Re: Gtk scrollbar: thumb too short

[Luc Teirlinck]

Richard Stallman wrote:

       First time scrolling stops with the last screenfull of real text
       visible, unless the end of the buffer is visible at the outset and
       stays visible.  In other words, if you scroll up to see what is above
       and scroll back down, you can not (immediately) overscroll.  To
       overscroll, you have to first scroll to the bottom (unless you already
       are there), grab the thumb (*not* click above the thumb) and scroll
       down, without first scrolling up.

   I think the idea is worth trying.  I look forward to hearing people's
   reactions.

   Of course, this should only apply to Mouse-2.  It will also be
   possible to overscroll using the keyboard and using Mouse-1.

Everything applies only to scrolling with Mouse-2, nothing else is
affected.

My original implementation was, as I pointed out, only very rough.  I
discovered afterwards that it had some bugs related to continuation
lines and scrolling a non-selected window.  These bugs are easy to
fix, however.  I will send (probably before the end of the week) a
more "deluxe" version.  That version will include a customizable
variable with integer value, through which users can specify their own
preferred default limit for first time overscrolling with Mouse-2.  A
positive value N means that first time overscrolling always leaves at
least N screen-lines visible (if consistent with the fact that, of
course, the end must remain visible).  A negative value -N means to
recenter the last line of real text at -N, thus leaving (abs N) minus
1 empty lines at the bottom.  Thus, -1 shows the end with maximal
possible content visible.  To the other extreme a value of 1 only
makes a difference if the buffer ends in a newline, in which case it
avoids staring at an empty screen at the end of overscrolling.  As
always, however, if the user feels the irresistible urge to stare at
an empty screen anyway, then that can always be achieved by a second
scroll.

Sincerely,

Luc.