Re: [Usability]Re: Right Click the same as Ctrl+LeftClick???

[Calum Benson <calum benson sun com>]

On Fri, 2002-11-29 at 18:17, Alan Horkan wrote:

> On 29 Nov 2002, Curtis C. Hovey wrote:
> 
> > Date: 29 Nov 2002 08:51:05 -0500
> > From: Curtis C. Hovey <sinzui cox net>
> > To: Usability <usability gnome org>, desktop-devel-list gnome org
> > Subject: Re: Right Click the same as Ctrl+LeftClick???
> >
> > > How about click and hold? I'm not a Mac person, but I've seen Macs that
> > > do this. And I've seen it on handhelds. It would certianly help the
> > > Tablet situation..
> 
> This sounds very interesting and if you have and references i would love
> to read them (ill google and see if i can find anything myself of
> course).

This sounded like an interesting enough issue to put to poll my
usability colleagues about, so here are their assorted responses :)

---

Microsoft's single-click model never took off despite the ballyhoo.  A
big problem is, indeed, how to select without opening, if single-select
is reserved for opening (or whatever the default action is for that
item).  Hovering is far too difficult and tenuous, and causes
inadvertent selections because people use their pointer to just point at
things, to doodle, and they let it drift.  Modifier keys are annoying,
because they must be used a lot, because selection happens a lot--a lot
more than opening.

There are other ways to overcome the disadvantages of double click.
Most notable is the ability of many pointing devices to execute double
click with a single click of one of their multiple buttons.  Some
pointing devices even come configured that way out of the box.

And no, single-click isn't great "on the Web."  We've been struggling
for years to compensate for single-click in web applications

---

Relying on cursor change to signal state:

I've had repeated opportunities to observe that a change in cursor 
icon is *not* a sufficient visual cue to signal hot spots in a 
desktop application.   Users just miss it.   On the web, they're 
always looking for it, of course, but in my view the web forces me to 
spend far too much time scanning for hot spots (hunt and peck) and so 
is just another way in which the web offers sub-standard UI.  Forcing 
people to attend to *our* subtle UI cues is a violation of our basic 
mission, which is to let users concentrate on their work, not the 
application!

Double-click:

My views on single- versus double-click are similarly old fashioned.
Double-click is a motor pattern that humans find easy and are able to 
map to visual cues on the screen.   If double-click is now seen as a 
burden or annoyance, I believe that is ONLY because of the confusion 
brought about by the web (and Microsoft) in taking it away.   Studies 
at Apple showed that early users of the WWW always double-clicked 
links.  I watched my own 6-year-old daughter double-clicking links.

Double-clicking was easy for everyone to do, back in the days when 
our brains understood the underlying model:   double-click mapped 
onto ALL opening/navigating actions.  Now that it's muddled, then yes 
of course having some actions require double-click and some not makes 
the whole thing more annoying.   And logically double-click will feel 
more annoying because you naturally try single-click first.  Nothing 
happens so you single-click again hoping (against hope) that you came 
in under the requisite time-delay.  Most times, you find you didn't 
so you have to initiate the whole action again.

--- 

Perhaps the GNOME folks should get their user model straight (objects vs
actions), then leave well enough alone. If they try to change it, users
that use other computer systems too (virtually all GNOME users I expect)
will hate the difference.

Some history if you're interested... Double-click to open an object was
developed on the Lisa (multi-clicking existed before that, but only as a
means of extending a selection). We realized that clicking an icon to
select it and then going to a menu to invoke 'Open' was way to tedious
for this most common of operations.

Double-click was later generalized to "first click means select and
second click means 'do the default/common operation'". Before we reached
the generalization, we had a big battle over whether the window close
box was a button (single click) or whether a double-click should be
required (for symmetry). The Lisa (wrongly) chose double-click and it
worked ok because that is what the muscles learned. The Mac team
switched to single click to close and it has been that way ever since.

A desktop/folder icon has two components, the graphic and a name. Lisa
applied 'double-click to open' only to the icon, not the name (which
responded to normal text-editing interactions). Some users didn't
distinguish between these and complained that they double-clicked on the
name and the icon didn't open. The Mac team responded by including the
name in the double-click, forcing an ugly renaming scheme: click icon to
select, pause, click name to edit. If this is done too quickly the icon
is opened into a window. Arrgh...  The cure was worse than the problem.

---

Tell the Gnome guys to stick to the traditional (Macintosh) meaning 
for Single-Click to select and Double-Click to open. It works, and 
you don't have to invent a non-standard way to deal with the 
Use-Mention problem.

---

Why not let the user decide if they want to use single or double click
for icons.  I have found individual preferences vary.

If single click is supported then mouse over selection needs to be
supported in order to support multiple selection.

</comments>

Cheeri,
Calum.

-- 
CALUM BENSON, Usability Engineer       Sun Microsystems Ireland
mailto:calum benson sun com            GNOME Desktop Group
http://ie.sun.com                      +353 1 819 9771

Any opinions are personal and not necessarily those of Sun Microsystems