magic mouse three finger taps dashboard and expose

Peering into the settings for the magic mouse i have found out what looks like support for 3 finger tap gestures for Dashboard and/or Expose control , namely :

“Dashboard” – three fingers tap
“Exposé All Windows” – three fingers tap to expose all window
“Exposé Application Windows” – three fingers tap to expose app window
“Exposé Desktop” – three fingers tap to expose desktop

These look like the options you would see in a dropdown list from which to select one action associated with a 3finger tap.

Currently you do not have a mouse system preferences option for  3finger , only “One Finger” and “Two Finger” sections are available for now.

Another thing to note is that a 1 finger swipe action is also referenced , and that “Mighty Mouse” still remains as as string reference , if you search for that in system prefs the mouse icon will be highlighted , this could show that apple was really in a hurry on this , sloppy or understaffed , either way here is the system preferences movie for the magic mouse:

Who knows if 3 finger tap functionality was planned but not finished or removed , but it was not entirely built and disabled either , because it can not be enabled as it is.

EDIT : I released a free app to enable adding middle click , expose , dashboard , desktop , spaces , both button holding , etc , the works in my app

2 Comments October 28, 2009 Vlad Alexa

netbeans jarsigner woes

Ok so this is about the dreaded jarsigner error :

unable to sign jar: java.util.zip.ZipException: invalid entry compressed size

99% of the time what that means is your jar is already signed

However jarsigner has no way to remove signatures from a jar , but you can do that manually since a jar file is a zip archive all you have to do is extract it , delete the META-INF directory and repack it.

Personally i use muCommander , you have to do this : shift+F6 (rename to .zip) > enter > del META-INF > enter > shift+F6 (rename back)
It treats archives as standard directories so it automatically handles the unpacking and repacking of the archive transparently

If you are a terminal lover you can run this for the same results:

zip -d YourJar.ext “META-INF*”

deleting: META-INF/MANIFEST.MF

deleting: META-INF/CERT.SF

deleting: META-INF/CERT.RSA

Which is going to result in this :
deleting: META-INF/MANIFEST.MF
deleting: META-INF/CERT.SF
deleting: META-INF/CERT.RSA

The reason why i have to go into all this is because unlike Eclipse , Netbeans has no way of building a unsigned android apk (unless you mess about with -sign in nbproject/build-impl.xml) but this should apply and work with any kind of java package signing scenario (except the Maven jarsigner which blissfully has a unsign feature)

apple “magic” mouse testing

Personally i think a gesture enabled mouse is a great move, and am looking forward to seeing it implemented in more mice, besides the mighty mouse i have been using a Logitech Air mouse which has a touch scroll with momentum which i miss dearly when using the mighty mouse, i am sure the same will be true about gestures.

I am also a low profile mice guy, since the A4Tech OP620 i have been sold to the precision and handling mode of mice that do not look like you are supposed to rest your whole hand on, i am delighted that Apple also went this way tho i recognize that maybe in the future mice should come with 2 options (a raised or a low profile version) to suit everyone but Apple’s way is not about giving the user choice but taking that decision for them so i do not expect them to do this.

Additionally while not immediately apparent touch mice have totally different handling dynamics than legacy non touch mice, they are more similar in that respect to touchpads so it should come as no surprise that the low profile shape is the fitting one as opposed to the legacy mice’s breast shape that conflicts with the way touch devices are interacted with (roughly that the touches have meaning so they are non continuously applied)

I do have some issues with the magic mouse, when it was announced i was hoping a old issue with the apple mice might have been addressed, that is the inability to hold down both buttons, the mouse registers a left click when a user clicks with both the right and the left fingers pressing.

While the swipe functionality alleviates this a bit there are still a number of 3d applications, games, and browsers that need the old “poorman’s swipe” AKA Mouse chording a left swipe being similar to pressing and holding the right button then pressing the left and vice-versa, but this way of clicking can not be entirely replaced by the swipe feature as you can not swipe and drag for example.

What i do hope is that software developers will start to be aware of gesture enabled mice and of mice lacking 2button hold functionality, or even better mice manufacturers start making mice that implement both features, in any event here is a osx application i wrote for the purpose of testing mouse functionality.