I highlight text to increase contrast, but only in situations where the "designer" has totally failed and done something terrible like put dark color text on a black background.
Poll: Do you select text while reading?
231–240 of 366 posts
Re: Poll: Do you select text while reading?
#232> If these are common actions, perhaps browsers (or add-ons) can provide purpose-built features for these functions.
Maybe this is one of those cases where nothing actually needs to be done. Highlighting is highlighting, it works great and fulfills different needs. There are lots of add-ons for focus, black-out, markers and other features, but none is widely used.
In adittion, we are moving towards touch interfaces. I haven't seen anyone frantically touching the screen to highlight text in those; as some have confessed here, I believe this behavior has a lot to do with the mechanical act of clicking, the sound and feedback that for some reason feels good and ends up becoming a compulsion.
Re: Poll: Do you select text while reading?
#233Holy fuck, I thought it was just me.
I think I do it more with black on white. I find it difficult to focus reading from a large bright screen.
I do find I end up not bothering to read a lot of articles I'd like to online, end up either bookmarking and ignoring, or just skimming over. Think it's because reading long articles in a particular layout is a chore. A layout browser extension might help, I should give it a try.
Re: Poll: Do you select text while reading?
#234Anyone highlighting text for the contrast will love this Chrome extension: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/hacker-vision/fomm...
Re: Poll: Do you select text while reading?
#235I do this, and another "silly" thing I do is when I copy something to the clipboard, I often hit cmd-c three or four times quickly. I don't remember why or when I picked up this habit. I imagine maybe at some point I had a system or program that didn't always register the copy the first time? Or maybe it's just completely random. But I don't even notice I'm doing it until someone points it out and asks me about it.
Re: Poll: Do you select text while reading?
#236Yes. I do for multiple reasons
Re: Poll: Do you select text while reading?
#237Earlier quoted context omitted.
And those sites that have popup ads on certain words - so annoying!
Usually that's because you got some adware on your computer.
Not always; Phoronix, for example, has an ad provider which double-underlines some words in articles, with monetizing links.
Re: Poll: Do you select text while reading?
#238I do it primarily as a way to track my place in the text when I scroll down the page. Or because, forever multitasking and getting distracted, I need a way to remember where I was up to.
Re: Poll: Do you select text while reading?
#239Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yep, same. Sites that do things like auto-search highlighted words drive me nuts because of it.
ALA New York Times. Although, I checked right before writing this, and it seems they got rid of it, or at least, they replaced it with a not less annoying, but potentially more profitable full page pop-up that forces you to sign up. I wonder if once singed, they have the auto-search. Can anyone confirm?
I'm a subscriber, and clicking works normally when I just checked. It used to create a lookup of some sort.
Re: Poll: Do you select text while reading?
#240Earlier quoted context omitted.
While thinking of what to do next? Was this before the internet?
This could probably fill an entire separate thread but I love this thought. I am only just now remembering that I actually used to sit down at a computer and .. wait for it.. FINISH. I'd do something.. be done. Then I'd go do something else. The computer has become infinite. Yikes.
I remember something similar, though the real cause of my time on the computer ending was because I was on dialup and that would tie up the phone line. This was back when I was much younger and with my parents, but after my family moved all of our phones off the landline and to cellular, we ended up getting a lot more use out of the computer. After all, the computer only had entertainment purposes if you had a movie or a game, and all our games were the single player sort. So, with the advent of the Internet, there were things to do on the computer to pass the time, like browse webrings and forums or try and fail to learn Esperanto (and RPG Maker 95, which probably contributed a lot to my interest in game development).
Before all that, I spent a lot of time climbing trees and wanting to be an architect and writer (the latter of which I've been pursuing for a while now). My brother and I'd drag planks into trees and we'd build little things we called forts and make up our own currencies (using the tabs on soda cans, for example), we'd play with our family's chickens and cats, and we'd grouse about picking up fallen apples (because it was boring) and so on. Odd to think how little of any of that I'd get away with now -- now I'd suffer some odd looks from folks for climbing a tree that looked especially climbable. Really, the computer was just for Doom and Encarta and writing book reports. That's just rambling though and not all that interesting or indicative of any change other than growing up a bit.
Unfortunately, I was a child back then, so my memory of pre-Internet computer use is probably different than that of someone who was an adult the entire way through. Would be nice to see a bunch of people writing about it - not so much about how computers and the 'net changed things, but what they were like beforehand without concerning themselves too much with the difference between now and then.