Re: [Usability] Single click directory navigation?

[Magnus Bergman <magnusbe algonet se>]

On Sun, 14 Sep 2003 19:43:37 -0400
"Curtis C. Hovey" <sinzui cox net> wrote:

> On Sun, 2003-09-14 at 17:45, Sean Middleditch wrote:
> > On Sun, 2003-09-14 at 17:20, Gregory Merchan wrote:
> > > On Sun, Sep 14, 2003 at 05:19:45PM +0300, Tuomas Kuosmanen wrote:
> > > > On Sun, 2003-09-14 at 19:03, Magnus Bergman wrote:
> > > > > Has the idea of single click directory navigation (click once
> > > > > on a directory to enter it) ever been considered for the FOSA
> > > > > dialog? This is used in Deluxe Paint and GQView for example
> > > > > and I like it very much. (I'm lazy and clicking once is half
> > > > > the job of click twice, right?)
> > > 
> > > Not really. Double-clicking comes so naturally to so many that web
> > > browsers have to ignore the second click. Single-click activation
> > > becomes costly where selection is desirable.
> > 
> > It's natural because so many places require it where they arguably
> > shouldn't.
> 
> It has been argued by many usability professionals that the mouse
> needs specialized buttons, select, inspect, activate.  Now if we
> didn't have 20 years of mouse behavior to unlearn, we could make it
> simpler by requiring 3 button mouses and provide sticky labels for the
> buttons to remind the user it's simple.

Didn't this use to be the case in the Unix world before it got invaded
by windows inspired strangeness? Back in school think the Solaris
machines had mice with buttons for active, select and menu. And the
whole environment was consistent with it. There ware also some
additional, more specialised, buttons on the keyboard, like minimise and
help. If you pressed help you got help about the things near the
pointer. You really miss that stuff then you are forced to use windows
(in school that is, never used it since).

> It would be great to have a little app that could show what keyboard
> keys and mouse buttons are mapped to in the desktops current state,
> but I'd need to map that to a unique key to display it in the context
> of the apps/windows that are open and in focus.  I might need another
> app to tell me which key I mapped my map or keys and buttons.

Do you mean to merge the key bindings of the current window (provided by
an application) with the global key bindings (usually provided by the
window manager) and show them all together? In case you do, that was a
quite interesting idea. Maybe someone should think of a standard to
query key bindings and make that possible?