#2295: PatienText

Today’s invention is a relatively simple interface design idea that seems to have eluded the world of software.

Everyone in that world is no doubt a flawless typist and password prodigy.

Joshua_Davis_login

It drives me crazy, however, when eg logging into some program that the OS or browser or whatever launches another dialog box which then becomes the centre of events and soaks up the previous few characters I’ve just painfully generated.

The result is that I have to deal with the new box first by deleting my inappropriate part-entry and then remembering a wholly different password.

Instead, imagine that any new text entry boxes popping up do so without occluding the one you are working on.

If there is a problem, such as having forgotten one’s password for the window being typed in, rather than locking up the entire machine by refusing to move to the next dialogue box, such windows would all have equal status -so that you could type one letter at a time into each, if you fancied the idea.

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