RE: [Emacs-diffs] /srv/bzr/emacs/trunk r99650: Put scroll-baron right by default on UNIX.

[Drew Adams]

> Stefan Monnier <address@hidden> writes:
> 
> >> It might help to reduce its size.  I use 
> >> --without-toolkit-scrollbars myself and additionally
> >> (setq-default scroll-bar-width 15)
> >
> > 15 is reduced?  I've had it set to 6 for so long that I 
> > can't imagine what "more than 15" could fee like,
> 
> It has been smaller at one time for me, but screen resolutions have
> increased.  Maybe it would make sense for such resources to be
> specifiable as a float and have it measured as a multiple of the
> standard font's character pitch rather than an absolute number of
> pixels.
> 
> I want to be able to hit the scrollbar without squinting somewhat
> reliably, and 0.8 characters are more or less what makes that 
> convenient for me.

I never thought I'd reply to this thread, but you open a side topic that is
interesting. Yes, 0.8 chars. Or 1.3 chars, or 0.6 chars. Users can have
different preferences, but what's interesting is to have the scroll-bar width
follow the frame char size.

As a default scroll-bar size (possibly giving users some way to customize to
override/adjust, as in 0.8 vs 1.0), the default (frame) char size is a good
yardstick. If you can see and manipulate chars with the mouse, then the same
generally holds for the scroll bar.

In fact, I miss the Emacs 20 feature (yes, to me it is a feature), at least on
Windows, that the scroll bar size (width) follows the frame char size in just
this way. If you shrink a frame (its font), then the scroll bar width shrinks
accordingly. Whatever size text you (your eyes and your mouse fingers) are
comfortable with, the scroll bar will be the same size, so you are likely to be
comfortable with it also.

A side-benefit of the Emacs 20 behavior (on Windows, at least) is that I can
leave the scroll bars turned in my thumbnail frames (tiny frames that act kinda
like icons). You can scroll them using the mouse, in addition to using keys. See
attached images - the scroll bar in the Emacs 20 case is only a few pixels wide,
but it works fine.

Obviously, you would not want to do lots of work using the mouse on a thumbnail
frame. But you can - select text, click buttons/links, scroll, etc. The point is
that if you're comfortable manipulating text of a given size, then you are
likely to be just as comfortable using a scroll bar of about that size (width).

Yes, I know, we're not going to go back to the display system used for Emacs 20.
(Too bad, at least in some respects, like this one. IMO.)

throw-emacs-23-thumb-frame.png
Description: PNG image

throw-emacs-20-thumb-frame.png
Description: PNG image