Middle mouse button scrolling

[harold-b]

• VSCode Version: 1.10

I searched the issues but did not find any such post, so apologies if there is an existing thread that I missed.

I'd like to know if there is any middle mouse click scrolling, planned? That is, clicking the scroll wheel to toggle drag scrolling. It's a useful feature to have when navigating very long files.

And if it isn't, is there any API that would allow this to be enabled via an extension?

Thanks

[Tyriar]

@harold-b This is an OS-level Windows feature, it should work on Windows now. Also middle click has special behavior on Linux by acting as a secondary clipboard so it definitely wouldn't work there.

[harold-b]

it should work on Windows now

Which version is it available on? I can't seem to trigger it on 1.10 public or insiders.

[Tyriar]

@harold-b do you have the same issues in Chrome and/or Atom? I wouldn't expect us to need to do anything on our side for it to work.

[harold-b]

I'm on Chrome right now and it's always worked. I've never used atom (other than electron via VSCode), but I'll grab it and verify.

[harold-b]

I tried Atom, it didn't work either. I checked the settings page to see if there was an option I needed to enable, I didn't find anything, but scrolling worked on the settings page. So I decided to check a markdown file in preview mode on VS Code, and it worked there too. However, not in text documents on either app.

[Tyriar]

@harold-b k, I'll relabel and assign, thanks for bearing with me 😃

[harold-b]

Not at all, my pleasure to help. Thanks for your attention 👍

[csicky]

Hi, any news on this?

THX

[jeepshop]

Bump!

I use this feature constantly within Visual Studio, and it is greatly missed.

[csicky]

I keep seeing that you guys are working on something each month when there is a new version. How come you keep forgetting about this one? There has been a year already. If you say it is something OS level it means it's a bug. It doesn't matter, bug, feature, just please make it work.

[Tyriar]

@csicky there are 4000 open issues currently and there are ~2000 new ones created every month. Everything needs to be prioritized.

[csicky]

I understand that, but if there are 2000 new ones every month it means that in a year there were many issues prioritized before this one.

[alexdima]

@csicky The advantage of us being Open Source is that if you'd like to have something implemented, you can do it and submit a PR. Issues and discussions are very valuable, but IMHO a PR will have a far greater impact! ❤️

[csicky]

@alexandrudima OK then, until I will find time to make it myself I will have to live with it every day. OS is not always an advantage. But if you say it's an advantage, why are you doing it actually? Not to share it with the users? Here is a request from some users.

[Tyriar]

@csicky I don't understand the point you're trying to make here? There are many good and bad things with OSS, but from this conversation I've gathered:

Advantages:

• Ability to talk directly with developers
• Access to source code
• Ability to contribute
• More unfiltered feedback from users

Disadvantages:

• ?

The fact that VS Code is OSS doesn't change the fact that we're busy and need to manage and prioritize the vast amount of incoming issues. You would probably be worse off if VS Code was closed as you wouldn't have the ability to contribute is what @alexandrudima was trying to say.

[ChaosOrdeal]

Highly-desired long-standing low-hanging fruit.

[csicky]

No matter how many people upvote or comment, this will never be fixed. This issue here is still open only for the reason to not have another one opened by people.

I can recommend X Mouse Button Control to take control over stubborn apps.

[adamrushuk]

I can recommend X Mouse Button Control to take control over stubborn apps.

Thanks for the X Mouse Button Control recommendation, @csicky.
This is great, especially after enabling the "sticky" scroll option so it acts close to default browser scrolling:

[ChaosOrdeal]

Autohotkey Script

[ianbenlolo]

Is this still not done? I'm on Ubuntu and this would be helpful and very much a low-hanging fruit...

[JethroHazelhurst]

Lol this is genuinely amazing.

What's wrong guys? Why are we unable to do this?

[TimeTerminal]

I believe it's due to unfamiliarity of the tools (having to make this work with the different operating systems), and not that many people who use the middle mouse button to scroll, so this keep getting deprioritized.

[csicky]

What is cool is that now the issue count is at 181825 and this is 6302, in time, as the count only goes up to millions, and this will never be closed or completed, this will be a Guinness Book record worthy issue here, the issue with the smallest number still open 😄

[Tyriar]

No matter how many people upvote or comment, this will never be fixed.

This is not true, the number of votes an issue gets feeds into the team's prioritization.

What is definitely not helpful is coming back with snarky messages as it causes people like me to unsubscribe to the issue and/or lock the issue when it's particularly noisy (which prevents further voting). I'd love to see this as well but if it was trivial it would have been done already, either by the core team or a contributor.

[novacrazy]

It's niche, but my Nickel allergy makes it annoying to use the scroll wheel on my mouse (G502), which is made of Nickel metal. Less an issue nowadays that I have calluses on them, but it used to even make my fingers bleed sometimes. So instead I bind the thumb-button to middle-mouse-button for scrolling most of the time. Doesn't work in VS Code, though, hence why I've been subscribed to this issue for years.

[github-account1111]

@novacrazy one solution I can think of is to not use a mouse with a nickel wheel.

[novacrazy]

@novacrazy one solution I can think of is to not use a mouse with a nickel wheel.

You can pry my G502 from my cold, dead, bloody hands.

[alsoLut]

On Linux, you can enable this functionality system-wide with:

xinput set-prop 15 'libinput Scroll Method Enabled' 0, 0, 1 
xinput set-prop 15 "libinput Button Scrolling Button" 2
xinput set-prop 15 "libinput Button Scrolling Button Lock Enabled" 1
xinput set-prop 15 "libinput Natural Scrolling Enabled" 1

replace 15 with the value obtain from xinput --list --short

man libinput for more settings

[lancemcmuffin]

Would love to see this addressed. Still holding out after 7 years

[abventorg]

I use this feature all the time within Visual Studio, and it's greatly missed.

[ChaosOrdeal]

So, it looks like MS is removing middle mouse button scrolling from all of its products and defeating it on their websites.

The only thing the staff has ever done on this ticket is: close it with a bizarrely innaccurate assessment, ignore it for years, act like middle mouse-button scrolling is not a dirt-common feature, complain that users are snarky, threaten to unsubscribe from this thread, and told the users to fix what they claim they could not.

How can the staff devs know that this problem is not trivial if they never worked on it? And why would they have worked on it at all if it never got the necessary votes? It sounds like it got the votes, they made a token effort, it was hard, it wasn't very Linux-y, and suddenly, mysteriously, it didn't have the required number of votes.

** It's beneath Linux devs to implement Windows-like features. **
That's been the problem the whole time. Too cool to do their jobs.

Sorry if this comes off as snarky. Don't unsubscribe or this will never get fixed.

[csicky]

Opened in 2016...
let's wait till 2026!
😂

What is snarky...

[NicTanghe]

@ChaosOrdeal
Very weird that you would think Linux users wouldn’t like middle mouse scroll
I used it to scroll to ur comment.

@alsoLut
xinput set-prop 15 'libinput Scroll Method Enabled' 0, 0, 1
xinput set-prop 15 "libinput Button Scrolling Button" 2
xinput set-prop 15 "libinput Button Scrolling Button Lock Enabled" 1
xinput set-prop 15 "libinput Natural Scrolling Enabled" 1
property 'libinput Scroll Method Enabled' doesn't exist, you need to specify its type and format
property 'libinput Button Scrolling Button' doesn't exist, you need to specify its type and format
property 'libinput Button Scrolling Button Lock Enabled' doesn't exist, you need to specify its type and format
property 'libinput Natural Scrolling Enabled' doesn't exist, you need to specify its type and format

[lukakostic]

Middle click scroll when? 7 years guys..

[Galacticai]

Middle click scroll when? 7 years guys..

Waiting for the 10 years anniversary or even better, never

[dfvr1994]

2024, still waiting...

[matiasmacarioo]

2024, still waiting...

[NatoBoram]

Ah, shame. My mousewheel got dirty and I can't fix it, so it counter-scrolls half the time. I would really, really, really need autoscrolling to be able to navigate my code while the next mouse is shipping.

Can we tag this as accessibility Keyboard, mouse, ARIA, vision, screen readers (non-specific) issues ?

[thetechdog]

I need this...

[Sceptrum]

From time to time, I press the middle button to scroll, like I haven't tried it already a thousand times. That's how I miss this feature.

[csicky]

https://github.com/microsoft/vscode/issues?page=2&q=is%3Aopen+sort%3Acreated-asc

this is at number 50 of never to be completed issues

[LeviGary]

+1
i use it in browsers all the time so to not have it is incredibly weird