[Etoys] Puddle effect? Finding cursor. Was Re: Another eToys on XO testemonial

[Ken Ritchie]

Or, to locate the cursor, how about a brief ripple wave upon touching  
the pad, as if a drop of water had landed on the screen at the cursor  
point, and the screen behaves like the surface of a puddle? That would  
be a universal metaphor on planet Earth.

See at end below...

Cheers,
-Ken Ritchie (Atlanta)
;-)

PS, Sent from my iPhone. Please excuse typos & brevity.

On Nov 20, 2008, at 17:25, Bert Freudenberg <bert at freudenbergs.de>  
wrote:

>
> On 20.11.2008, at 22:16, Takashi Yamamiya wrote:
>
>> Bert Freudenberg wrote:
>>> On 20.11.2008, at 20:21, Takashi Yamamiya wrote:
>>>> Bert Freudenberg wrote:
>>>>> Well, there actually is a preference indeed to enable the big
>>>>> cursor,  and it is of course enabled on the XO for its 200 dpi
>>>>> screen (the  regular 16 pixels-tall cursor is *tiny*). We
>>>>> already  made the cursor  quite a bit smaller and pointier than
>>>>> Eben's Sugar  default cursor. But  maybe it's still too large ...
>>>>> Takashi, what do you think?
>>>>
>>>> I believe that all cursors for each software in a system should be
>>>> same size. So I think cursor size have to be in the system global
>>>> preference if it is necessary.
>>> While I agree in principle, by that logic we'd have to switch to
>>> the  Sugar cursor which is unusably bulky. Besides, we don't have
>>> the logic  to use system cursors yet.
>>
>> Yes,
>>
>>> But we could easily make our cursor smaller. Do we want to do that?
>>
>> I don't think so for now. It is difficult to read optimal cursor size
>> only from the article.
>>
>> http://blog.laptopmag.com/olpc-mali-collaboration-emerges-as-the-program-winds-down
>> The mouse was either too fast, or their little fingers were too
>> fast. There is no consistency with the mouse arrow and buttons. It
>> is too big and the buttons are too small. It would be great if the
>> child could choose the size of the arrow as it can sometimes get
>> lost on screen.
>>
>> Even we have to make it larger, otherwise it would get lost on screen
>> more likely???
>
>
> Hmm, strange indeed. I'd vote for pressure-sensitive touchpad buttons
> then, the more you press, the larger the cursor gets. How does that
> sound?
>
> - Bert -
>
The cursor could be any size, if it is easy enough to find it. Here is  
a simple yet sufficient way to draw my eye to the cursor:

      When my finger tip lands on the touch pad - either to tap or  
drag - I would like to see a circular wavefront (a growing ring)  
briefly emanating from the point of the cursor, appearing as if the  
screen were a puddle and I had lightly touched the surface at the  
point of the cursor.

Perhaps if we demonstrate this in etoys first, it could become popular  
enough to be implemented in the XO Sugar as a universal effect.

It could be done as a simple bitblt ring that grows and fades, even  
without any liquid visual puddle effect. The goal is to gently draw  
one's gaze to the locus of the cursor by way of a visual cue. This  
method would work with any cursor size, shape, or color.

Cheers again,
-Ken Ritchie (Atlanta)

>
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