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MaxiMice is an OS X add-on that promises to take the clicks out of scrolling views and dragging windows. Move the mouse pointer near the edge of a view and it scrolls. Move it closer to the edge and the scrolling speeds up. Or just hold down a modifier key to move or scroll the window under the cursor. Tobias Peciva, a developer at Catchy Software, had some comments about my mini-review of Catchy's MaxiMice clickless scrolling utility for OS X in OS X Odyssey 307.
Mr. Perciva wrote:
"There are a few common problems that users have run into. After installing MaxiMice, you need to quit and restart any Cocoa applications for MaxiMice to load properly in these applications. This is detailed in the documentation - and we realize it can be a bit of a nuisance; but most users prefer that to being forced to restart the machine. If restarting applications is not enough, does MaxiMice work after a full system restart?
"Also, did you have CocoaTech's Path Finder installed? Version 1.0 of MaxiMice was incompatible with this program and the symptoms would be that both PathFinder and MaxiMice could crash. If this was the case, you may wish to try out MaxiMice 1.0.1, which was just released. It resolves this issue, as well as an incompatibility with Safari 1.0. If none of the above works, please let us know, so that we can investigate further!"
To recap, what I said in the review was that:
"Now, I have to assume that there is something about my setup (PowerBook Pismo/ OS X 10.2.4) that MaxiMice doesn't like. I presume that the program really does work in most instances, but I'm baffled as to what the problem might be in my particular case." I did not have PathFinder installed, and I did restart all programs (and indeed rebooted the Mac before checking out MaxiMice the first time, which I found necessary in order to get the MaxiMice panel to show up in the System Preferences window), so that was not the problem. MaxiMice is a utility I really want to like. One of the things I miss badly working in OS X is Eden Sherry's Scrollability auto-scrolling utility that I have used for years through various versions of the Classic Mac OS. Happily, Scrollability still works in Classic Mode for the few Classic applications I still use, but unfortunately there is no version for OS X, so I had hoped that MaxiMice would prove to be an equivalent replacement. I downloaded and installed MaxiMice 1.1 and installed it this time on my iBook, and I can report that I did have better luck with this latest version. It works perfectly in OS X Text Edit, although I still find performance erratic in Safari 1.0 final. In Safari, it will sometimes scroll down but refuse to scroll up, and seems to behave differently on different Web pages. 
For users who work a lot in Cocoa applications, MaxiMice will eliminate much clicking and holding. Unfortunately, I spend probably 90 percent of my time in non-Cocoa apps -- Tex Edit Plus; Eudora; and Nisus Email being the heavy hitters, and MaxiMice does not work with any of them. My wish list for MaxiMice would be for it to be able to emulate the no-hassle, uniform across all applications, and universal performance of Scrollability in the Classic OS.
New in MaxiMice version 1.0.1:
System requirements:
MaxiMice is $10.00 shareware
For more information, visit:
iBook batteries re: That Panther Finder From Thomas Lomonte "My second observation is that losing 57% of it's charge in eight hours sleeping is not what one would expect to say the least." This is typical behavior on my 12" PowerBook. It is not what I expect either. I noticed this a while back, but no cure has been found. Does my email fall in the category of misery loves company? I hope not.
Good luck,
From Jonathan Boyd Hi Charles, my iBook's battery must be about 2 years old by now and barely holds a 1 hour charge, if even that. And that's with it being plugged into the mains 99% of the time. Batteries start to lose their charge after a year and are pretty badly gone after two. It's possible that your battery is older than the computer and been sitting in a warehouse a while before you got it. Then again, back when I first got the computer, it seemed to lose charge a lot faster while asleep under X than 9. X just isn't very frugal with your electrons. Even while asleep bizarrely. No idea what it's doing differently to 9 when it's asleep, but something is definitely happening. My advice is to turn the computer off if you're planning to leave it asleep on battery for more than a couple of hours. Draining and recharging the battery can also shorten its life-span, so avoid it were possible. And never even think about installing 10.2.4. But you're already w=aware of the problems there :^) Jonathan Boyd
Hi Thomas and Jonathan;
Thanks for the observations. I don't think my battery is much older than the computer, since it is an "Opaque" model which was introduced only 1 1/2 months before I bought the computer. The battery matches the opaque white case.
After the overnight battery drain, I tried working using battery power for a session. After three hours, I was down to 10% battery charge, and considering that I was on the Internet (modem) much of that time, kept the backlight at normal brightness, and took no power conservation measures, I would say that was acceptable battery life. It appears to be an OS X power management issue that sucks the battery dry while the machine is sleeping.
I haven't tried sleeping the 'Book overnight in OS 9, but I don't doubt that you're right. OS X power management leaves a lot to be desired for efficiency.
Yes, I'm well aware of the caveat to installing OS 10.2.4 on iBooks, although it was a good sustem on my Pismo PowerBook. I'm currently running 10.2.3 on the iBook. Have you had good experiences with 10.2.5 or 10.2.6, or are you like me still running an early version of Jaguar?
Charles
From Mel After trying out Panther on a display Macintosh at our local Comp USA store, the one thing that I noticed besides the "brushed metal" look and the additional panes stuck to the finder windows, is the obvious downplay of the red, yellow and green action buttons. They have been stripped of their bright colors when inactive, and when activated to zoom, minimize or close a window, the color is very dim and subtle.... I don't like it. I generally like the brighter Aqua colors. Overall I think I will eventually get used to the new finder windows. I checked to see if I can haphazardly throw folders and files on the desktop, and that was possible... so all is not lost on those of us who like to keep our desktops cluttered. Mel
Hi Mel;
Delighted to hear that I can continue in my cluttered and messy Desktop motif.
There was also a verty encouraging report on MacInTouch yesterday noting that there is a quantum improvement in speed running Panther on a 400 MHz Pismo, which bodes well for folks like me with G3 machines.
Charles
The OS X Odyssey archives may be accessed here: Note: Letters to Moore's Mailbag may or may not be published at the editor's discretion. Correspondents' email addresses will NOT be published unless the correspondent specifically requests publication. Letters may be edited for length and/or context. Opinions expressed in postings to Moore's MailBag are those of the respective correspondents and not necessarily shared or endorsed by the Editor and/or Applelinks management. If you would prefer that your message not appear in Moore's Mailbag, we would still like to hear from you. Just clearly mark your message "NOT FOR PUBLICATION," and it will not be published. CM
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