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Improper Keyboard Row Selection Behavior

#60

Steps to Reproduce:

  1. Go to a transaction list view with at least 4 rows: A, B, C, D.
  2. Click row C to select it.
  3. Hold down the shift key and press the up arrow key twice, selecting rows A through C.
  4. Press the down arrow key.

Expected Results:

Row D should be selected.

Actual Results:

Row B is selected.

Regression:

This works properly if a selection is extended by holding down shift and clicking, but not by using the keyboard.

Notes:

After pressing an arrow key by itself, instead of selecting the next row outside of the selection, the next row from the unanchored end of the selection is selected. I haven't checked the HIG, but this is at least how Finder list views operate.

Reported by Randy Becker · August 22nd, 2009 @ 06:22 PM

State: invalid
Milestone: none
Assigned to: nobody

Activity

  1. Virgil Dupras
    Virgil Dupras

    I think that it's a Carbon vs Cocoa thing. Yes, Finder and iTunes behave like this, but other apps I tried (Transmit and Versions) behave like moneyGuru. I'd be curious to see how Finder will behave in Snow Leopard (since it's being rewritten in Cocoa).

    August 22nd, 2009 @ 06:59 PM

  2. Randy Becker
    Randy Becker

    I think you're right. Safari also acts like Transmit and moneyGuru. It's strange that I never noticed the difference before. I think Carbon has it right; text deselection works similarly in both Carbon and Cocoa. I filed a bug with Apple. rdar://7163022.

    August 22nd, 2009 @ 08:12 PM

  3. Virgil Dupras
    Virgil Dupras
    • State changed from new to invalid

    I doubt that Apple considers this as a bug. The Cocoa's way make sense as well, as there's a selection, which can be multiple, and a "focus", which is a single row. Thus, regardless of whether you hold shift or not, the focus row will behave the same if you press up 3 times and then down once.

    In any case, I'll set this ticket as invalid because moneyGuru is simply following Cocoa's default behavior.

    August 23rd, 2009 @ 08:05 AM

  4. Randy Becker
    Randy Becker

    I agree that it definitely isn't a bug with moneyGuru. I do think it is an Apple bug; standard controls should behave in standard ways. Making interfaces predictable is an important part of making them usable. If you make a selection in a list, it's hard to predict which item will be highlighted if you then press an arrow key. Not only does it depend on the direction in which you made the selection, it depends on whether it's a Carbon or Cocoa application.

    August 23rd, 2009 @ 03:51 PM

  5. Randy Becker
    Randy Becker

    In Snow Leopard, the Finder behaves like moneyGuru, and any other Cocoa application.

    September 1st, 2009 @ 12:00 AM

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