Xref: utzoo comp.sys.mac:13855 comp.windows.misc:265
Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!husc6!mit-eddie!uw-beaver!ssc-vax!benoni
From: benoni@ssc-vax.UUCP (Charles L Ditzel)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac,comp.windows.misc
Subject: Re: 2 button mouse
Message-ID: <1758@ssc-vax.UUCP>
Date: 11 Mar 88 04:07:46 GMT
References: <4129@hoptoad.uucp> <283@rhesus.primate.wisc.edu> <1710@ssc-vax.UUCP> <17702@think.UUCP>
Organization: Boeing Aerospace Corp., Seattle WA
Lines: 45
Keywords: window human computer interface

In article <17702@think.UUCP>, barmar@think.COM (Barry Margolin) writes:
# 
# This whole argument about the number of buttons on the mouse is silly.
# The Mac already has a virtual 16-button mouse.  Where are all those
# other buttons?  One of them is on the mouse itself: you can
# double-click (and some applications even make use of triple-clicking).
# The rest of them are on the keyboard: you can hold down Shift,
# Command, or Alt (and Control, on the new keyboards?) in order to
# modify the meaning of a click.  Thus there are eight combinations of
# modifier keys and either click or double-click, making sixteen ways to
# click the mouse.
How ergononomic!! :)  Seriously, the whole idea of hitting the keyboard
*and* mouse is hardly elegant.  Did Apple do a study on how hitting
the keyboard and mouse is easier for novice users. :)

Think of the possibilities for all those three button mice.  
  
# the mouse clicks currently do).  I also taught my parents, who are
# completely computer illiterate, how to use the Mac.  In this case, I
# am very glad that it only has one button, as it was hard enough
# teaching them how to use the menus, and double-clicking was a major
# achievement.  I can just imagine them calling me up at night to ask
Here you have a very good point.  Having taught people with very little
computer experience...every little nuance is a major learning experience.
Still a two button mouse could have it's uses.
Again say a two button mouse had the second key as help?  Whenever the
the person was lost they could hit the second key.
  
# without having to drag across the entire thing.  MacPaint is a bad
# example: you need to shift-click/drag in order get constrained motion.
Isn't all this dependent on how an application developer chooses to
design his or her code?  Yes..i know Apple has standards they want followed
(just as Sun devoted a section in their SunView Programmer's manual to such
a standard) however people can choose to not follow the standard (such as
Interleaf on the Sun .... and Mac) .
  
# do.  But a computer neophyte would find Emacs completely overwhelming.
# Everywhere I've been where Emacs is used, I've seen lots of Emacs
# wallcharts pasted above terminals.  Apple didn't want people to have
# to post MacWrite wallcharts.
and yet what we gain in simplicity...somehow we lose in power.  Imagine
a MacWrite with levels of power.  So you understand the basic functions
you then can migrate to the second level. and so on ...i'm not sure this
is the answer but it gives you a pause to think about doing such things .
differently.