scroll bar
<graphics> A widget found in graphical user interfaces and used to show
and control ("scroll") which portion of a document is currently visible in a
window. A window may have a horizontal or, most often, vertical scroll bar or
both.
A vertical scroll bar is a narrow strip drawn up the side of the window
containing a "bubble" whose position in the scroll bar represents the position
of the visible part within the whole document. By dragging the bubble with the
mouse the user can scroll the view over the entire document. Arrow buttons are
usually provided at the end(s) of the scroll bar to allow the window to be
scrolled by a small amount, e.g. one line of text, in either direction by
clicking them with the mouse. Some programs provide a second pair of buttons for
scrolling a page at a time or some other unit. Clicking on the scroll bar
outside the bubble will either, depending on the particular WIMP, move the
bubble to that point or move it some amount (typically a screenful) in that
direction.
Different WIMP systems define different standards for whether scroll bars appear
on the left or right, top or bottom of the window, and for their behaviour.
To reduce mouse movement, the up and down scroll buttons should either be next
to each other at one end of the scroll bar (as in NEXTSTEP) or should reverse
their effect when clicked with the right-hand mouse button (as in the X Window
System and RISC OS). The fraction of the scroll bar filled by the bubble should
indicate the fraction of the document visible in the window.
(1998-06-26)
Nearby terms:
SCROLL « scroll « scrollable list « scroll bar
» scrolling » scrool » scrozzle
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