Yeah I read that editorial a while ago; I agree with some of your points and not others (IMO, copy/paste should be easy to implement for finger-input and scrolling is easier/faster with finger-input).
Copy/paste with fingers has the same problem that drawing has -- specifying your starting and ending points exactly. For example, if I put my finger on a Web page full of text, I could be covering 9 characters or more (3 on 3 lines). How would you improve that accuracy to avoid selecting the wrong place to start? A stylus makes it easier.
As for scrolling, how is finger-input faster? I've heard Android starts scrolling with a flick and ends with a touch (or something), but I assume the scroll speed is fixed. With a stylus, I can rip the stylus quickly to the bottom of the page or scroll more deliberately to pinpoint where I want to stop. I can also do page-at-a-time scrolling by tapping above or below the scroll box, which seems almost as fast as a flick scroll (assuming I have the stylus in hand, of course).
Maybe there are decent ways to do those with your finger and I'm just not imaginative enough, so let me know.
No, this is incorrect. Currently, the G1 only has text input in the landscape (keyboard open) mode. There are builds of alpha releases that have soft keyboards floating out on the web, so a solution is there long-term.
--janak
Not sure what you're saying was incorrect as I was referring to 3rd party soft-keyboard projects available for download.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Pony99CA
Copy/paste with fingers has the same problem that drawing has -- specifying your starting and ending points exactly. For example, if I put my finger on a Web page full of text, I could be covering 9 characters or more (3 on 3 lines). How would you improve that accuracy to avoid selecting the wrong place to start? A stylus makes it easier.
Yes an advantage to a stylus is that it instant knows the point of contact, however, exact curser position isn't a problem with the iPhone because it has the little magnifying glass that pops up. Also in addition to comparing input words to a dictionary, the iphone uses an algorithm to figure out exactly where you meant to press (based on the shape and pressure gradient of your finger's contact patch). So copy and paste is a non-issue.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Pony99CA
As for scrolling, how is finger-input faster? I've heard Android starts scrolling with a flick and ends with a touch (or something), but I assume the scroll speed is fixed. With a stylus, I can rip the stylus quickly to the bottom of the page or scroll more deliberately to pinpoint where I want to stop. I can also do page-at-a-time scrolling by tapping above or below the scroll box, which seems almost as fast as a flick scroll (assuming I have the stylus in hand, of course).
Maybe there are decent ways to do those with your finger and I'm just not imaginative enough, so let me know.
Finger input allows you to quickly and intuitively apply a certain amount of momentum to scrolling. On the iPhone, it scrolls at various speeds, depending on how you flicked it (when I wrote it's quicker, I was referring not to the speed of the scrolling itself, but rather how quickly and conveniently you can get it to scroll the way you want... though on that note it also allows for faster scrolling than my old stylus devices did).
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Not sure what you're saying was incorrect as I was referring to 3rd party soft-keyboard projects available for download.
Oh, nevermind then. Apologies for the misstatement. I obviously don't know my Android 3rd-party apps.
Quote:
Finger input allows you to quickly and intuitively apply a certain amount of momentum to scrolling. On the iPhone, it scrolls at various speeds, depending on how you flicked it (when I wrote it's quicker, I was referring not to the speed of the scrolling itself, but rather how quickly and conveniently you can get it to scroll the way you want... though on that note it also allows for faster scrolling than my old stylus devices did).
Not only that, but the fact that you don't need to navigate to a scrollbar (thanks to gesture recognition) is a major advantage. The iPhone also has a shortcut to top-of-list. Apart from special cases (i.e., scrolling to the bottom of a long list), I find touch scrolling far quicker than stylus-based scrolling.
Yes an advantage to a stylus is that it instant knows the point of contact, however, exact curser position isn't a problem with the iPhone because it has the little magnifying glass that pops up. Also in addition to comparing input words to a dictionary, the iphone uses an algorithm to figure out exactly where you meant to press (based on the shape and pressure gradient of your finger's contact patch). So copy and paste is a non-issue.
Then why doesn't the iPhone have it?
I think the problem could be that they used swiping motions for scrolling, and thus can't use them for text selection. A dedicated area for scrolling (a scroll bar) allows distinguishing between the scenarios.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Deslock
Finger input allows you to quickly and intuitively apply a certain amount of momentum to scrolling. On the iPhone, it scrolls at various speeds, depending on how you flicked it (when I wrote it's quicker, I was referring not to the speed of the scrolling itself, but rather how quickly and conveniently you can get it to scroll the way you want... though on that note it also allows for faster scrolling than my old stylus devices did).
I've haven't used the iPhone much (maybe 5 minutes), but I'm not sure how "intuitive" the speed would be. Is there a calibration system that allows setting how various flicks correspond to scrolling distances/speeds? If not, how does one know how far one will scroll based on a given flick?
Plus, a scroll bar easily indicates roughly where you are in the document and allows you to change your position in an absolute manner.
Of course, if you can solve the problem of distinguishing scrolling from selection, then nothing prevents Windows Mobile from implementing flick gestures, either. (In fact, I think several programs already do that, but probably in limited locations.) You could have the advantage of finger-friendly input with the improved precision of scroll bars (using my finger-friendly/stylus-friendly modes).
Not only that, but the fact that you don't need to navigate to a scrollbar (thanks to gesture recognition) is a major advantage.
Wow, "navigate" makes it sound like a difficult and time-consuming process; I would just say "move". Moving a distance of less than 4 inches is hardly "navigation".
Wow, "navigate" makes it sound like a difficult and time-consuming process; I would just say "move". Moving a distance of less than 4 inches is hardly "navigation".
Try shifting from typing on a thumbboard, for instance, to scrolling. With a WM device, unless you're really dexterous, you have to stop, pull out the stylus, move it to the scrollbar, and navigate.
Even if you're only doing stylus-based input, it's still some work to locate the down arrow or the scroll bar or the scroll region and tap. With touch scrolling, you just scroll anywhere on the screen and the gesture recognition picks it up immediately.
It's worth playing with an iPhone or an iPod touch to get a good feel for the scrolling physics embedded in the device.
I think the problem could be that they used swiping motions for scrolling, and thus can't use them for text selection. A dedicated area for scrolling (a scroll bar) allows distinguishing between the scenarios.
I've haven't used the iPhone much (maybe 5 minutes), but I'm not sure how "intuitive" the speed would be. Is there a calibration system that allows setting how various flicks correspond to scrolling distances/speeds? If not, how does one know how far one will scroll based on a given flick?
Plus, a scroll bar easily indicates roughly where you are in the document and allows you to change your position in an absolute manner.
Of course, if you can solve the problem of distinguishing scrolling from selection, then nothing prevents Windows Mobile from implementing flick gestures, either. (In fact, I think several programs already do that, but probably in limited locations.) You could have the advantage of finger-friendly input with the improved precision of scroll bars (using my finger-friendly/stylus-friendly modes).
Steve
Responding to your three main points:
What I wrote before (and you quoted) basically explains why the iPhone doesn't have a stylus: In short, Apple figured out how to implement exact cursor position with finger input (in a simple and convenient way) and for most users a stylus is more trouble than it's worth.
There is no problem with distinguishing between scrolling and selecting text with finger input. Search youtube for demos of the various copy/paste solutions currently available to jailbreak users (as well as videos demonstrating copy/paste concepts).
Dedicated scroll areas on a phone suck. Even when they're tiny, they pixels they take up would be better used for viewing content. And you have to be precise when you tap on them.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Pony99CA
Wow, "navigate" makes it sound like a difficult and time-consuming process; I would just say "move". Moving a distance of less than 4 inches is hardly "navigation".
Steve
Using a stylus to select a tiny scroll bar obviously doesn't bother you, but scrolling with your finger anywhere on the screen is comparatively intuitive and convenient. As I mentioned in a previous post, a stylus is nice for a few types of applications (such as inputting complex characters or drawing) but otherwise is a clumsy and out-of-date interface on a phone.
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What I wrote before (and you quoted) basically explains why the iPhone doesn't have a stylus: In short, Apple figured out how to implement exact cursor position with finger input (in a simple and convenient way) and for most users a stylus is more trouble than it's worth.
Sorry, I wasn't clear. The "it" I was referring to was copy/paste in the last sentence of the part I quoted. If copy/paste is so easy, why hasn't Apple added it yet?
Quote:
Originally Posted by Deslock
Dedicated scroll areas on a phone suck. Even when they're tiny, they pixels they take up would be better used for viewing content. And you have to be precise when you tap on them.
They hardly suck. They're a metaphor any PC user is used to. Yes, they do take space, but you could probably make them auto-hide (similar to the option on the Windows task bar). (And, with the iPhone's larger display, scroll bars would take up less space than on your standard QVGA Windows Mobile devices. )
However, scroll bars serve another purpose. They're a quick visual indicator of where you are in the document itself. That's useful information regardless if you use a stylus or not.
Some people respond that you could still show a scroll indicator that takes up less space than a scroll bar (and Windows Mobile Standard does that), but it doesn't work as well on touch systems. Thanks to people's experience with PCs, users think that anything that looks like a scroll bar should behave like one.
One job I had was testing a PC VOIP phone client that duplicated the look of a physical VOIP phone. The real phone has a directional pad for navigation and a touch screen with scroll indicators to indicate where in lists you are. You could tap an item on the screen to choose it, but you had to use the directional pad to scroll. I saw bug reports from people wondering why the scroll bar didn't work. The combination of the touch screen and scroll indicator made them think the indicator was actually a scroll bar control.
In fact, when I first started testing the PC version, I tried to use my mouse to scroll through the list. It was mentally jarring to discover that I couldn't and had to click the directional pad control just like on the real phone.
Another reason dedicated control areas don't suck is because it doesn't matter if you get fingerprints on them. How often does an iPhone user have to clean their screen from all of the touching? And, because the screen is touch sensitive, I assume you have to turn the phone "off" (or sleep or lock) to do that if you don't want unexpected actions to occur (although I'm not sure if that's true on a capacitance screen; it is on a resistive screen).
That's probably one reason the Pre has a dedicated gesture area.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Deslock
Using a stylus to select a tiny scroll bar obviously doesn't bother you, but scrolling with your finger anywhere on the screen is comparatively intuitive and convenient.
I've agreed that it's more convenient (and have argued that Windows Mobile should support finger-friendly input). However, it's not quite as intuitive as you think.
I assume making a downward swipe on the screen scrolls you toward the bottom of the document, correct? That would imply that you're moving the viewport down on the document, but you could also argue that you could be moving the document itself down (and thus scrolling toward the top of the document).
In a scroll bar control, the scroll box (or thumb) represents your position in the document, and moving it directly indicates where you want your position to be. It's less ambiguous.
To be fair, the ambiguity isn't just with flick scrolling. The mouse wheel exhibits similar ambiguity (are you moving the viewport or the document?), as do some spin button controls (does clicking the down arrow reduce the value displayed or rotate the next number above the one displayed down into view like a car's odometer?).
Obviously, once you've done it a few times, you know what to expect, but it's still learned behavior, not intuition.
Again, I'm not opposed to touch scrolling. I just think the stylus provides additional flexibility (and maybe even speed in some cases) and scroll bars still have uses. Phones shouldn't require a stylus, but Windows Mobile Professional phones should still allow the option of using them.
Copy/Paste and Scrolling
Linear Mode
