Create keybindings for vertical zoom commands

[henrik-jensen]

Your idea

Expose Create keybindings for Vertical Zoom (optionally defaulting to ctrl+shift+1/2/3), mirroring the normal zooms keybindings ctrl+1/2/3, (ctrl+2 Zoom Normal mirrored by shift+ctrl+2 Zoom Reset)+ adding some Vertical Center up/down keybindings to mirror the functionality available to the mouse for setting the Vertical Center for the zoom.
Mirror the normal zooms interaction with the mouse-wheel, ctrl+mouse-wheel for zooming in/out, with shift+ctrl+mouse-wheel for vertical zooming in/out as suggested by @petersampsonaudacity.

Bonus would be keybindings for the other "dB area" Vertical Scales popup menu items which likewise is only accessible with the mouse. (caveat: some of the menu items disappeared in 3.5.0 alpha. See @petersampsonaudacity's post.

Vertical Scale outlined in red in the screenshot

Problem to be solved

Main problem is accessibility.
You can't vertical zoom without the mouse as this functionality is dependent on the mouse cursor hovering over the Vertical Scale. And it is not possible to navigate to this area in other ways than with the mouse which exclude or at least complicates help from external automation/accessibility tools.

Prior art

No response

Additional context

I've brought this up in the Audacity Help Forum post Controlling Vertical Zoom without mouse, where steve points out some of the ambiguated problems that arises with Vertical Zoom opposed to normal Horizontal Zoom.
I don't find the problems Steve points out a big hindrance to give access to Vertical Zoom from the keyboard. There are already some problems present with the current implementation when using the mouse interface. Yes you can decide where to start your zoom, top, bottom, middle, but the precision is so very low with the mouse, that you have to retry again and again to hit the spot you aim for. Using the keyboard for this would be much more in your control, adding some Vertical Center up/down keybindings. (This said with the assumption that there are no technical debt in the source code that makes such functionality impossible.)

Edits:

• Additional context section:
  • Rephrased and fixed a badly phrased and incorrect statement "The problems Steve points out are already present for the current implementation...".
• Your idea section:
  • Copied the need for some Vertical Center up/down keybindings to mitigate some of the problems steve pointed out from the Additional context section.
  • Using the correct terminology (thx @petersampsonaudacity)
  • Added @petersampsonaudacity's suggestions.
  • Caveat with 3.5.0 alpha.

[petersampsonaudacity]

@henrik-jensen

Just a quick heads-up:

Vertical zooming is changing a little for the upcoming 3.5.0 - and thus so is the context menu for the Vertical Scale (the bit you outlined in red):

The new vertical zoom commands:
Zoom In, Reset Zoom and Zoom Out could map to your suggested
Ctrl+Shift+1, Ctrl+Shift+2 and Ctrl+Shift+3

---

Note that the old "Advanced Vertical Zooming" is being removed from the app.

[petersampsonaudacity]

To extend this idea further:

Shift + Ctrl + mousewheel could be used to effect vertical scaling in and out

[henrik-jensen]

To extend this idea further:

Shift + Ctrl + mousewheel could be used to effect vertical scaling in and out

How could I have missed that? 👍

I added "... adding some Vertical Center up/down keybindings to mirror the functionality available to the mouse for setting the Vertical Center for the zoom..." to the Your idea section, to mitigate some of the problems pointed out by steve on the forum. Feel like I'm moving the goalpost by editing the Enhancement Request. Hope you still can support it.
(Maybe I should keep additions down in the comment. On the vscode repo the admins monitor the thumps-up count to determine the priority of a proposal. I don't know what the audacity admins/mods/devs policies are but I do feel a bit dishonest changing the Enhancement Request if audacity has a similar policy)

Re: the upcoming 3.5.0
Couldn't find it described in the roadmap or in the github branches.
Could you point me to where to find the details of this upcoming release?

[petersampsonaudacity]

Re: the upcoming 3.5.0
Couldn't find it described in the roadmap or in the github branches.
Could you point me to where to find the details of this upcoming release?

I find out what's going on by following the GitHuB Actions: https://github.com/audacity/audacity/actions

and the GitHub Pull Requests: https://github.com/audacity/audacity/pulls

The Projects>Main section: [AU3] Main board

(filtered for 3.5.0: [AU3] Main board (view)
gives an indication of what Muse are planning for the next release - but I suspect that it may not be a complete list.
They well have internal road maps that are not published.

[SteveDaulton]

There are a couple of plug-ins available HERE for zooming in/out on the track that has focus. When installed and enabled you will be able to create keyboard shortcuts of your choice (I'm using the "+" and "-" keys on the numpad).

[henrik-jensen]

@petersampsonaudacity
Thanks for the links. 👍
Good opportunity to get into github Actions and Projects.

@SteveDaulton
Thanks for the script, got them keybinded and working, and thanks for introducing me to your audacity-focussed nyquist website audionyq.com.
This looks like a goldmine of knowledge on the subject. 👍
Now on to refreshing my limited diku-lisp/elisp knowledge and digging into those scripts.

[petersampsonaudacity]

@LWinterberg is this something that you would consider adding to Audacity ?

It sounds like a good idea to me.