved it (the touchpad) and one guy now has them on all his computers (even desktops) instead of a mouse.

      --
      funny munging
  5. Mouse wheel? by millwall · · Score: 2, Interesting

    The company made a straightened-out version of it for Creative's Zen Touch

    It amazes me why they haven't considered making a mouse with this straightened-out version. Scroll wheels for mice would benefit from some development. Mine keeps getting stuck and makes an annoying sound when scrolling

  6. Re:Summary "borrowed" by avalys · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Obviously you don't RTFA too often - I'd say about half of the stories on Slashdot use text directly lifted from the article in the summary.

    I don't see what the problem with this is. Why should someone bother writing a summary for a story submission, when there's a perfectly good one available in the article itself?

    I suppose it technically is plagiarism, but considering that the story submitter doesn't really stand to benefit from it I don't see how it matters. Have you ever heard yourself say "Damn, that was a kickass summary. That story submitter must be a freaking genius!"?

    No? Didn't think so.

    --
    This space intentionally left blank.
  7. Re:Summary "borrowed" by Short+Circuit · · Score: 2, Interesting

    That's frequently the case...I wish more people would at least prepend a "Quoth the article."

    --
    tasks(723) drafts(105) languages(484) examples(29106)
  8. Re:clickwheel? by ahecht · · Score: 5, Interesting
    Like all touchpads (and touchlamps as well), the device measures a change in capacitance (Synaptics calls it Capacitive Position Sensing). Each section of the wheel (divided by the lightning-bolt lines) can be measured individually, so it knows which section your finger is on. From that, it is pretty easy to figure our how fast your finger is moving.

    You can get more information on the geeky side from http://www.synaptics.com/technology/cps.cfm

  9. Rio wheel by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    That's not a clickwheel, it's a thumbwheel. Sony actually has a patent on clicking thumbwheels in Japan. But anyway, the problem with thumbwheels is the same as mouse wheels, you have to "pedal" the thing to go through long lists. That is, you have to remove your thumb from the wheel when you've scroll all the way one direction, then put your thumb back on at the other end and scroll again.

    It works, but in very long lists it is noticeably inferior to a circular wheel you can stay on. Try scrolling through your list of all songs on your Rio. It doesn't work well, and this is proably why the Rio has you select the first letter of the song first and then go to the list (at least the Karma does).

  10. Anyone Else Hate It? by ras_b · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I love the ipod, but hate the scroll wheel. I use my ipod in my car frequently. sometimes scrolling through that thing is worse then driving and talking on a cell phone. i look down, i'm one 'click' above the artist/song that i want, look at road, look down, scroll ever so slightly, end up one notch past what i want, look at road, look down, scroll ever so slightly, one notch past again, and so on.

    the new click wheel looks a lot nicer and would probably solve that problem, but i have the old one.

  11. Re:clickwheel? by hattig · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Cheers! Yes, that is pretty much how I was thinking it worked.

    Aside: I remember having an old Sony Trinitron 14" TV once, and it had a similar system for changing channel. It was very annoying if a fly decided to walk across the buttons, because the channels would change as the fly walked across!

  12. Re:evidence? by mccalli · · Score: 3, Interesting
    I'd like to see some independent evidence that the iPod scroll wheel is actually superior...The main attraction to designers of touch sensitive devices like Synaptics produces seems to be that they are comparatively cheap, fairly intuitive to novice users, take up little space, and don't gum up.

    I have an original 5Gig iPod. No touch sensitivity here, the scroll-wheel is mechanical. So the wheel was done for design reasonss, not purely for touch sensitivity.

    Also, look at the very latest iPods - I allowed myself a wry smile here, as I'd always mainted that capacity disregarded, the original iPods are better designed than all but the newest ones because they don't depend on a row of buttons at the top. Apple clearly agreed, the buttons have disappeared and the pure scroll-wheel interface has returned.

    So there's two strikes regarding the wheel being chosen for design, as opposed to cost features.

    Cheers,
    Ian

  13. SlashBoing by belgar · · Score: 1, Interesting

    Mayhaps you could do everyone a favor, Taco, and just redirect the slashdot domains to BoingBoing, and save us having to check two different feeds every hour. :P

    Three of the top eight stories are from BoingBoing this AM. Geep. I'm all for wider dissemination of information, but come on...

    --
    What does it mean to wake out of a dream
    and be wearing someone else's shorts?
    BNL, Born on a Pirate Ship (1998)
  14. look for it to show up elsewhere by Chuck+Bucket · · Score: 2, Interesting

    It's such a step forward in UI I expect to see it other places soon. the move to put the play/fwd/etc buttons on the wheel just adds to the functionality. I think it would work very well on cellphones, or pdas. it's a brilliant design.

    CP#$B

    --
    free ipod and free gmail!
  15. Re:excellent new UI feature by Echemus · · Score: 2, Interesting
    I've often wondered why cell-phones don't have some type of similar device
    So did someone else it would seem...
  16. Not the mechanical one, though by hacksoncode · · Score: 2, Interesting

    There's one factual error in the article. Synaptics didn't design or manufacture the mechanical scroll wheel on the gen1 iPods.

  17. Re:Apple is like James Watt by Trurl's+Machine · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Apple's contrbition to the "invention" of the GUI is to copy and make prettier. Show me examples of things they've invented in the GUI and I'd be shocked if there isn't prior art.

    1. Pull-down menu
    2. Drag'n'drop
    3. Direct windows manipulation (moving & resizing)

    I hope you can find now a decent posttraumatic treatment?

  18. Re:You Know It's Funny... by hunterx11 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I'd like to know how many Apple employees actually use the one-button mouse. After all, OS X takes advantage of a two-button scroll wheel mouse; Safari even opens links in a new tab if you middle-click. And using X11 programs with a one button mouse is just pathetic.

    --
    English is easier said than done.
  19. Re:Apple is like James Watt by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Some more, some GUI, some not:

    1. Icons which stand for objects rather than actions.
    2. Partial window updates.
    3. Desktop switching (how people forget).
    4. Peer-to-peer networking for personal computers.
    5. Integration of screen WYSIWYG with laser printers (yes, Apple beat Xerox to integration with PostScript).
    6. 3.5" floppies.
    7. Soft eject.
    8. SCSI (Mac Plus was the first).
    9. Built-in synthesizer.
    10. Speech synthesis in software with no added hardware. ... etc...

    And let us not forget all the NeXTSTEP innovations, as Apple is largely run by NeXT nowadays:

    0. 3D "chiseled" UI. WAY before anyone else.
    1. Read/write CDs
    2. The first usably fast, all-OO development environment (c'mon, Smalltalk on the Alto was s l o w). And still one of the very best! Amazing.
    3. Display PostScript (NeXT largely coded it; Adobe went along for the ride).
    4. Multi-media mail (pictures, fonts, embedded file icons).
    5. Multi-media news reading (Newsgrazer drove the USENET nuts for a while).
    6. VLSI used in a PC or workstation.
    7. Real-time scrolling and window dragging.
    8. DSP used in a PC or workstation, plus extensive, sophisticated synthesizer and sound processing internally (I'm looking at you, Amiga wannabees).
    9. SCSI2
    10. Real-time 3D graphics.
    11. Ooh, ooh, The World Wide Web... ...man this list is gonna go on for quite a while...