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IBM didn't want Microsoft to use the Tab key to move between dialog fields

devblogs.microsoft.com

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Re: IBM didn't want Microsoft to use the Tab key to move between dialog fields

#81

Post by Joker_vD »

bsimpson wrote: post #30
MrDOS wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd never really thought about it before, but Enter to advance to the next field field and Ctrl + Enter to submit the whole form (which is the typical keyboard shortcut for submitting the form while a multi-line text input control has focus) does have a certain appeal to it.

The overloading of return to either send a message or add a newline has become really annoying since chat apps (and then now AI) have become popular. You have to keep a mental context of whether you need to hold shift before you press return. See also: every message I've ever sent that ended with I' because I fat-fingered the ' key while typing a contraction.

Terminal keyboards generally used to have two separate ENTER (submit the form to the mainframe) and RETURN (insert a line break) keys. I mean, even the original 101-key PC keyboard has them: the RETURN key above the right Shift, and the ENTER key of the numpad.

Re: IBM didn't want Microsoft to use the Tab key to move between dialog fields

#82

Post by Joker_vD »

tracker1 wrote: post #68
bsimpson wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The overloading of return to either send a message or add a newline has become really annoying since chat apps (and then now AI) have become popular. You have to keep a mental context of whether you need to hold shift before you press return. See also: every message I've ever sent that ended with I' because I fat-fingered the ' key while typing a contraction.

Shift+Enter will usually enter a newline in a message without triggering send... At least that's the convention used most of the time. No guarantees on specific applications, just my own experience with this.

Some applications annoyingly use the opposite convention: Shift+Enter is what commits the entered text, while plain Enter inserts a newline.

Re: IBM didn't want Microsoft to use the Tab key to move between dialog fields

#83

Post by dmonitor »

zzo38computer wrote: post #50
donatj wrote: post #14

As someone who prefers tabs (I'm not looking to argue), I once asked Brendan Eich on Twitter why he prefers spaces. His answer was more thoughtful than I'd expected. The tab key itself is hijacked by modern OS/UI behavior. It makes it complicated to actually type literal tab characters in certain contexts, particularly in the browser. I still prefer tabs (and I'm a Go developer), but he is absolutely correct about th…

It might be reasonable to have a separate key for "tab" vs "next field", as well as separate key for "line break" vs "send". (But, tab and line break are not applicable for all contexts.) However, it might also be reasonable to have a key or key combination (some programs use ^V) to enter control characters as data rather than as commands. It might also be a consideration when designing a new computer (which does not…

Put it where the capslock key currently goes. Not sure what purpose it serves these days.

Re: IBM didn't want Microsoft to use the Tab key to move between dialog fields

#84

Post by AbbeFaria »

the Microsofties viewing their IBM colleagues as mired in pointless bureaucracy and the IBM folks viewing Microsofties as undisciplined hackers.

I work at MSFT, this made me chuckle hard. Microsoft must have been a very different company back then, because now I find myself and my colleagues mired in pointless bureaucracy via endless meetings, AI mandates, promotion theatre and the list goes on. I am decently paid but the bureaucracy is soul destroying.

Re: IBM didn't want Microsoft to use the Tab key to move between dialog fields

#85

Post by torben-friis »

I've had to work with oracle people this very year and had the same style of interactions, funnily enough. They required constant input from higher ups in our mostly flat org, no matter how many times an annoyed VP had to email a "I agree with whatever my people say".

Re: IBM didn't want Microsoft to use the Tab key to move between dialog fields

#86

Post by tuetuopay »

dmonitor wrote: post #83
zzo38computer wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It might be reasonable to have a separate key for "tab" vs "next field", as well as separate key for "line break" vs "send". (But, tab and line break are not applicable for all contexts.) However, it might also be reasonable to have a key or key combination (some programs use ^V) to enter control characters as data rather than as commands. It might also be a consideration when designing a new computer (which does not…

Put it where the capslock key currently goes. Not sure what purpose it serves these days.

Its whole purpose is to be remapped as CTRL, as god intended.

Re: IBM didn't want Microsoft to use the Tab key to move between dialog fields

#87

Post by yndoendo »

MoonWalk wrote: post #38
ch_123 wrote: post #13

I find this story odd because IBM was consistent with their keyboard nomenclature across multiple products, and the 3270 series mainframe terminals used the Tab key, located in the same place where you would find a tab key on a modern keyboard, to move the cursor to the next field. https://www.bitsavers.org/pdf/ibm/3278/GA27-2890-4_3278_Disp... (Page 73 of the PDF) As an aside, it's worth noting that moving between f…

Also conspicuously missing from the story is what key IBM DID want to use. I mean... that's the first question you'd ask! Lame.

It looks like it they wanted to use their existing special field management keys (field advance and field backspace) with tab being a different user experience. [0] Document does even use the word "Tab". "Field Backspace" seems to duplicate "Home" key usage under some conditions.

To be fair, Microsoft & Bill Gates are bad at quality user experience. "Ctrl+F" differs through their applications.

[0] https://archive.org/details/bitsavers_ibm525xGA2onDisplaySys...

*Edited.

The more I think of it the current TAB (SHIFT+TAB) key should of been used for entry navigation navigation only while the white space tab should of been something such as "SHIFT+SPACE".

Re: IBM didn't want Microsoft to use the Tab key to move between dialog fields

#88

Post by Henchman21 »

coredog64 wrote: post #74
MoonWalk wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Microsoft is suffering from the lack of such a group today; they're definitely doing it wrong, where "it" is pretty much everything... except pissing off users.

Microsoft could implement the "Am I doing it wrong?" check via the shell script `/bin/true`

They’d need to install WSL2 first though!

Re: IBM didn't want Microsoft to use the Tab key to move between dialog fields

#89

Post by jonathanstrange »

I find keyboards fascinating because they have many anachronistic elements and design flaws, yet nobody outside of elitist mechanical keyboard circles seems to be willing to fix them. Everybody seems to just think "whatever, gotta live with it." Why do they still have an extra large Caps Lock key in such a prominent position? What does ScrLk key on my keyboard do? Why is there an Ins key when practically every text edit field is in insert mode anyway? How often do you actually use the Pause key and what does it do?

Re: IBM didn't want Microsoft to use the Tab key to move between dialog fields

#90

Post by pavlov »

thaumasiotes wrote: post #55
ChuckMcM wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having worked at IBM, I would guess that using the tab key in this way was part of a patent they were pursuing and Microsoft's use would show this to be 'obvious' and thus not patentable. But that is just a guess. In the 80's IBM had a whole class of high level technical people called "Systems Engineers" whose entire job description was to opine on the merits of any given system. Not write systems, not debug them, an…

> I would guess that using the tab key in this way was part of a patent they were pursuing and Microsoft's use would show this to be 'obvious' and thus not patentable. Something that's bothered me about user-facing patents: Let's assume that the idea of using a keyboard key to move between input fields in a software form is not obvious, and in fact is a brilliant stroke of genius the likes of which the world is not l…

> “a brilliant stroke of genius the likes of which the world is not likely to see again. If that one guy hadn't been born, we would have gone thousands of years with no method”

But that’s not the criteria for granting a patent. It doesn’t have to be a stroke of genius. It can be something that many people could invent at the particular moment of the filing (as evidenced by many cases of near-simultaneous patent filings, like Daimler and Benz competing for the ICE in the 1880s). It just needs to be demonstrably novel.

I’m not saying tabbing back and forth through dialog fields qualifies, but then again it’s hard to place oneself in 1980.

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