There was news before that pre-2005 Apple portables/laptops had “w-enhanced” keyboard hardware. A hack was made available, which can enable two-finger scrolling on these trackpads.
The new 2005 Powerbooks have hardware scrolling features too, but do not necessarily mean they have the same type of trackpad as the pre-2005 models do.
Anyways, when news first came out about a month ago, I tried it. My system hung, good thing I prefer navigating using the keyboard, so that problem was quickly solved.
Today I tried it again, and this time it worked. But I found myself going back to SideTrack after a few hours. The rest of this post is input that I hope may help other people in trying out the said hacked drivers.
What’s all this scrolling business about anyways?
Well, for the more experienced (PC/Apple) computer users, having hardware scrolling support is just as important as the “right-click” of the mouse (though the latter is strictly an Apple issue nowadays). Anyways, most mice now, have the famous scroll wheel, which obviously does what it’s named after.
It all boils down to useability. You still can scroll by clicking and dragging those scrollbars – just as you can “right-click” with an Apple by CTRL-Clicking. It’s one thing to love a challenge, but in this case it would be plain stubbornness. Come on, you know you want it!
So you’re talking about mice – where does this “hack” come in?
As I said, most decent mice nowadays have the scroll-wheel, but what about laptops who have other forms of pointer controls? In the PC world there are machines that have solved this problem either by hardware or software. Wether it be installing some dials into the computer to handle them or have some configurable trackpad or pointer drivers.
In the Apple arena though, if I’m not mistaken, only the second method has been implemented… and the most popular software that achieves this functionality is SideTrack – at least until now. With the revelation of this whole w-enhanced business, it seems that Apple technology supported the said function at a hardware level as early as 2004. Hence all this w-enhanced shit everyone’s talking about.
But if it was hardware, why need a hack? That seems to suggest it’s a software issue
Good question, and that’s basically why I posted this… er… post.
I guess the best explanation I can come up with is that all computer hardware have basic input-output processes that they can do on their own – the question is to what degree can they operate independently and effectively. Through firmware (which is basically like a specific hardware’s “mini-os”), these basic IO instructions can be further extended to do higher-level operations… all of which can still be considered “hardware-level.”
The point is that “drivers” are there to interpret user input and give the hardware a set of instructions of what to do – ultimately performing the “expected” task. As stated previously, the hardware can also be made to support more complex operations, which can make the driver use less “instructions” to talk to it.
In the case of SideTrack, it sets the trackpad to its lowest level of operation (by simply detecting which areas are being touched) and interprets/outputs everything via software. In the case of the w-enhanced or new powerbook trackpads however, the trackpads themselves can take on some higher-level operations, hence reducing the load needed to “process” user input.
Hardware-level support is always better because, as you can see in the SideTrack vs. W-Enhanced scenarios, SideTrack will, logically, take more resources to operate than something that has been enabled at a hardware level.
Ok, Ok, I get the picture… so what which should I choose?
Well, right now it depends what you want to achieve. I’ll give you the pros and cons of each at the time of this posting.
The good thing about the trackpad hack, and probably the only reason it’s even being considered nowadays, is that it’s a hardware-based operational function. This entails minimal [or possibly, no] resource overhead (which supposedly equates to faster performance). Plus, it’s an Apple feature that simply was enabled. So if Apple actually spends time on supporting these older, but w-enhanced pads, then there’s a lot to look forward to.
The bad thing is that since it is currently not officially supported, all driver updates/development aren’t quality checked with these extra features the trackpads have. That’s why my system crashed the other time. You’d have to keep an eye out for updates to the hack in case an OS update breaks the current working version you have. That is something I don’t think I have time to deal with time and time again.
Another is that the x (horizontal) scrolling seems to be extremely buggy – I can’t get it to work properly no matter what position I put my fingers in. Circular/rotational scrolling I don’t intend to use so it is beyond the scope of this post.
As of now, there is no configuration utility – so you’re working with the hardware defaults at best. And scrolling with them is a pain in the arse if you’re used to fast scrolling like I am.
The only bad thing here is that it uses the lowest operation mode of the hardware – thats like saying you’re using something for the simplest function it can do (e.g. buying an iPod photo using shuffle feature alone) – which is an awful waste of “features.” Anyways, because it uses the simplest IO operations on the pad, to add functionality, the developer would have to do all processes entirely on a software level – hence, more resource overhead.
The good thing is that it’s extremely stable (why shouldn’t it be, given how it operates). And since the programmer skipped all the higher-order functions the trackpad has, he can pretty much make the pad do anything via software – hence the configurability of SideTrack.
Another good thing is because that SideTrack has been around longer, it practically beats the hack in every “useability” feature the latter has to offer. Or even if the latter had something better (e.g. circular scrolling), it would be easily implemented into the software if enough people asked for it.
The author mentions that now that the free hack was released, he still isn’t worried about SideTrack‘s profitability since the only thing he has to do is simply offer more than what is available. And 1.1.1 hasn’t been released yet, so he could easily put in some extra goodies.
Conclusion
Personally, the scrolling speed alone was enough to make me want to use SideTrack instead of the hack. Until the hack becomes configurable somewhat – I have no gain from it. Plus, SideTrack usually works even after you update your OS – unlike the hack, which is pretty picky on the version upgrades.
With regards to the “overhead:” It’s just a frigging trackpad! Even if you do everything via software, it can’t hog up that much resources. Frankly, regardless of the overhead it may entail – I doubt that it would put that much of a dent on any machine with decent RAM. I have 1GB – so the overhead which the trackpad may generate is the least of my concerns.
If you’re really that picky about resource overhead, then be my guest and use the hack. But as far as useability and stability are concerned – SideTrack wins on all counts. After reading how SideTrack works, I believe that problems connected to it are more of user-error (or major system misconfiguration) than the application itself being buggy.
Of course that’s not to say that the hack will not improve – when that day comes, I’ll try it again and see which is better. But as of the moment, for what they are supposed to be doing, I prefer SideTrack. Unless you find that SideTrack is conflicting with some of your apps (which is possible, but unlikely), I see no considerable gain from the hack over SideTrack aside from the price and the sheer novelty of the idea.
Having said that, I hope I made your choice an easier one.