Single-click keeps menus open?

**Ripcord** · August 17th, 2003, 01:57 PM

I mentioned that I'm setting up a brand new G4.

Now, am I crazy, or is there a way to open menus (File, Edit, View, etc) and keep them open by single-clicking and dragging, instead of click-and-hold? I find myself keep trying to do this over and over, and I'm thinking that my last Mac used to do this as well. Or is it just that I've been using Windows for a week and am already used to it??

Thanks,
Rip

**adambyte** · August 17th, 2003, 02:15 PM

Traditionally, on Mac OS systems 1.0 - 7.6.x, you had to hold down and then let go on the menu item you wanted. Mac OS 8.0 finally gave us the option of either clicking and holding, OR clicking once on the menu, then on the item. You should be able to do either, these days.

**DeltaMac** · August 17th, 2003, 02:21 PM

If you move the cursor off of an open menu, without selecting any items, the menu will stay open (until you click again)

**Ripcord** · August 17th, 2003, 06:03 PM

Mine's not doing that. For example, I'm in Safari at the moment. If I click on "File" and then let go immediately, the File menu drops down and disappears immediately.

I'm now convinced it didn't use to do that. I remember that there was a slight pause between highlighting a sub-menu option (with a right arrow next to it) and when it would open up the new sub-menu. Invariably I used to click to open the sub-menu (I'm used to this from Windows), and the menu would just close, which frustrated me.

Is this an option I can change? I haven't found it yet. I wouldn't be surprised, this new Mac also had Dock magnification turned off by default, which I don't remember happening when I installed Jag from CD onto my older machines.

**Ripcord** · August 17th, 2003, 06:08 PM

I have 10.2.6 loaded, with no special mouse or (related) software loaded, by the way... Nor any settings changes that I believe would affect the mouse, like Accessibility options, etc.

**Ripcord** · August 17th, 2003, 06:17 PM

This is weird too - if I click on "Help" then let go immediately, the Help menu closes immediately. However, if I drag the mouse across the top of the screen and highlight the Volume icon or the Time, their drop-down menus open (remember, the mouse button is NOT held down). Huh.

**DeltaMac** · August 17th, 2003, 06:57 PM

I have seen this occasionally. A log out and back in will fix it, or just restart. There's no prefs that do this, it's just the Finder being a little stubborn. (even a force-quit of the finder may get it working again.)

Normal operation for my system - Click on an empty area of the menu bar, now move your mouse to the right end without clicking again, you should see each system menu drop down (time, volume, etc.) click on the empty area again, now system menus do not drop when moused over. click on any App menu (from the Apple and on through) and the menu drops, holding open when you release the button, move along the app menu headers, each will drop in turn without clicking (until you click again)
Check you mouse prefs for a double-click that is too short.

**Ripcord** · August 17th, 2003, 07:29 PM

Yep, a logout/back in cleared the problem and I haven't seen it come back. I KNOW I rebooted between occurances of this problem, it just seems like my bad luck that I happened to have the problem more than once in a short period of time... Thanks, guys, I'll post back if I can come up with a sequence of events that triggers the problem =)