On Mon, 04 Mar 2002, Lex Spoon wrote:

> It's interesting that at least two serious developers have gotten yellow
> and blue swapped here: the  developer who made sq.h, and the developer
> who did the win32 mouse-handling code.  This seems a pretty clear sign
> that the red/yellow/blue terminology has completely fallen out of usage.
>  I used to think that people would just get used to this terminology
> over time.  But that will only happen if the terminology is actually
> used.  It's not.

I don't agree. I use it, so does the super meta tutorial by the Andrews.
(Andrew Greenberg and  Andrew P.Black, not the Andrews Sisters ;-) and lots of
other people.  

> 
> So I'm now in the camp that we should rename the mouse buttons.  How
> about we give them names that describe what each button is mostly used
> for?  When I talk to people about Squeak, for example, I will frequently
> say "halo click to do such and such" and they seem to understand
> immediately.  "blue click to do such and such" is unlikely to go over as
> well, especially since I may get the color wrong myself!

But I'd argue that the colour convention 

a.	Has history on it's side

b.	Is going to be easier to remember than the main/menu/halo convention.
(Which already, IIRC, conflicts with VW's "naming convention" which I find a
real PITB.)

The answer is really simple and completely mechanical: either take 3 pots of
paint into class (the stuff we used to paint plastic model planes with is very
good for this) or, if your students are messy/in a hurry, a packet of Ben Day
Dots purchased for next to nowt from your local stationer. 

Cheers

John

-- 
They're afraid, very afraid......
According to CRN magazine, Microsoft staff discovering Linux in use
will have now access to a special 'escalation' team.
Now, where did I put that stake and mallet?
http://www.newsforge.com/article.pl?sid=02/01/16/0310222&mode=nocomment