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Just let me select text

aartaka.me

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Re: Just let me select text

#191

Post by Ukv »

catapart wrote: post #169
Ukv wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A menu with "我的帳戶" in it, and often a generic icon or no icon at all, doesn't really have sufficient context to determine what the button means. If the website is already translated into your language then great, but many websites aren't (because it's a small site, or you don't speak one of the most common languages, or it's aimed at a different audience, etc.)

Ah, so the website had bad UX? I think we've found the issue!

Bad UX is the result, from the combination of disabling text selection and being in a language you don't understand. Ideally both would be fixed - since unselectable text causes UX issues even when in a language I understand (when I want to select as I'm reading to keep place, or copy a partial link, or right click -> search/define a technical term, or copy-paste to tell someone what button to click, etc.)

Re: Just let me select text

#192

Post by slater »

catapart wrote: post #21

As a web dev, I fully agree with this, but with a huge exception: clickable text. Anything that is meant to be read as content should absolutely, without fail, be selectable and copyable (assuming appropriate permissions). But stuff like tab headers, buttons, or even text-sparse tiles - things meant for the user to click on - can, and usually should , prevent text selection. It is super annoying to be clicking back a…

Counterpoint to that is the bizarre "everything must be a link!" state of things on modern websites. Heck, even on hn - click on a user's name in these replies, it goes to their profile page. great! then on that profile page, the user's name is... a link back to the same page.

Re: Just let me select text

#193

Post by 1718627440 »

catapart wrote: post #74
odo1242 wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What would be your ideal solution to the described problem? (Clicking on UI elements selecting text instead of processing the click)

I know you're not asking me, but I would really love the "copy" feature added to ALL context menus. Right clicking a standard anchor element gives you the "copy link" option, but you don't get to copy the word without having it selected. Would be nice to just have a "copy word" feature, for starters. Could even be expanded so that it auto-selects the text after copying it so that if you wanted to copy more than just…

It does give you the search this text option.

Re: Just let me select text

#194

Post by cubefox »

gsa wrote: post #115
magnio wrote: post #7

On Android, long press home button activates Google Assistant that can OCR the current screen and translate immediately. Unironically one of the only two features keeping me on Android until now.

Like with all things Google, this feature wasn't available in Gemini (or only available on some devices) last I checked. With Gemini going to replace Google Assistant in the future, this is yet another useful feature that Google will be taking away from Android.

If you open an image with Google Lens (or select the image in the Google Search app, which seems to result in the same thing) Google does by default an image web search and shows you similar pictures, but it also displays a blue "translate" button on the right, which activates OCR and text selection, and optional translation. Though it doesn't seem possible to avoid it doing the image web search first, which might be problematic for private pictures.

Re: Just let me select text

#195

Post by froddd »

Interesting choice of example. I would probably have gone with the PayPal or eBay apps, which (on iOS at least) still refuse to let you select the text from the address you have to send the item you’ve sold to.

Re: Just let me select text

#196

Post by whstl »

catapart wrote: post #187
whstl wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You provided an example with anchors. In your original post you say "But stuff like tab headers, buttons, or even text-sparse tiles - things meant for the user to click on - can, and usually should, prevent text selection" and you explicitly mention that you leave out anchors. So far no reply to me has talked about problems causing by having selectable "tab headers, buttons, or even text-sparse tiles". I am still 100…

[flagged]

Nope. Without examples there's nothing for anyone.

Re: Just let me select text

#197

Post by socalgal2 »

This is why I prefer web apps over native apps. Web defaults to selectable text and text readable by extensions. I can long press on almost any word and pick "Define" if I don't understand a word (or right click on desktop). Native defaults to unselectable text and no extensions.

It's also why I hate Flutter on web. They render text to canvas, suddenly nothing is selectable and so accessibility and definition/translation options don't work.

See https://earth.gooogle.com Click on a city. An info box pops up. Nothing is selectable. Of course a poorly designed HTML info box could do that too but the designer has to go out of their way to make it bad whereas with Flutter (and native in general) the default is bad.

Re: Just let me select text

#198

Post by Dilettante_ »

johanyc wrote: post #128
NoraCodes wrote: post #16

Given that this page has the following styles which aren't applied anywhere else on the blog: body { -webkit-user-select: none; -webkit-touch-callout: none; -moz-user-select: none; -ms-user-select: none; user-select: none; } I think it's safe to assume that being unable to select text on this page is not unintentional, as several comments here assume, nor "ironic", but an intentional effort to demonstrate how annoyin…

I have a bookmarklet just to deal with this kind of websites lol

Would you share perhaps?

Re: Just let me select text

#199

Post by DangitBobby »

nmeofthestate wrote: post #129
magnio wrote: post #7

On Android, long press home button activates Google Assistant that can OCR the current screen and translate immediately. Unironically one of the only two features keeping me on Android until now.

Interesting. I screenshot then send to Google Lens which is obviously more of a hassle than what you're describing. But I have gestures enabled and so no home button. I wonder what is the gesture-equivalent of long-pressing on home.

On my Pixel 5, if you swipe from the bottom bar up (as if you are gesturing to close the app), near the bottom some options will appear: Screenshot or Select. The Select mode is an OCR enabled text selection.

Re: Just let me select text

#200

Post by larodi »

Dude is right, most of this non-selectable web can be served as images from a back-end. We have both the server power and network to do it, perhaps is going to be in many cases be faster than all the React/Angular slop on top of simple UIs in 2025.
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