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Ask HN: Why does Apple refuse to add window snapping to macOS?

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Re: Ask HN: Why does Apple refuse to add window snapping to macOS?

#371

Post by kitsunesoba »

somat wrote: post #330
vladvasiliu wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My favorite is how, if you have multiple windows of the same app visible, when you cmd-tab to that app, it moves all of the windows to the top of the stack. So if you want to switch between windows of two different apps, you better hide the ones you don't use.

My favorite "weird" thing common in X11 window managers is how they can separate the focus and the raising operations. On windows(and I presume mac) these operations are tightly linked. Why would you want to separate them you might ask? It turns out to be really useful to look at the window on the top and be able to type/control the obscured window underneath. On the one hand X11 sort of sucked with it's inconsistent…

It won't let you type, but you can interact with most inactive windows on macOS by holding down Command and left/right clicking. Very useful for selecting text in an inactive window and copying it without first bringing the window forward.

Re: Ask HN: Why does Apple refuse to add window snapping to macOS?

#373

Post by lynndotpy »

egypturnash wrote: post #113
rr842j wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I still have to meet anybody that is not at a minimum annoyed by the macos animations. I literally stopped using the spaces feature because of that!. The default animation got me dizzy all the time, but even with that one disabled via accessibility settings they keep a terribly slow fading animation. It's absolutely ridiculous for a professional machine to impose these things on you.

I'm absolutely fine with them. I use Spaces all the time - mostly by hitting f3 and clicking on the screen thumbnail at the top, rather than control-arrowing or control-number. HN has a lot of hate for these animations but I don't think I've ever seen anyone bitching about them elsewhere.

> HN has a lot of hate for these animations but I don't think I've ever seen anyone bitching about them elsewhere.

Because MacOS (and iOS) are the only major OSes that don't let you disable them.

Re: Ask HN: Why does Apple refuse to add window snapping to macOS?

#374

Post by crossroadsguy »

lloeki wrote: post #202
prewett wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you move the mouse up to the top of the screen in fullscreen mode the menu bar will reappear, so things work about like normal (although that certainly wasn't obvious the first time I pressed the green button). The double-click on the title bar is "Zoom" mode, which you can activate with Window >> Zoom. But I agree, it's not obvious, nor is it obvious what "Zoom" means.

> what "Zoom" means This: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36373756

> not wasting space with useless empty space inside the window

Wow. In the linked comment you just turned it into the class discussions.apple.com answer which always translates to “you are doing it wrong” and then “why do you even need that”.

Re: Ask HN: Why does Apple refuse to add window snapping to macOS?

#375

Post by SoftTalker »

lloeki wrote: post #141

Well, because it has? Hover over the green stoplight, you get a popover with fullscreen options. Press Option and the fullscreen options mutate into snap left/snap right/zoom. These can also be found in the Window menu. Again, press option to mutate the fullscreen ones to snap. And since these are menu options, one can set any keyboard shortcut of their choosing through the keyboard shortcut prefpane+. So it is not "…

Steve Jobs hated full screen windows. It’s why “maximize” expands based on content and not screen size. I haven’t used a Mac in years but that might still be part of the reason.

Re: Ask HN: Why does Apple refuse to add window snapping to macOS?

#376

Post by vosper »

rchaud wrote: post #255
vosper wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ask / Tell HNs definitely can be click/engagement bait, and this probably is.

Engagement bait doesn't serve any purpose on HN. On other social media it's necessary to send a relevance signal to the algorithm. You don't win any prizes for posting a lot on HN.

Do you not get HN points if the post is heavily upvoted? Individuals with high point counts are perceived as being influential (are, in fact, influential) which has value.

Note I'm not claiming the person who posted this Ask HN is trying to build points in order to sell influence. But it's a thing that happens all across the internet.

Re: Ask HN: Why does Apple refuse to add window snapping to macOS?

#377

Post by 7znwjshsus »

kitsunesoba wrote: post #370
crazygringo wrote: post #364

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is true. Which is what is so bizarre about it. Everything else about Apple is about cleanliness, focus, minimalism, simplicity. Yet the windowing system is designed so that everything's overlapping, it's hard to pick out your foreground window from 20 other background windows of varying shapes and sizes and positions, and bringing up Expose/Mission Control shows you something like a detective's corkboard as he t…

Well, it is simplistic from a certain point of view. If we rewind to the mid-to-late 80s with the Lisa and original Mac, which do you think most users at that point would find more simple and natural: windows that act as analogues of physical papers on a desk, or windows that have no real life equivalent and resize to fill empty space under arbitrary conditions? Granted, that was ~40 years ago and things are differen…

My main issue with this workflow is that if I alt tab to terminal, then it brings all of the terminals to front, rather than the one I wanted. Now one inactive terminal may be blocking the previous app that I want to use as reference for my active terminal. The only workaround is to resize and drag all the terminals around which I usually don't want to do. So I have to make the previous app fullscreen to move it to a separate window and then suffer from the slow window animation. It's just the worst UI ever designed. Never had any such issues with default ubuntu or windows. Things actually feel like a real desk(top) on those.

Re: Ask HN: Why does Apple refuse to add window snapping to macOS?

#378

Post by oblio »

mahathu wrote: post #349
gibbitz wrote: post #331

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Like scroll direction, having a sim card in your phone, using accepted standard cables, giving users access to their own files, using standardized file formats, etc. These guys abuse their users and somehow they believe Apple cares about them. Not sure when everyone will wake up and realize that arbitrary change isn't better than expected behavior. I guess when the industry points "AI" at generating OSes then Apple w…

The default scroll direction on macOS absolutely makes sense from a UX perspective. On a phone, you scroll up by physically touching the same display your content is on, so you have to move your finger down on the screen, which makes sense on phones but not on computers where the content is separate from the touchpad.

We've had "down to scroll down" on desktops back when smartphones were still Sci-fi.

Re: Ask HN: Why does Apple refuse to add window snapping to macOS?

#379

Post by Gigachad »

djfdat wrote: post #69
D13Fd wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Like what? I use both every day, hard to think of any major features for my usage other than snapping that Mac OS lacks.

- Peek at desktop - Quick hide-all-windows to copy something from your desktop to your clipboard, then bring everything back - Alt-tab, especially when it comes to apps with multiple windows, and windows in different states, such as minimized - A modern/fully-featured default web browser without a locked down extension ecosystem. - A start menu for seeing all your applications - A taskbar with application grouping -…

> The concept of uninstalling an application vs just deleting the application

Uninstalling is a workaround for the failure of windows to actually contain an apps data. The way macos handles it is much better.

Re: Ask HN: Why does Apple refuse to add window snapping to macOS?

#380

Post by oblio »

sleepybrett wrote: post #341
SebastianKra wrote: post #256

I always feel like Apple must have some grand 1000IQ concept for window management and I just don't get it. Stage Manager, Spaces, Mission Control, Expose, Window Zooming, Hiding, Minimizing (which is different from Hiding), Fullscreen/Splitscreen... yet the first thing I do is install a third-party window manager. I tried for months to go vanilla and get my head around the features. But why, why do fullscreen window…

They know that 90% of users use apps in fullscreen mode most of the time, or just higgly piggly stacked windows. Most people do not, most of the time, end up in situations where they are using two apps at once. Why do you think it took so long to get any window management at all into the ipad os? They also know that power users have options in the 3rd party app market if they want more fiddly or opinionated window ma…

Aren't non mobile devices catering to power users at this point, though? We're not in 2005 anymore, the vast majority of people using laptops or desktops are either professional computer users or gamers, which are generally power users.

Casual users have moved to phones and tablets, like, 80% of them.

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