So I'm sitting here typing on my laptop. To my right is a large monitor. Sometimes it's a little hard to type on the laptop while watching the monitor, so I have a second keyboard under it in case I need to do anything significant. I have a mouse between the two.
Let's say I'm coding on the laptop, and I want to scroll the docs that are up on the monitor. Three things need to happen here: 1) focus on the docs, 2) scroll, and 3) focus back on my work. My goal of course is to do this as swiftly and effortlessly as possible.
So, using the keyboard: I alt-tab from editor to browser, hit the space bar to scroll down, alt-tab back.
Alt-tabbing is more of a hassle the more programs I have open. Additionally, the scrolling is either a lot (page down) or a little (down arrow); usually what I want is something in between. It could be made easier if I had a specific keystroke set up to switch to Chrome, or to scroll by x amount, but that's far from intuitive.
Using the mouse: I move my hand down to the trackpad, or over to the mouse. Wiggle it around briefly to locate the cursor, then drag it across the screen to the second monitor. Use two-finger scrolling or the mouse wheel to scroll to where I want to. On OS X I blessedly don't have to click to focus scrolling, so I could start typing immediately, but to avoid confusion (and because I want to scroll my code) I need to drag the pointer back.
This provides a much better scrolling experience, but the process of moving focus across monitors with a pointing device is a huge drag.
Using a hypothetical desktop gesture reader: I lift my hand in front of the second monitor. This focuses on the window. I draw two fingers down (or up) to scroll. I drop my hand back to the keyboard and begin typing immediately.
My elbow stays on the table, so it's quite comfortable. I have excellent granularity in scrolling— not as good as the mouse wheel, since I'm not actually touching the screen, but probably about as good as two finger scrolling. Most helpfully, the task of focusing on the browser and back is about as effortless and intuitive as it possibly could be without reading my mind.
Let's say I'm coding on the laptop, and I want to scroll the docs that are up on the monitor. Three things need to happen here: 1) focus on the docs, 2) scroll, and 3) focus back on my work. My goal of course is to do this as swiftly and effortlessly as possible.
So, using the keyboard: I alt-tab from editor to browser, hit the space bar to scroll down, alt-tab back.
Alt-tabbing is more of a hassle the more programs I have open. Additionally, the scrolling is either a lot (page down) or a little (down arrow); usually what I want is something in between. It could be made easier if I had a specific keystroke set up to switch to Chrome, or to scroll by x amount, but that's far from intuitive.
Using the mouse: I move my hand down to the trackpad, or over to the mouse. Wiggle it around briefly to locate the cursor, then drag it across the screen to the second monitor. Use two-finger scrolling or the mouse wheel to scroll to where I want to. On OS X I blessedly don't have to click to focus scrolling, so I could start typing immediately, but to avoid confusion (and because I want to scroll my code) I need to drag the pointer back.
This provides a much better scrolling experience, but the process of moving focus across monitors with a pointing device is a huge drag.
Using a hypothetical desktop gesture reader: I lift my hand in front of the second monitor. This focuses on the window. I draw two fingers down (or up) to scroll. I drop my hand back to the keyboard and begin typing immediately.
My elbow stays on the table, so it's quite comfortable. I have excellent granularity in scrolling— not as good as the mouse wheel, since I'm not actually touching the screen, but probably about as good as two finger scrolling. Most helpfully, the task of focusing on the browser and back is about as effortless and intuitive as it possibly could be without reading my mind.