4 ms·

I like macOS/iOS's hidden scrollbars personally, but I agree with you about not wanting pages to be able to override scrollbar behavior in any manner. The way m

I like macOS/iOS's hidden scrollbars personally, but I agree with you about not wanting pages to be able to override scrollbar behavior in any manner. The way my scrollbars work is perfectly fine and, more importantly, predictable, and I don't need web pages changing that on their creators' masturbatory whims. Too bad Google once again leads the way of being a prominent example of a bad idea with its custom scroll bars on many of its properties.

munchbunny 7y ago
I agree with this, so based on the article I think that browsers should respect the Windows setting since it's an expression of the user's preferences. Other than that, I have a strong preference that webpages don't try to style the scrollbar (with exceptions when it really makes sense).
- nordsieck 7y ago
  > I have a strong preference that webpages don't try to style the scrollbar (with exceptions when it really makes sense). That's the crux of the problem: the only time a website makes changes to the scrollbar is when the author thinks it makes sense. I just disagree all of the time.
  - Springtime 7y ago
    One site I've thought it made sense was in Discord, which acts as a properly themed web app and where the clash of certain native scrollbars would be jarring (eg: bright scrollbars on a dark theme). That said the scroll bar it uses for the user list is microscopic compared to the one used for the message log, which is a baffling decision. For every other regular site, and even most web apps, I always prefer native, for Windows.
- marcosdumay 7y ago
  Well, no problem in making all those styling rules opt-in. When it really makes sense, you can choose to use the author's UI. Apply that for colors too. Applications should respect the DE settings for UI. Browsers are the main culprits here, but only because CAD software isn't widely used. Oh, and there's MS Office, that will respect absolutely nothing. All of those are in the wrong. But everywhere the DE is powerless to enforce its style onto applications, so this is a much harder problem to fix;
- philote 7y ago
  Personally I think the main page's scrollbar should be handled by the OS. For any element inside the page, I think it's ok for the site to handle how the scroll works to make it consistent with the page's design.
NeedMoreTea 7y ago
I used to like MacOS's subtler than Windows approach to scrollbars, but they became too subtle. They were lovely in Snow Leopard: Gently aqua coloured, arrows, large enough for middle aged (or overworked, and in a hurry) eyes. Obvious. Then they went to Lion and ruined them: grey and almost invisible by design. Magical mystery popping into existence when you hover where it ought to be. Probably. I think this is when they inverted the magic mouse scroll behaviour to pretend like your iMac was an iPhone.
- redwall_hp 7y ago
  I've had the setting flipped to always show them since they added that nonsense. It looks a bit more subtle, and isn't brightly colored, but it serves the important role of showing at a glance how long the page is. The backwards scrolling is way more obnoxious though, and I rage every time I use someone else's Mac or do a fresh install.
  - NeedMoreTea 7y ago
    Aye, me too. Though I prefer when they were a little more obvious - now they're a background visual indicator, and essentially deprecated as a control, for being too narrow. Most of the times I encounter backward scrolling on someone else's Mac, it's only there because they never realised Settings let you invert it to sane and useful!
    - jacobolus 7y ago
      The “backward” scrolling (a better name might be “content scrolling” as compared to “window scrolling”) was changed because the “forward” way does not work for scrolling content on a multi-touch display. If the content moves in the opposite direction from the finger, it completely breaks the illusion that the fingers are directly controlling the content. People switching back and forth between Macs and iPhones or iPads initially found it very inconvenient/frustrating to have window scrolling on a touchpad and content scrolling on a touchscreen. It was decided that switching the Mac to be consistent with iOS would cause momentary frustration for Mac users (it requires a few days of retraining to get used to) but would be less frustrating for most users than preserving two inconsistent behaviors into perpetuity. The option to keep the Mac on window scrolling was included to mollify those few Mac users unwilling to spend a few days or weeks re-training themselves to a reversed gesture.
vinniejames 7y ago
I really dislike these, they're too narrow and difficult to scroll manually

munchbunny 7y ago

I agree with this, so based on the article I think that browsers should respect the Windows setting since it's an expression of the user's preferences. Other than that, I have a strong preference that webpages don't try to style the scrollbar (with exceptions when it really makes sense).

nordsieck 7y ago
> I have a strong preference that webpages don't try to style the scrollbar (with exceptions when it really makes sense). That's the crux of the problem: the only time a website makes changes to the scrollbar is when the author thinks it makes sense. I just disagree all of the time.
- Springtime 7y ago
  One site I've thought it made sense was in Discord, which acts as a properly themed web app and where the clash of certain native scrollbars would be jarring (eg: bright scrollbars on a dark theme). That said the scroll bar it uses for the user list is microscopic compared to the one used for the message log, which is a baffling decision. For every other regular site, and even most web apps, I always prefer native, for Windows.
marcosdumay 7y ago
Well, no problem in making all those styling rules opt-in. When it really makes sense, you can choose to use the author's UI. Apply that for colors too. Applications should respect the DE settings for UI. Browsers are the main culprits here, but only because CAD software isn't widely used. Oh, and there's MS Office, that will respect absolutely nothing. All of those are in the wrong. But everywhere the DE is powerless to enforce its style onto applications, so this is a much harder problem to fix;
philote 7y ago
Personally I think the main page's scrollbar should be handled by the OS. For any element inside the page, I think it's ok for the site to handle how the scroll works to make it consistent with the page's design.

NeedMoreTea 7y ago

I used to like MacOS's subtler than Windows approach to scrollbars, but they became too subtle. They were lovely in Snow Leopard: Gently aqua coloured, arrows, large enough for middle aged (or overworked, and in a hurry) eyes. Obvious. Then they went to Lion and ruined them: grey and almost invisible by design. Magical mystery popping into existence when you hover where it ought to be. Probably. I think this is when they inverted the magic mouse scroll behaviour to pretend like your iMac was an iPhone.

redwall_hp 7y ago
I've had the setting flipped to always show them since they added that nonsense. It looks a bit more subtle, and isn't brightly colored, but it serves the important role of showing at a glance how long the page is. The backwards scrolling is way more obnoxious though, and I rage every time I use someone else's Mac or do a fresh install.
- NeedMoreTea 7y ago
  Aye, me too. Though I prefer when they were a little more obvious - now they're a background visual indicator, and essentially deprecated as a control, for being too narrow. Most of the times I encounter backward scrolling on someone else's Mac, it's only there because they never realised Settings let you invert it to sane and useful!
  - jacobolus 7y ago
    The “backward” scrolling (a better name might be “content scrolling” as compared to “window scrolling”) was changed because the “forward” way does not work for scrolling content on a multi-touch display. If the content moves in the opposite direction from the finger, it completely breaks the illusion that the fingers are directly controlling the content. People switching back and forth between Macs and iPhones or iPads initially found it very inconvenient/frustrating to have window scrolling on a touchpad and content scrolling on a touchscreen. It was decided that switching the Mac to be consistent with iOS would cause momentary frustration for Mac users (it requires a few days of retraining to get used to) but would be less frustrating for most users than preserving two inconsistent behaviors into perpetuity. The option to keep the Mac on window scrolling was included to mollify those few Mac users unwilling to spend a few days or weeks re-training themselves to a reversed gesture.

vinniejames 7y ago

I really dislike these, they're too narrow and difficult to scroll manually