Slashdot Mirror
On the Widespread Misuse of the Mouse
An anonymous reader writes "Recently launched blog "The New Interface Advocate," has an entry about how mice are being applied to situations they are intrinsically poorly suited for. It also has an interesting proposal for how to keep most of the current paradigm of GUIs and still take advantage of the other control devices, such as the keyboard."
I know, i know CLI is there but CLI browsers are no match for GUI browsers sadly.
Moreover i would love to use keyboard keys for everything and for those who feel like me shifting to a more keyboard centric environment, try fluxbox. Wicked cool with all things in place, plus it is fast too, not to mention custom ways you can mould it to.
-- "Genius is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration" - TAE --
I skimmed the article, and I didn't see one other reason why I think everything that can be done with a mouse should also be doable by a keyboard, even stuff that is more efficient to do with a mouse: scripting.
Generally, scripting and automating mouse actions is very difficult. Scripting and automating keyboard actions is trivial.
...run by someone with no credentials, who couldn't even be bothered to make his own blog template.
He blathers on about some "proposal," which basically involves popping up menus based on modifier keys. Then he says "Without further adieu." This is a worthless blog, and a worthless post, and a new low for slashdot being used to jack up hit counters.
Is it just me or does this "new" system look a lot like the control system employed by Emacs (and even vi), but with a colorful overlay?
Rankmaniac 2010
Stick out your arm, just do it. Now hold it there for 5 minutes. Do you start to feel a little tired? Now leave it out there for another 10 minutes, see how good you feel.
Now imagine doing that straight through an 8-hour work day.
The only ways around this would be to make all screens flat against the desk (like a piece of paper) or to pivot your arm at the elbow. But even the elbow lever method would wear you out after a while. Sure it would probably be good exercise but I'm sure it would cause more health problems than a mouse in the long term.
If you don't like the mouse, try track pads, roller balls, pens, etc. Personally I use the trackball, with my only complaint being I have to continusouly clean the thing (more than my old ball-type mice).
People like mice because the way the GUI interfaces is set up with a mouse gives people information on the fly now to use the program, while doing things with a mouse. Accessing those same things with a keybaord can only really be done with the menus, and those are usually set up to be more mouse efficient.
I think the author hit the nail on the head with his article. You can't just make the application do everything via the keybaord. Rather, you have to have it able to use the keyboard for any task, and able to prompt the user so that they don't have to keep going to references to find what they want.
The overlay idea is fairly interesting and ingenious compared to what a normal keyboard-only interface produces. I kinda like that solution.
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It was called vi. [ctl]s isn't much more efficient than [esc]:s
I like the idea of making as many commands as possible doable with the keyboard, but half the point to a gui is the ability to use the mouse instead of having to memorize a bunch of cryptic commands. Just keep the most used commands accessible by keyboard, and leave the rest to be hit with the mouse. Yeah, mice are kind of crappy for an input device, but redesigning the mouse will work better than redesigning the interface. The reason vi and emacs and other command-based editors aren't in common use outside of the geek world is because no one wants to do that except geeks.
The louder he talked of his honour, the faster we counted our spoons. -- Ralph Waldo Emerson
Wants to go back to the 'good old days' where you'd have to tab 20 times to get to the text box you want (enevitably you'd press it 21 times and have to start over), have to remember different key combinations for every program (most keep the basics the same but advanced functions usually are different) and generally do most graphical activities slower?
Users like icons and using mouse for most activities because it's easier, safer and there's less risk of doing the wrong thing by accident. Who here hasn't experienced the frustration of losing 20 minutes of typing or resetting a connection because they pressed 'backspace' to try and delete some text only for a browser to go back a page?
Now that we've got that settled about mice, how about the widespread misuse in CSS style sheets of "body {font-size: 62.5%;}". I set my font size so that I can read the body text on pages which don't pull that crap, and now every blogger in the world has their body size set to 62.5% because that was the default that came with their TypePressBlogger thingy. So now I have to zoom the text on blog pages and Digg, and then un-zoom it when I go back to "normal" pages.
If you want your headline text bigger, then freaking set the headline font size to greater than 100%!
Admittedly, this wasn't such a problem until I got a MacBook Pro, with its higher DPI screen than the previous generation. But 62.5% also wasn't such a fad back then either.
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You know there are professions that have been in use for ages that require you to use your arms all day. Blacksmithing, weaving, farming, manufacturing, etc, etc. You would learn to do it, just as you have learned not to do it. Besides, if it was laid down on the desk, it would be like ... writing, you know, that people have done for ages. Maybe we could get some Franciscan Monks to teach us how to hold a pen for 8 hours. Yeesh.
Sera
Slashdot, where armchair scientists get shouted down and armchair theologians get modded up.
I doubt most folks would disagree with that for basic word processing, power computer users (which includes 98% of /. readers) often prefer memorizing tons of secret key strokes over using the mouse. Duh. But for folks that don't live and breath these apps, mouse-driven menus at least let folks easily access EVERYTHING.
The issue is that it's inefficient to switch between multiple input devices so one should design GUIs that allow users to go with the flow rather than forcing them to constantly switch in the middle of their workflow. But the article obsesses with trying to argue that the keyboard is far superior to the mouse rather than saying the keyboard is better for applications that focus on text entry.
Try creating Powerpoint slides without a mouse - or navigating the web - or playing games - or anything except for text-entry centric apps. It's a ridiculous premise to argue that the mouse is obsolete.
Artists and Draftsman have been doing it for centuries.
Just shift to a drawing-table-style inclined workspace for display and input.
The problem isn't that people don't like the mouse.
The problem is that the mouse is not good at what it's being used to do.
Further, touchscreens do what mousing does far better and the keyboard does the remainder even better than that.
So why not combine it all into an inclined desktop with an app-programmable touch-based keyboard (live app-specific shotcut keys with meaningful icons) and a touch-sensitive flat display?
Clickety-clack fans could even keep the physical 101, and their programmable touch keyspace could just wrap around the sides and top for additional shortcut keys.
// "Can't clowns and pirates just -try- to get along?"
For me, the quickest path is a nice fine blend of keyboard & mouse. I find myself using the keyboard much more often than the mouse though.
The one thing I realized I can't live without is the mouse wheel. That saves quite a bit of clicking over to the scrollbar arrows, etc. Sadly, it's not supported everywhere, even in 2007. Windows' Remote Desktop often filters it out on scrollbars, which makes kitty unhappy.
Sadly, my middle mouse button(scrollwheel) doesn't close firefox tabs in my newer Logitech & MS mouse like my old MS Intellimouse Explorer used to. that saved me a lot of rt click & close tab actions. The mice made today have a much stiffer wheel that doesn't adapt to your finger over time.
If you've ever watch an excel expert their hands almost never leave the keyboard. Excel is really well designed such that almost all the commands are easily accessible from keyboard shortcuts and power users quickly come up to speed on the commands. The interface for excel is extremely well thought out making it easy for beginners to be guided through the options and power users to be able to blaze through. Excel is perhaps one of the best designed and most usable programs ever. (The OSS alternatives for excel are good for basic lists and trival spreadsheets. Excel is one reason that Open Office is unlikely to succeed in corporate environments.)
Ever seen the back of a 60 year old draftsman?
I would say fortunately.
It has been a pet gripe of mine: why do developers insist that data entry can be performed with a mouse? Programming, writing the great novel etc. that is what folks think of with this but..BUT! What of the lowly clerk? This poor soul data enters all day...They must key enter the vouchers the salesman brings in, the payment coupons, the thousand and one non-OCR compliant bits of data that need be digitized.. Ever watched a clerk do their job? - type type type in a field, click to the next field (because some wit forgot to make the fields tab-able), type type type, click, type, click, etc.. right hand is on the keyboard, then the mouse, then the keyboard then the mouse.... The action of reach and click reduces the clerk's effectiveness at their job by a goodly percentage. "elephant: Mouse designed by committee and built to government specifications" -seems to apply in this case too.
- Minutus cantorum, minutus balorum, minutus carborata descendum pantorum.
because some wit forgot to make the fields tab-able
Or made them tab-able but not following a logical order (such as the order the fields are on the screen)
No sig
I can never be sure when watching someone type-click-type-click that the developer is at fault. Hell, even my wife does that sometimes, despite me harping on her that she can just hit return or tab...I think it's intellectual lazyness: "I'm too lazy to try to understand the tool I'm using so that I can use it better."
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