[Xquartz-dev] 2.3.1_beta1

[Viv Kendon]

On Sat, 9 Aug 2008, Martin Costabel wrote:

> Viv Kendon wrote:
> []
>> Right-click (button 2) is command-click in Tiger.
>
> Viv, please don't confuse this even more than it is already. Long before
> Windows came along with its 2-button mouse, X11 was made for 3-button
> mice where buttons 1, 2, 3 are left, middle, right.

Actually, because that was about MAC OS, not X11, I was 
thinking of the Apple 5 button mouse, which I think does 
label the right button as 2 and the middle as 3.  But I 
don't have one at the moment to bring the preferences up to 
check.  My apologies if I misremembered their labels.  I 
also mouse left-handed, so right-left labels can be a bit 
awkward.  I'm going to use "primary" "secondary" and 
"middle" from now on (which is what they get called in 
Preferences if you plug a generic 3 button mouse in).

I certainly agree it is confusing.  Especially because MAC 
OS did change to using crtl-click for "secondary mouse 
button" (i.e. right button for most people) in Leopard. 
Which is what confused Jeremy.  And means that X11 will need 
to emulate mouse buttons differently from MAC OS, because we 
need ctrl for other things, as you point out.

Under Tiger, Apple's X11 did use the same emulation for 
secondary mouse button as MAC OS (command-click). 
XDarwin/Xorg allowed you to choose.

Personally, I prefer to use trackpad actions as mouse 
buttons, and a two-finger tap on newer trackpads does give a 
seconary mouse button click.  However, there is no way in 
MAC OS to tap a middle button so there is no point 
discussing it here.  But it does mean I only need to emulate 
one mouse button for x11.  Having it configurable would make 
a lot of sense, I could use cmd-click for middle button and 
leave option/alt free to be meta for emacs (for example).

-- Viv

> By all means make this configurable, but Jeremy, please don't make
> ctrl-click = button2 or button3 by default. It is needed for
> ctrl-button1. Until now, fortunately, I don't see this happening in
> 2.3.1_beta1, I see it only in the wrong text in the Preferences, where
> it is written that one should "Hold Option or Control while clicking to
> activate the middle or right mouse buttons".
>
> Please, please, don't do this!
>
> -- 
> Martin

________________________________________________
Dr Viv Kendon    http://quantum.leeds.ac.uk/~viv
tel: +44 113 343 4864      Physics and Astronomy
Quantum Information Group    University of Leeds