This problem has come up before, and what I think the conflict really boils down to is that Windows
considers the middle mouse button to be the "least used", and Smalltalk (and Unix?) considers the
right mouse button to be the "least used".

Given that, I don't know if there's any permanent solution.

I can see why Windows treats the middle button this way, this allows the right button to consistently
be referred to as the "right button" in documentation, regardless of whether the user has a 2 or 3
button mouse.

I think it's fairly clear that the right (a.k.a. blue) mouse button is the least important in
Smalltalk, given that a two-button (e.g. Windows) configuration uses only the red and yellow buttons,
relegating the blue button to a modifier key combo.

I don't know if any studies have been done regarding which mouse buttons should be treated as primary,
secondary, etc.... could be interesting.

(On a related note, I still think "primary", "secondary" and "tertiary" are the best generic
(intention revealing :-) ) terms for the three buttons, rather than "red", "yellow" and "blue".)

See the Squeak FAQ item at http://minnow.cc.gatech.edu/squeak/897 for more details on this topic.

- Doug Way
  dway at mat.net, @riskmetrics.com
  RiskMetrics Group, Ann Arbor, MI
  http://www.riskmetrics.com


Ned Konz wrote:

> Those of you without 3-button mice shouldn't care about this, but:
>
> I just spent a few minutes trying to figure out why the mouse button
> mapping for buttons #2 and #3 (middle and right) of my 3 button mouse
> was different between Windows/NT and Linux.
>
> I finally figured out that I had the "3-button-mouse mapping" VM
> preference turned off in Windows/NT.
>
> That's interesting, because it was doing what I thought was the
> right thing with that preference turned off.
>
> That is:
>
> * hitting the right button brought up menus
>
> * hitting the (less-used) middle button brought up less-used things
> like Morphic halos and window menus.
>
> This is consistent with Windows behavior.
>
> However, under Linux (and Windows with the 3-button-mouse mapping
> turned ON), the meanings of the middle and right mouse button were
> swapped.
>
> It seems to me that, for consistency with 2-button mice and accepted
> Windows multi-button mouse usage, the mapping should be:
>
> 3-button    2-button   Squeak  Meaning
> Left        Left       Red     Select
> Right       Right      Yellow  Context menus
> Middle      -          Blue    Other stuff (window menus, halos)
>
> With, of course, various modifier keys added to produce
> missing mouse button activity for those with 1- or 2- button mice.
>
> But this is not what is currently defined.
>
> I don't know what the 2-button mice do, but I suspect that their
> right button is defined as the yellow button. Is this not the case?
>
> So my suggestion is:
>
> Let the definition of the left and right buttons stay the same
> between two and three button mice.
>
> And make the right button the yellow button for both.
>
> If we're concerned about making Squeak acceptable for people
> used to Windows, we should probably do this.
>
> (yes, I realize that I can change the mapping in sqXWindow.c).
>
> Ned Konz