Similarities Between Apple’s & Windows’s Trackpads

Apart from the two brands running on completely different systems, Rohan will just stick to the User Experience part. Before getting to the Trackpads, let’s look at the two brand in general (please click to skip to the Trackpads section).When it comes to Apple and Microsoft, there is always the dispute of which is better. In many cases is it a scenario of personal preference, however, when it comes down to the price of the products, Windows very often wins the argument very quickly. However, in other cases it could come down to what you might use the computer for. In many cases (such as accounting), Windows is much preferred for the numbers pad which you can have on the keyboard. Programmers tend to prefer Apple and also it appears that the most stable system to run Windows on, is an Apple computer.

Comparing the two against each other in terms of safety, Windows falls short quite significantly, due to the vulnerability to viruses. Apple products are much less prone to viruses which, in the long run, could save you quite a sum of money when you bring into account the antivirus products (fair enough, you do get free products), and should you pick up malware, the costs of getting it removed… Apple’s products are much less prone to these type of problems.

Apple seems to be much more prominent with the various functions of the Trackpad on their products. There are far more that you can do with the trackpad than just scroll up and down. This goes for both Apple and Windows laptops (although in my experience, Apple does have  few more functions).

The video above mentions 10 very useful feature, lets just focus on a few of them and feel free to leave a comment on which ones you find most useful. The video also displays feature on a MacBook, so feel free to comment which also work on Windows (that are not covered in the Blog).

Instead of clicking with the mouse button (or left corner on Apple’s Trackpad) and grabbing hold of the scroll bar in the righthand side of the page, take 2 fingers and drag them up and down your trackpad. This will scroll the page up and down, although in my experience, Apple does have a much smoother scroll in this regard.

When taking 3 fingers on the Apple Trackpad, and pushing them up (without clicking the Trackpad) you will be presented with all the programs that you currently have open on your laptop. If you do the same on Windows, the same will happen. All the programs that you currently have open will be shown on your screen. The more there are, the smaller the previews with be. With both systems you can either click on the program you could like to use, or you can drag 3 fingers downwards to continue on the program that you were previously on.

If you would take 3 fingers and pull them downwards on the Trackpad, you will be presented with the amount of windows you have open on in that specific program. When doing this on a Windows laptop, you will be presented with the desktop. It will minimise all your programs and you will be able to only see the desktop. Bringing the programs back to view, just drag 3 fingers up again, and the last program you were viewing will be displayed again. Dragging your fingers up again will have the same effect as previously mentioned (viewing programs).

So if Windows can access the desktop with the swipe of 3 fingers downwords, how can Apple users do this? If you swipe downwards with 3 fingers, you are presented with the windows in one program currently open. The answer is simple; Apple users use 4 fingers and start with all 4 fingers together in the middle of the Trackpad, then glide their 4 fingers simultaneously outwards (away from each other). This moves all the other programs to the outskirts of the desktop, making it accessible for the user. When doing this on a Windows laptop, (in my experience) nothing happens.

If a user does the opposite to the previously explained instruction (taking 4 fingers and gliding them from the outskirts of the Trackpad inwards), you will be presented with the Launchpad. This is another place where you can find your applications and group them together as the user prefers. Getting out of this view you can either move your 4 fingers from the middle outwards again, or you can press the escape key on your keyboard. Doing the same gesture on a Windows Trackpad, it calls the Action Center, although it does take a few tries usually.

When browsing the Internet, an Apple user can take 2 fingers and swipe them from left to right to go back to the previous page they were visiting. Should the user decide the the page they were viewing before (before swiping from left to right), they can swipe from right to left to go back to that page again. Browsers do have backward and forward arrows to do the same, but not having to move the cursor, this does save time, and it also just becomes a habit. Rohan has tried these gestures on Windows, but they do not seem to work.

Another convenient feature on Apple, is to rotate a picture. When opening a picture, you can simple use 2 fingers and make a rotating gesture on the trackpad in the direction to which you would like to have the picture rotated. There is also the option of clicking the option of rotation the picture (on both Apple and Windows), but with this, you need to move the cursor to the correct place first. It’s not the end of the world having to do this, but again, it all comes down to ease of use and it quickly becomes a habit to work in this way.

There are more gestures that can be done on an Apple laptop, like swiping from left to right to access the Dashboard, but some of them do get a little distracting. When swiping 4 fingers inward (accessing the Launchpad), there is an icon to click on to access the Dashboard very easily. Fortunately most of the distracting features can be disabled easily, just Google the function that you are having and how to disable it.

These are just a few similarities that were picked up when working with the 2 different platforms, and Rohan is sure there might be more. Please feel free to mention them below in the comments section. Rohan is not whether these functions work on all Windows laptops or all versions of Windows, but he has tried it on a ParckardBell and a Lenovo with Windows 7 and Windows 10 respectively.