One of the most irritating features of working on Windows products is a severe user-interface design error that results in random zooming in of text and other window content, when using certain mice. It’s so bad that some Windows applications, such as Visual Studio, have a special control, always present, to correct the bug when it happens (although in Visual Studio, I’ve only seen this bug exhibit itself as random font size changes inside panes). It’s so bad that some other applications become unusable because of it: they provide no mechanism to zoom in and out of the window content, so when this Windows bug appears, there’s no means of restoring things.
I believe this is a design error in the software associated with the mouse. If I don’t use a mouse, I don’t see this bug. What I don’t understand is this bug has been around for years, I’ve complained about it in surveys for years, and it is never ever fixed.
What’s interesting is that if I use a Mac to RDP (to ‘Remote Desktop’) through to a Windows machine—another ridiculously unreliable acivity—the problem is significantly worse. This shows that the bug is not in the mouse hardware, but in the way the mouse is handled by Windows.
But I’m absolutely not letting Apple off here. Their mouse also has idiotic design bugs. For example, clicking the mouse on the left hand side of the mouse often results in a right click. Someone in Apple doesn’t get the difference between left and right. Furthermore, the mouse has no place to rest a finger, so at random moments window contents will scroll left or right … which is an annoying waste of time and attention when working, but fortunately easy to fix.
I wouldn’t mind so much if there was a setting in Windows or MacOs to address these errors, but there is not. There is no Windows Settings setting to disable random zooms. There is no Macos setting to tell the mouse the real difference between left and right.
The underlying problem here is not so much Microsoft and Apple, but a failure of governance. There is quite obviously too little competition in the computer world, so big companies can get away with fundamental errors leaving consumers with no way round them. How much effort would it require Microsoft to disable randoming zooming in Windows? How much effort would it take Apple to grasp the true difference between left and right? In my opinion, probably some, but it’d be nothing compared to the companies’ ridiculous bottom line … but it would effect, in a very tiny way, those bottom lines, hence the inaction, hence my comment about governance. They do not bother because they have no incentive, they have no genuine competition, they have an effective duopoly. Monopolies, duopolies, etc., are economic errors that have to be fixed by governments, not end users like me.
I’ve long since been on the lookout for a mouse for the Mac that works properly, and I’ve never found one. I need to find the same for my Window laptop. There are lots of mice out there from lots of companies, but none seem to address the problem. This is another reason why I believe the problem is neither the mice per se, nor the mouse drivers, but the mouse management inside the operating systems.
So, Microsoft, I’ve been telling you off for years for Windows’ random zooming in and out. It makes some Windows software unusable. It makes other Windows software—Microsoft software—introduce special controls to counteract it. Would you kindly be arsed to get round to finally fixing this fecking bug? I somehow doubt it.