grahamt@syma.sussex.ac.uk (Graham Thomas) (12/18/89)
The disk cataloguing program STDCAT has a feature which I quite like - I wonder if it's worth implementing more generally. It's called 'auto newtop' in the menu bar, and when it's activated the window under the mouse pointer automatically becomes the 'active' window. What do you think? Would this be a desirable feature to have in the desktop (or in an alternative like NeoDesk)? Clearly there would be some overhead in display update time, and there may be problems with overlapping windows if your mouse pointer strayed into an unwanted overlapping window on the way to the one you want. But would it be worthwhile to implement (as a user-selectable option, of course)? Would any existing programs break if 'auto newtop' were installed on the desktop? Would it be a nightmare to write in a way that would cope with every contingency (unlike in STDCAT, where it's in a single program environment)? Sorry - I'm not volunteering to try to write this. I'm just interested to see if anyone else thinks it would be worth doing. Graham -- Graham Thomas, SPRU, Mantell Building, U of Sussex, Brighton, BN1 9RF, UK JANET: grahamt@uk.ac.sussex.syma EARN/BITNET: grahamt@syma.sussex.ac.uk ARPA: grahamt%syma.sussex.ac.uk@nsfnet-relay.ac.uk UUCP: grahamt@syma.uucp Phone: +44 273 686758
exspes@gdr.bath.ac.uk (P E Smee) (12/21/89)
I would think this would be acceptable only if you modified the concept to be somewhat like Sun-windows -- that is, JUST moving the mouse pointer into a window would not 'top' it, but it would be auto-topped if you then DID anything -- hit a keyboard key, press a mouse button, ... The auto-top would NOT eat the key or mouse press, but would top the window and then pass the key or mouse-press through to it. -- Paul Smee, Univ of Bristol Comp Centre, Bristol BS8 1TW, Tel +44 272 303132 Smee@bristol.ac.uk :-) (..!uunet!ukc!gdr.bath.ac.uk!exspes if you MUST)
uace0@uhnix2.uh.edu (Michael B. Vederman) (12/23/89)
Graham Thomas writes about an auto window topper for the desktop... Graham, I wrote such a desk accessory over a year ago, and I found several problems when using this at the desktop and in programs. Of course I do know more about the machine now, but these are what I found back then: At the desktop: The window would come to the top, but the OS wouldn't change the directory pat so you had 'weirdness' do to that. Any program previously selected in the active window became deselected when the new window was automatically topped. Therefore, you couldn't copy very effectively, or do something like a 'show info' because the file would be deselected before you got to where you were going... I did sorta change it such that if you had the right mouse button down it wouldn't auto-top, but whats the point? That's more work... In programs: The window became topped, but unfortunately the bottom window was still the active one (or so the program thought). In a word proccessor, this is kinda funny, because your cursor and block highlights are no where correct for the current window, but rather aligned with the bottom window... All in all, I thought it was a neat idea, but it turned out to be pretty useless (at least back then). Maybe if I get the chance, I'll look into it again... - mike -- ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Double Click Me | Double Click Software | P.O. Box 741206 | Houston, Tx, 77274 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Support BBS: (713)944-0108 | SHADOW | DC FORMATTER | DC UTILITIES | and others