[Qt-creator] Click to activate vs. reposition cursor

[Adam Higerd]

Ernst Huber wrote:
> Interesting to learn a little about Mac UI style guide. My neighbour has 
> a Mac with a mouse that has no (one) button - which must also be a Mac 
> standard. So for context menu popup in Mac UI one has to press an ALT or 
> CTRL button in combination with the mouse click - that's ok if you 
> cannot do else, but its far easier to have a right mouse button for 
> context stuff.
> Related to window activation: why not leaving it to the user how the UI 
> should behave, as does the KDE/Linux desktop manager where you can fine 
> tune window behaviour  -  for example the "focus follows mouse" policy 
> is absolutely helpful for developers allowing rapid window switching. 
> This also points it out that window behaviour should best be left to the 
> window manager and not to applications to get an uniform look'n feel.
> 
> Regards
> Ernst
> 
> 
> http://docs.kde.org/stable/en/kdebase-runtime/userguide/kcontrol-desktop.html


I'll take a moment to digress about the mouse. Mac supports two- and 
three-button mice, has for years. Cmd+Click is no less convenient than 
right-click; it's just different, but right-click works if you want to 
use it. (In fact, MacBooks can right-click directly -- older ones, two 
fingers on the touchpad and click, newer ones, click the bottom-right 
corner of the button.) Cmd+Click works no matter what kind of mouse you 
have, but if you prefer a right mouse button it IS available.

As far as window activation is concerned, it's possible for the window 
manager to make that decision but X11 doesn't define any way for a 
client to specify its desired behavior. A WM could easily swallow the 
click that raises the window, but how would a window request 
click-through? And then what about MDI applications -- how does it know 
what behaviors to use? You're right that it SHOULD be controlled by the 
WM, but it's just not practical on X11, so applications DO more or less 
have to decide on this for themselves.

/s/ Adam