Disable scrolling on window list to flip through windows

Thanks for your bug report. I don't quite understand - do you mean the trackpad equivalent of scrolling the mouse wheel over the workspace switcher applet? Or am I on the wrong track?

This is the window list. So, here's what happens:

1. My cursor is on the panel (eg, because i was switching windows)
2. I want to move the cursor somewhere else
3. I often put my finger on the lower right hand corner of the pad.
4. The trackpad thinks i'm scrolling
5. windows flash wildly

The issue is that this scroll isn't as reversible as scrolling in a text document or something.

That bug is not really clear:
- on what applet do you that? windows list? workspace switcher?
- what do you cakk "flash wildly", the glowing effect of the windows list?
- with what application does it happen? Using the scrolling mouse action change the active window on my box but without any effect

On Fri, 2006-04-14 at 12:08 +0000, Sebastien Bacher wrote:
> That bug is not really clear:
> - on what applet do you that? windows list? workspace switcher?

Windows list
> - what do you cakk "flash wildly", the glowing effect of the windows list?

Even on a desktop, look what happens when you use the scroll wheel on
the windows list. It's like pressing alt+tab alot. Now imagine if it was
really easy to do this by mistake.

>
> - with what application does it happen? Using the scrolling mouse action change the active window on my box but without any effect
The issue is *exactly* that it changes the active window. However, it's
really easy to trigger this by accident with a laptop touchpad.

That is a new upstream feature: http://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=309956

Ccing Vincent who is upstream. Vincent, what do you think about that? Should it be a gconf option?

No plan for this, but I can't say we'll never do this.

Ben, I don't quite understand this comment: "The issue is that this scroll isn't as reversible as scrolling in a text document or something."

Why isn't it as reversible?

On Fri, 2006-04-14 at 14:22 +0000, Vincent Untz wrote:
> No plan for this, but I can't say we'll never do this.
>
> Ben, I don't quite understand this comment: "The issue is that this
> scroll isn't as reversible as scrolling in a text document or
> something."
>
> Why isn't it as reversible?

When you scroll a text document a few steps by accident, you don't lose
your place that much. You are just a few lines off from where you were.
However, when you scroll on the window list, you need to make the
*EXACT* same number of scrolls to get back to where you were. This is
hard to do on a laptop touchpad.

The scrolling works really well when you have a normal mouse, however I
think that it is hard to control with a laptop, and false-positive
detection of scrolling can make things worst, rather than better, with
the new feature.

-- Ben

Isn't the right fix to fix scrolling on laptops, then?

I mean, there are a lots of places where you'll get similar issues. We shouldn't disable scrolling everywhere except for texts just because of this.

At least for me, the panel ends up being more of an issue than other places we use scrolling for non-text (like in tabs). The panel is a natural "resting" place for one's mouse. Also, I've found that I often use the lower-right-hand corner of the trackpad as a starting place to scroll.

The panel is the *ONLY* place I ever accidentially scroll using my laptop.

One (somewhat) odd thing: on a trackpad, the most natural motion to switch windows would be scrolling along the *bottom* of the trackpad, left to right or right to left. I imagine that's a bit more complicated though.

I've forwarded that upstream: http://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=402528

I agree, i actually disabled touchpad scrolling because this happens so much

This happens to me a lot too.

And it's more of a problem on desktop than in other places because a small, mistaken scroll in most app windows will not cause much trouble, it will generally scroll just a little.
Instead in the desktop even a very tiny amount of scroll will start switching like mad between screens.

The real issue i think is a sum of two factors:
1) it takes even a very small amount of scroll to switch one or two desktops in a certain direction. in other words, the desktop scrolling is more sensitive than scrolling in other windows (e.g. firefox or nautilus)
2) the desktop list is circular, so it will keep scrolling very fast even if you reach the last desktop

The combination of these creates the very annoying "flashing" effect.
it also makes it effectively impossible to use this feature intentionally. The desktops flash by too fast and you need to be a precision monster to be able to use this feature on a laptop.

(please not that using a mouse will not show this issue since the scroll whell has "notches" that provide easier control of the number of "scrolls" you generate. a laptop touchpad scroll feature has no such thing instead)

I can see how this could be a very useful feature for mouse users but I agree with the other laptop
users--this feature is extremely frustrating for me because I accidentally trigger it all the time on my
touchpad. And yes, my windows flash wildly when it happens. :-) Picture someone spinning the
scroll wheel on a mouse at some very high RPM rate--each window that gets focus raises itself to
the foreground for a fraction of a second, until the next window gets focus and raises, etc.

It would be wonderful if this feature had an enable/disable setting on the Window List Preferences
pop-up dialog. It really is unusable on laptops.

I have this exact problem using KDE. I have read the KDE developer's responses to requests about this and they are unwilling to add the option to disable scrolling on the task bar. They were IMO very rude to their users about this issue. One response they gave was to learn to use the touchpad better. What jerks.

I am happy to see that GNOME is a little more user sensitive and I am now switching my desktop manager. If an option could be added to satisfy laptop users, I think this would be very helpful.

Thank you for even CONSIDERING this issue and thank you for being concerned about what your users. You guys are really great.

I totally agree - scrolling desktops should be turned off when using touchpad. This is a daily annoyance. But the current workaround, turning scrolling off altogether, would be worse.

Yes scrolling desktops is not 'reversible' since often I end up on another desktop that has some window open, and when I would like to scroll back, I end up just scrolling in that particular window. Scrolling desktops is also very sensitive.

Add another "bump" to this. It is far too easy to accidentally scroll the desktop switcher. I'm not even sure how scrolling is useful in the desktop switcher. You would have to be extremely precise with the mouse to get the desktop you meant to get in this fashion.

Scrolling in the desktop switcher seems entirely useless to me.

Fully agreed. This is extremely annoying on my laptop. An option to diable, or even turn the sensitivity way down would be welcomed.

you can disable this scroll event with compiz fusion http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=583112

actually, you cant. this doesnt work with the window list, sorry. i thought i had it for a second, then it happened to me again :(

you can disable the vertical (or horizontal) scroll via System->Preferences->Mouse->Touchpad->Check off the "Enable scrolling" box.
However it will turn off the touchpad scrolling feature in all applications, not just windows list. But as for me, I dont like to scroll with touchpad, it's too sensitive, so I have it off anyway.

I landed here when I was googling for a way to turn off the mousewheel control of the workspace-switcher. I am using a laptop and the sudden workspace shifting is pretty annoying. Since it seems there is no way to turn this off, I have to say this "feature" is terribly bug-like...

To disable all scrolling as suggested by Cheshirecat86, is not a good alternative as most applications make very good use of the mouse wheel. (like scrolling, zooming, slider control etc...)

The best solution so far is to use xfce4-panel which doesn't support scrolling at all and looks like default gnome taskbar.

1) install xfce4-panel (thing can be installed apart from whole xfce)
2) right click on your taskbar, "Delete panel".
3) alt-F2 (will show "run command"), type "xfce4-panel" -> will start the panel
4) setup the panel, right click "properties" and "Add New Item" (add Window List)
5) add "show desktop", "workspaces" and recycle bin as they are in default ubuntu-gnome

enjoy the simplicity of xfce4 without that f**kin annoying scroll.

For the developers, that don't understand what is going on: we don't want disable scrolling everywhere, we are using it to scroll docs in Firefox, editors, everywhere. We want to disable scrolling exactly in taskbar, because it is useless there if you can't (and you can't with touchpads) scroll precisely.

KDE Plasma has no scroll too, but don't rely on this, eventually it will be there and probably without config option (explained in KDE thread)...

Yes this is an extremely annoying "feature". Whenever my pointer is
over any area of the desktop and I go near the vertical scroll area of
the trackpad I lose 3 minutes of my life. 2 to stop the impending seizure
caused by the flashing workspaces and 1 to find where I need to be again.
Then I can work for 2-5 minutes before it happens again. If there was a way
to change the behaviour only for trackpads, I think it would be great if it could
be set to work on the Left Scroll zone of the trackpad where it would not be
confused with a page scroll. Or I would find it useful also if it perhaps was
just a tap in the upper left corner to pop through the workspaces. This might
not be attractive for those that tend to use many workspaces but for like 4 it
would be fine. Just some suggestions.

I am new Ubuntu(& Studio) user. The MS Viral Magnet and Spy Generator
features forced me to look for something else. I am glad I did. Thank you!

I will bump this. I also think that it is not even convenient when we use the "normal" mouse wheel. To look on every desktop a window free area to use it, is much more a pain in the ars*. it's much more simple to simply use <ctrl><alt> arrow.

I never used this "feature" intentionally. even without the trackpad. It's a pain not to be able to disable it

I also feel that this is a bad design, even for normal mouse use. It seems like "making the scroll wheel do something" just for the sake of it. There are other instances of this which *can* be turned off. For example, using the scroll wheel when the cursor is over the desktop switches desktops by default under hardy with compiz. (Actually, I think this is what the two previous comments are referring to, not the original bug.) This behavior is also very annoying to (some) touchpad users, but can be turned off in compiz settings.

Yep, i agree too.

This 'feature' is very very annoying in both:
1.touchpad mode
it's almost guaranteed to face this problem every time you use touchpad.

2.mouse mode
sometimes pointer is not on application window and you scroll to another desktop. Happens at least once in a day. (4-8 hours of work).

So at least 'disable' option is mandatory.

Also, didn't find any request for automatic touchpad disabling when writing or when USB mouse is connected. This is a very basic feature ant writing your own scripts is absurd (if you want to make ubuntu OS mainstream). Making these features would save lots of nerves for ordinary people.

Same grievance here. Whenever the pointer is accidentally over the taskbar and I only slightly touch the scroll area of my touchpad, I'm instantly desoriented for a few seconds. On a touchpad, this feature is unusable (at least, obviously to a lot of people) and it should be possible to disable it.

Wanted to chime in on how annoying this "feature" is. In particular the desktop switch when mouse wheel event occurs on desktop. Whats worse is that certain parts of some GTK interfaces (labels, for example on the nvidia-settings program) and other unexpected parts of some GUIs will also cause this desktop switching behavior, despite the fact the cursor is over the application window (its really bad when its things like the trough near a scroll bar). I've been using Linux for about 12 years now and gnome since early 1.0 releases and its things like this, that make it feel like its progressing backwards in usability, probably an exaggeration, but reflects just how $&*@ing annoying this is. I think this option should be disabled by default. If some masochistic user wants to enable it, give them a gconf option somewhere, call it something like "/desktop/gnome/really-annoying-desktop-switch-mouse-wheel-hell".

I bump this too, we really need a way to disable the scroll feature (even with a mouse) on the windows list, maybe even on the workspace switching area : many newcomers have problems with this feature and get disoriented (clic on task list to a text document, they want to scroll the doc and other windows show up), they ask to disable this but I couldn't find a proper way (thanks for the xfce4 suggestion, but of course it's not ideal for everyone)

As stated in upstream report:

"It's totally visible to the libwnck developers. The only way to elevate this is
to provide a patch -- it's all a matter of priorities, and there are some
things that I personally consider more important to fix in libwnck. Note that
it really shouldn't be hard to do..."

Indeed, a simple band-aid fix probably only involves:
- adding a gconf setting for disabling this behavior
- in libwnck, check the gconf setting in the scroll-event handler, and ignore the scroll-event if value is set
- build and publish a new libwnck package with that patch

This would make it possible for users to work around this usability problem, by using some gconf command line.

In the long run, it would be nice to either expose the gconf setting in some UI (in panel applet config dialog?), or detect if a scroll event comes from a touchpad, and ignore it in that case (this might be difficult to implement, though). But for now, it would be a huge improvement if users could just manually disable this annoying behavior.

Oliver did you coordinate with anybody before adding this hundredpapercut task there? The idea was to have the design team selecting issue not to have any user to add random bugs to the list, if every start adding some random bugs to the list it defeat the purpose to have a selected set of usability issues

Sorry if that was inappropriate. From http://blog.davebsd.com/2009/06/10/one-hundred-paper-cuts/ I got the impression that everyone could mark a bug as "papercut"; and my personal opinion is that this bug qualifies for that. But it wasn't my intention to interfere with the design team's decisions.

seems that the design team meant to let everybody do suggestion, seems that people have quickly picked on adding the bug they would like fixed many not being small or design issues though; this one for example about adding an option most users will not understand is probably not one

Here's a patch that'll disable the feature entirely.

At the end I don't know what this portion is in the patch or if it's needed.
--- libwnck-2.26.0.orig/libwnck/tasklist.loT
+++ libwnck-2.26.0/libwnck/tasklist.loT

This proof-of-concept patch registers a boolean option at /apps/panel/global/tasklist_mousewheel, in which a true setting turns on the mousewheel capability and the false option turns it off. There is not yet a "gconf schema" for it and I am not sure if the gconf option was added in the right place, but nevertheless it demonstrates the option requested in this bug.

A few caveats:

1) it should probably be a per-panel option, stored in /apps/panel/applets/window_list_screenX/prefs where X is the number of the screen upon which the window tasklist is shown. That would make it consistent with the other panel options;
2) there needs to be a GUI option added to the gnome-panel preferences applet to toggle the flag;
3) as mentioned earlier, it needs a default value and a gconf schema and I don't know exactly what the schema is;
4) make sure that the implementation is optimal. Right now, the tasklist constructor (tasklist.c) is returning a global variable of the tasklist GTK object, because I don't know what called the tasklist constructor. The tasklist GTK object needs to be stored because the signal needs to be connected and disconnected upon callback of the gconf notification;
5) ensure that the dependency gconf-2.0 (libgconf2-dev) was added correctly to configure.in, control.in, and anything else that may need it. I don't know the minimal version of the package to specify: I assume any gconf-2.0 will work so this is how the dependency was added for the time being. And I know it's required for Build-Depends, but I don't know if it needs to be in the Depends for the generated libwnck-dev package as it currently is.

Please see libwnck under my PPA to test it for Karmic Koala: https://launchpad.net/~xt-knight/+archive/ppa

You do not need to relink gnome-panel against it. Simply install the deb packages for libwnck and run "killall gnome-panel && gnome-panel". Then add the boolean gconf key. Changes should take effect immediately.

It'd be really nice to see an option to disable this annoying feature in one of the upcoming releases of Ubuntu.

xtknight, I wrote a similar patch to disable scrolling in the workspace switcher, maybe we should use the same gconf key name?
Se bug #150443 for the patch.

I don't think it's necessary to add a GUI option to enable the scrolling, this just clutter the gui, better let it rest in gconf for the geeks who want it (like me).

After a quick look I would propose not add the gconf dependency to libwnck but instead add a property, scroll_enabled, to the tasklist and use gconf within window-list.

What do you think?

This patch adds the ability to set the scrolling behavior of the tasklist in libwnck.

This patch against gnome-panel adds the ability to change the scroll behavior via gconf settings.
Please comment on code (mostly c'n'p) and if this is the correct way to handle this issue.

Hello all,

I’m totally new here. A friend linked me to this page as he knows I am a fervent defender of this windows scrolling feature. I read all the thread and it seems it will be disabled by default. My request is that, if you disable it, please let users reenable it and please, through something more intuitive than gconf (which I find totally user-unfriendly and which I would consider a classic user shouldn’t have to pass through, neither for enabling windows scrolling nor for hiding icons of mounted mass storages — but that’s not my point). I came on Ubuntu with Dapper, and windows scrolling and select–middle-click are the two features I appreciate most compared to other OS…

PS : Sorry for my unperfect english if I made mistakes of any type.

Due to popular demand, here's a patch that adds a gui for changing the scrolling behavior.
Comment on design and naming is welcome. Screenshot in a second.

Screenshot showing the scrolling option (and gconf setting). As said, suggestions are welcome.

> Comment on design and naming is welcome.
2 Marcus Carlson -- simply perfect =)

Regardless of how annoying this "feature" is I agree with Eoshyn, it is good idea to *not* change default behavior (leave scrolling enabled), because such unexpected changes are much worser. Just an option as implemented by patch of Marcus is really enough to make everybody happy.

I like the screenshot. It's (almost) perfect. I think the verbiage is slightly misleading. Instead of saying "enable scrolling", something like "Enable scroll wheel" or "Allow mouse scroll wheel to cycle windows" is more descriptive. Otherwise it makes it sound like the list is being scrolled through, and not the windows themselves that are being scrolled through.

While I understand where the above poster is coming from, *please do* consider making this the default. A bad default shouldn't be kept around simply because people are used to it. Think of the newcomers. They are the ones who need the more usable defaults anyway, not the veterans who are more capable of making such small adjustments. Of course the real question is whether this is a "bad" default. I happen to think that the results of an accidental scroll make it such.

This looks great. This really is a great improvement.

I agree with dfalk. "Enable scrolling" isn't clear enough. How about "Flip through windows using mouse wheel"?

I also agree this is a bad default and it should be disabled by default.

I'll try to get this accepted upstream first, but in case I won't - I'll get back and we'll continue discussing the issue here instead. I also think that when we're adding an option to the window list to enable mouse wheel scrolling, we should do the same for the workspace switcher, but that's for another bug...

We've implemented this in GNOME Do/Docky as well, but to deal with laptop touch pads that can be overly sensitive we've done some smoothing so that you can't make it freak out. Maybe we should do the same for gnome panel?

I can confirm this bug. When the cursor is too close to the gnome-panel "Window List" applet, and i use the scroll wheel, it scrolls through all windows. I also think this feature should be off by default but that, but have an enable/disable setting on the Window List Preferences (preferences accessible by right clicking on the edge of the window list). I have attached what this option could look like. It can also be a check box (check to enable) instead of two radio buttons.

I really would like to try Marcus' patches, so you'll excuse me for this noob question : how am I supposed to apply "scroll_gui.patch" (ubuntu 9.04)?
thank you

oliwek, try this (haven't tried it myself so you might have to improvise a bit ;-) )

First we need to build libwnck and install libwnck

# cd
# mkdir temp
# cd temp
# apt-get build-dep libwnck
# apt-get source libwnck
# cd libwnck-2.26.0
# cp /path/to/10_wnck_scroll_enabled.patch debian/patches/
# dpkg-buildpackage -rfakeroot -b -tc
# sudo dpkg -i ../libwnck*.deb

Then we need to build and install gnome-panel

# cd
# cd temp
# apt-get build-dep gnome-panel
# apt-get source gnome-panel
# cd libwnck-2.26.0
# cp /path/to/scroll_gui.patch debian/patches/30_scroll_gui.patch (from http://bugzilla-attachments.gnome.org/attachment.cgi?id=138627)
edit debian/patches/series (eg with nano) and add a line with "30_scroll_gui.patch" after "28_prefer_lvds_monitor.patch"
# dpkg-buildpackage -rfakeroot -b -tc
# sudo dpkg -i ../*panel*.deb

Kill gnome-panel (or relogin) and hopefully things will work, if they don't, comment here and I'll see if I can fix a PPA for this.

oliwek, I forgot to say that if you do sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get upgrade your special package will be removed and the ubuntu package will be installed instead - could be good to know if things don't work out as they should :)

komputes, you mean like how I've implemented this in the patch? See how it currently looks here http://launchpadlibrarian.net/28828672/scroll_gui.png

Yes Marcus, that looks great. I think it should be there but off by default.

Upstream said it should be on by default but that doesn't mean Ubuntu could change the default via gconf schemas.

thanks for the fast reply, Marcus

for the following step :

# cp /path/to/scroll_gui.patch debian/patches/30_scroll_gui.patch (from http://bugzilla-attachments.gnome.org/attachment.cgi?id=138627)
edit debian/patches/series (eg with nano) and add a line with "30_scroll_gui.patch" after "28_prefer_lvds_monitor.patch"

could you please explain

1/ if I have to manually download "30_scroll_gui.patch" from http://bugzilla-attachments.gnome.org/attachment.cgi?id=138627, and copy it somewhere?

(I have just done : sudo cp /home/oliwek/scroll_gui.patch debian/patches/30_scroll_gui.patch)

2/ then to edit manually debian/patches/series... using ls (from :~/temp/libwnck-2.26.0/debian/patches) I don't see any /series...

oliwek@bureau:~/temp/libwnck-2.26.0/debian/patches$ ls
01_workspaces_default_name.patch 90_relibtoolize.patch
10_wnck_scroll_enabled.patch 99_ltmain_as-needed.patch
30_scroll_gui.patch

I forgot to mention : for the :
 1/ sudo cp /home/oliwek/scroll_gui.patch debian/patches/30_scroll_gui.patch

the scroll_gui.patch was downloaded from your post #43

oliwek, sorry, my mistake. This

# apt-get source gnome-panel
# cd libwnck-2.26.0
# cp /path/to/scroll_gui.patch debian/patches/30_scroll_gui.patch (from http://bugzilla-attachments.gnome.org/attachment.cgi?id=138627)

Should be

# apt-get source gnome-panel
# cd gnome-panel-2.26.0 <-- CORRECT
# cp /path/to/scroll_gui.patch debian/patches/30_scroll_gui.patch (from http://bugzilla-attachments.gnome.org/attachment.cgi?id=138627)

Also note that it's two different patches, one for libwnck and one for gnome-panel.

thank you Marcus, scrolling is now disabled in the window list :)

I just had to install fakeroot before everything else.
note there's already an update proposed for libwnck22, I don't know if this would already disable your patch...
let's hope some method to disable this scrolling in the windows list will find it's way officially in gnome desktop : to compile from source is not for everyone.

by the way, when the mouse cursor is on the desktop, scrolling doesn't switch to other (virtual) desktops anymore (when the cursor is on the bottom right of the screen, above the bottom dashboard on the "workspace switcher", scrolling still switches desktops though) ; this is an ideal configuration for newcomers/ sensitive trackpads I think...

oliwek, not really sure what you mean but desktop (disabling) scrolling and (enabling / disabling) workspace switcher scrolling is two other bugs.

I don't know why, but after having applied your patch, if I use the scroll wheel with the mouse cursor located on an empty space on the desktop, this no longer switches from desktop 1 to desktop 2 (as was the case before) ; I can't see what I could have done myself to disable this feature...

oliwek, I'm not sure either as that belongs to compiz land...

I haven't read the whole thread, but this is not a bug. I understand what has been mentioned and it can be annoying in some regard, but I love the scroll between windows/tabs with the scroll button.

I don't use much on task bar, but I think that feature is a part of GTK that is used in Gnome... hence the same features in tabs in Firefox, dialog boxes, ets...

In compiz, the feature of scrolling to change windows is anoying. I turned it off cause I always ended up on a part of a window (some regions would scroll text but if in wrong place, would read as a "desktop hover" scroll and flip my desktops. Easy answer here is to make that not a default action.

I have noticed that on my laptop, I would have more erroneous flips,...

I'd recommend not to change the default actions. Frankly, I love Gnome and wish that windows had the usability features like Gnome (push to bottom, roll up, always on top, etc...).

I've been pinging vuntz for the last couple of weeks about this and other gnome-panel bugs ([1], or compiz problems with workspace switcher) but it seems he never got the time to look them through and commit them which is very sad. Now we're past hard code freeze and gnome-shell is getting all attention so I don't think this and other gnome-panel features will ever be committed unless someone takes over the maintenance of gnome-panel (vuntz said he won't).

So, either we close this one as a wont fix (which is a shame) or applies this to ubuntu (problem because of strings that needs to be translated).

[1] https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/gnome-panel/+bug/44082

vuntz will probably be fine to still review some gnome-panel changes when he has free slots, is the change there very useful and worth having a distro change?

This "feature" is driving me nuts ;) I can't emphasize that enough.

There's a way to disable this feature :)

apt-get install compizconfig-settings-manager
System >> Preferences >> CompizConfig Settings Manager >> Viewport Switcher >> Desktop-based Viewport switching >> Disable Move Next and Move Prev.

Would it be possible to get this patch as a PPA? I'm new to Ubuntu and I don't feel comfortable compiling this thing myself.

Coming from a Windows background, I find this thing to be more of a bug than a feature. I can understand uniforming things everywhere in the OS/WM, but it's still annoying that this thing doesn't have any GUI option to disable it.

you can disable sitch to next (virtual) desktop in compiz...but not disable
the "switch to next window" in the tasks list (this is not limited to
compiz, it works the same in metacity)

2009/9/29 JjBehrens <email address hidden>

> There's a way to disable this feature :)
>
> apt-get install compizconfig-settings-manager
> System >> Preferences >> CompizConfig Settings Manager >> Viewport Switcher
> >> Desktop-based Viewport switching >> Disable Move Next and Move Prev.
>
> --
> Disable scrolling on window list to flip through windows
> https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/39328
> You received this bug notification because you are a direct subscriber
> of the bug.
>
> Status in The GNOME 2 Panel: New
> Status in One Hundred Paper Cuts: In Progress
> Status in “gnome-panel” package in Ubuntu: Triaged
>
> Bug description:
> On a laptop track pad, it's really easy to accidentially use the "scrolling
> goes through windows" feature of the new g-p. I believe this would warrent
> disabling the functionality (maybe only if a trackpad is detected? is this
> doable?) or at least offering an option to do so.
>

There's a way to disable this feature :)

apt-get install compizconfig-settings-manager
System >> Preferences >> CompizConfig Settings Manager >> Viewport Switcher >> Desktop-based Viewport switching >> Disable Move Next and Move Prev.

IT. DOESN'T. WORK.

clear enough now?????

just for the record, this "papercut" was not resolved in ubuntu 9.10

Everything works like a charm on Jaunty.
Thank you Marcus!

It's also driving me nuts (Ubuntu 9.10, compiz uninstalled). With a Logitech MX revolution mouse the scroll wheel can spin freely for several seconds, or needs just a small movement to trigger it

This bug could be solved by fixing Bug #487749 for laptops. This bug is about replacing the current one-finger-on-the-edge scroll with the double-finger-scroll on Synaptic touchpads.

Switching the default scrolling method to two fingers only solves this bug if users stick with the default. I have some fine motor control problems, and I find scrolling using two fingers more difficult than with one along the edge.

Not to mention that not all touchpad support mltitouch config

But about every touchpad is a Synaptics touchpad and for the great mass of laptop users this will solve the problem. Tough it is true that if the user chooses to use edge-scroll or has some custom hardware this bug will still persist.

How do you tell users the way of scrolling has been changed? Users have been scrolling using the edges of the touchpad for years. You can't just change this to two-fingers scroll. If the edges don't work in a new release of Ubuntu, they'll think the developers screwed up the touchpad drivers and just re-install an older version of Ubuntu where this "bug didn't excist". Yes, I know it's just disabled and users can re-enable it, but they don't know. How does the user know he has to use two fingers to scroll? The best way is to show a window showing an animated picture of how to scroll in this new version of Ubuntu. This windows should be displayed for every user which logs on for the first time if Ubuntu detects a Synaptics touchpad. Otherwise people really don't know how to scroll.

Maybe, it would be ok to tell the user about this feature when the synaptic touchpad is detected. With a popup message and a small explanation about this bug.

Switching the default scroll mode to two finger scroll is a workaround, not a final solution. "Solving" this by defaulting to two finger scroll would be forcing everyone who is affected by this bug to use their laptops in a certain way. I thought Ubuntu was the free OS. =) I would still use edge scrolling even if two finger scroll was an option. Also, I'm not a coder, but it sounds a lot less work to write code for disabling an old feature than to implement a completely new feature.

JSuvanto wrote 2 hours ago:
"I would still use edge scrolling even if two finger scroll was an option. Also, I'm not a coder, but it sounds a lot less work to write code for disabling an old feature than to implement a completely new feature."

Two finger scrolling is already available in Ubuntu since Ubuntu 9.04.

Sorry for the double post, but I want to add I agree with you about two finger scroll not being a solution, but just a workaround. Disabling scrolling through windows isn't much work. Marcus Carlson already made a patch which makes it possible to enable or disable this feature, but it hasn't been included in Ubuntu 9.10. I don't know why.

Reassigning to match the product of the upstream bug.

Being discussed/handled upstream.

Well, the upstream discussion is quite stale. In the meantime, I've created a PPA with a very straightforward patch. No configuration options are added, just the function for scrolling on task list is completely disabled. No more, no less.

https://launchpad.net/~libwnck-noscroll/+archive/ppa

Log out after installation to activate the changes.

Only Karmic and Jaunty are supported at the moment. Just drop me a line if you want another release to be added.

That is great, David! You are awesome :-)

I would be infinitely grateful if you could create a package for hardy as well... Have you placed the patch online somewhere? Could you provide a link to it?

No problem, Øyvind. The source package for Hardy has just been uploaded and now it's waiting in the build queue.
The patch (version for Hardy) can be found at http://pastie.org/729263 .

Thanks a lot for also making the hardy package! What a cute little patch... :-)

glade is not used since karmic and the patch need to be updated, unsubscribing sponsors there for now

This 'bug' bothers me as well, as a user of a mouse with a rather sensitive scroll wheel.

This still is an issue in the latest build of Ubuntu 10.04.

This really should be fixed for Lucid. It drives novice users nuts: they issue a scroll command and their windows go thoroughly berzerk. It's up there with Microsoft Windows' tendency to think the Super/Windows key is stuck down or Mac OS X's tendency to ignore window button clicks: simple, but really frustrating for a novice users.

I've personally seen this feature scuttle a Windows-to-Ubuntu migration because it pissed off a few VIPs.

It probably won't be fixed in gnome-panel because the focus isn't there, but Ubuntu's focus on usability should allow for better practice. The fix (make the behaviour optional and off by default) has been developed and is well-known.

True. After all those years this bug still isn't fixed. Ubuntu 10.04 is an LTS release and this bug really needs to be finally fixed.

I just found a good alternative to window list this morning called Dockbarx. It gives you much more control over the way the window list functions, including the ability to disable the window scroll without having to disable scrolling system wide.

http://gnome-look.org/content/show.php/DockbarX?content=101604

https://launchpad.net/~dockbar-main/+archive/ppa

It seems to be working great for me.

Cheers,
 Rowan

The bug not duplicate on launchpad, is that really an hundredpapercut bug? In any case the change needs to be updated to the current codebase if that should still be an option or simplified to change the behaviour simply by default

This drives me crazy. My wonderful VX Nano mouse which I looooove in Windows is totally annoying in Ubuntu 10.04 because of this.

PLEASE give us a way to disable the scroll wheel from switching windows on the panel!!!!

 - Marking Invalid as per Sebastien's comment.
For further information about papercuts criteria, please read https://wiki.ubuntu.com/PaperCut.
Don't worry though, this bug has been marked as "Invalid" only in the papercuts project.

I disagree that this isn't a papercut, unless the last point ("In a default application of a release under development") is the case. To whit:

:A bug, or an unintended problem occurring within an existing piece of software, **Absolutely. This behaviour sees users, and especially users with trackpads, see window managment issues
:the presence of which makes a computer more difficult or less pleasant to use, ** Definitely, see above comments
:that is easy to fix, ** Patch is above
:that the average user would encounter, ** On a netbook or laptop this is trivial to trigger; it's not a lot harder to trigger with a mouse, either.

This leaves:

:In a default application of the Ubuntu or Kubuntu release currently under development OR in any of the featured applications.

Is the panel being replaced in the next release with one that doesn't exhibit this behaviour? Otherwise, this absolutely a papercut bug. It's very easy to place the cursor over the window list applet; it's demonstrated in Fitt's law that a screen edge control is much, much easier to hit.

I agree with psarhjinian. This pretty clearly meets the criteria for a papercut.

David Jurenka's patch at comment #87 worked flawlessly for me (on Maverick): no more scrolling through windows in windows list on panel. Thanks, David!

David Jurenka's patch works (Many Thanks!), but only for the window list, not the workspace switcher - which is actually where I get the most problems: I've used Windows for years, so I generally use Alt-Tab to switch windows, but I still use the mouse to switch workspaces.
As suggested by xtknight, running "killall gnome-panel && gnome-panel" will restart the panels, without requiring a log-out.

@ Vish - I agree with psarhjinian and zorblek - this definitely meets the requirements of a papercut.

@Marcus #48 - why should the workspace switcher be a separate bug? As I see it, everyone who has a problem with one, will have a problem with the other. Also, any discussion about options, their locations in menus/gedit, and their defaults, would apply equally to both threads.
If it has already been created as a separate bug, does anyone have a link?

I still have this bug on Xenial, Gnome Flashback Metacity. Is there an option to disable this yet? I can't find it.

Please don't let this ticket die. It amounts to one new setting and one new line (of pseudo-code):

    onScroll() {
      if (someSetting) return; // new line
      doNormalScrollThing();
    }

and would remove some *really* annoying behavior.

This behaviour is truly awful on a laptop using trackpad scrolling.

If I am scrolling a window down fast to the bottom, once I reach the end of the document the mouse cursor ends up over the task bar and before I know it I'm cycling through windows.

I've searched for settings and there don't seem to be any.

Ubuntu 18.10
Gnome 3.30.1

I have the problem on desktop too. The slightest accidental touch of the mouswheel while moving across the taskbar sends me zipping through windows. I could slow down the scroll speed, but then scrolling through a document would be slower than desired. I basically dont want my mouse wheel to do anything except scroll through windows unless a key is held down (like for zooming).