Comment by bsimpson
1 day ago
The default modality changed.
Classic Macs were designed for the mouse or trackball. Modern Macs are designed for multitouch scrolling. When it's easy to get the scrolling infrastructure on demand, the desktop might not need the same click-first affordances.
You're missing the fact that the scrollbars also indicate where you are in their range, which is important regardless of how you do the scrolling itself.
I think their point also covers this - since it's so easy to scroll, you can always just do a little two finger scroll wiggle to have it appear and see where you are. And that's only if you haven't configured it to always display.
Many of the complains surrounding the former iOS7 and today's Liquid Glass are tied to the requirement of the interface never moving. Which isn't just an unreasonable requirement, but a ridiculous one.
Just like iOS7+ it is possible to position and layer interface elements in a way where the visual effects will render a screenshot difficult to read, but in practice the elements are frequently in motion or as you've already pointed out easy to make them move. That motion is what negates the layering problems, thus making visual occlusions rare, short-lived and easily resolved.
There is a certain unreasonableness in ignoring that reality, and also ignoring that there is a user setting to keep a full-sized version of the scroll bars always visible.
This isn't to take away from legitimate criticisms such as the issue with the resize hotbox not being updated to match the more rounded corners, but rather highlight that not all online forum criticisms comes from a bona fide place.
You don't even have to scroll. Placing two fingers on the pad makes the scrollbar appear immediately. I'm happy for each additional pixel of space on my screen, but I also think a scrollbar should be completely configurable userland behavior.
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> since it's so easy to scroll, you can always just do a little two finger scroll wiggle to have it appear
That changes the effort required to show useful information from zero to more than zero. Which, while it not be a great quantitative change, is an enormous qualitative change.
Like Chesterton's Fence, it was there for a reason.
"At last (and at least) we have reclaimed that narrow vertical strip of screen real estate on the screens eastern-most vestige! Now to find a good use for it!"
The true annoyance is that in many cases explicitly enabling them does not restore the original functionality.
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