Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!ukma!xanth!lll-winken!snll-arpagw!paolucci
From: paolucci@snll-arpagw.UUCP (Sam Paolucci)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: Re: Yet Another Entry In The 1.4 Wish List...
Keywords: RE: 1.4 Enhancement Wish List
Message-ID: <92@snll-arpagw.UUCP>
Date: 9 Apr 89 01:53:27 GMT
References: <504@morgoth.UUCP> <3453@amiga.UUCP> <505@morgoth.UUCP> <716@ibmpa.UUCP> <980@quintus.UUCP> <91@snll-arpagw.UUCP> <982@quintus.UUCP>
Reply-To: paolucci@snll-arpagw.UUCP (Sam Paolucci)
Organization: Sandia National Labs, Livermore, CA
Lines: 60

In article <982@quintus.UUCP> pds@quintus.UUCP (Peter Schachte) writes:
->I won't respond to your individual points, because they miss my point
->entirely.  I guess I don't communicate as well as I think I do :-(.
->I'll try to be clearer.
->
->X's "no policy" policy is a really good idea, but it needs to be
->followed up with a mechanism that allows users to formulate their own
->policy.  For example, X has a mechanism (the resource manager) that
->gives users a standard way to modify aspects of X programs like the
->color of certain widgets.  There is also the translation manager to
->allow users to bind keystrokes to functions.
->
->There is no similar mechanism for users to bind mouse buttons.  So no
->one trying to write a program that makes any effort to run on a variety
->of hardware will use buttons 4 or 5 for anything important, because few
->people have more than 3 mouse buttons.  And anyone with less than 3 is
->going to be in trouble, because a lot of X software expects 3 mouse
->buttons.  (I wonder what Dale does about this?  Besides selling a 3
->button mouse.)

Now that you have made your point clear, I agree with you entirely.
Any machine that does not support 3 mouse buttons is going to have
difficulty in using many X clients.  What this means is that if
you have interest in using X on the Amiga you should go out and
buy a 3 button mouse from Dale.  Many of those clients cannot be used
effectively on the Amiga with a two button mouse.  On the positive
side, how many clients you think you could use on a MacIntosh with
a 1 button mouse :-) ?

->Even if everyone had 3-button mice, the "no policy" policy gets into
->trouble here.  Since there is no policy of which buttons mean what, each
->application can do whatever it wants.  Chaos.  There is no way for the
->user to create homogeneity other than to only buy software that uses
->mouse buttons the way he does.  Or write it himself.
->
->So what should they have done?  Basically, rather than returning
->uninterpreted mouse button numbers, they should return something with an
->interpretation, and allow users to change the mapping from physical
->event to interpretation.  One way to do this is through the keymap
->facility.  Merge keypresses with buttonpresses, and invent a bunch of
->keycodes for logical mouse operations:  select, extend, menu, insert,
->etc.  This approach would also allow users to map modified mouse buttons
->(e.g., meta+shift+button1) to keycodes, and would allow the keyboard to
->be used instead of the mouse for these things.
->
->Of course, it's too late, the protocol is fixed.  Maybe for X12.
->
->BTW, Intuition avoids this problem by not being policy-free.  I'd rather
->it were policy free, if it allow me to set my own policy.  But I prefer
->SOME policy to anarchy.

I'd rather have chaos and be free, than have rules that tie my hands.  But
as you suggest, maybe there is a better way.


-- 
					-+= SAM =+-
"the best things in life are free"

				ARPA: paolucci@snll-arpagw.llnl.gov