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Dear Aunt TUAW: Help revert scrolling to normal

Dear Aunt TUAW,

I hate Lion's new reverse scrolling feature. I mean I really really really really really really really really really hate it.

Fix it for me and I'll buy you prune juice.

Your loving niece,

Sophie

Dear Sophie,

Auntie's still new to Lion but Uncle Steve was quick to the rescue. He walked Auntie through the steps so she could relay them to you.

In Lion, you can disable that nasty reverse scrolling both for your mouse and for your trackpad. Head on over to preferences and choose Trackpad > Scroll direction:natural > disable or uncheck Mouse > Move content in the direction of finger movement when scrolling or navigating. Both options return your Mac to its traditional "down-means-down" scrolling behavior.

Although Auntie prefers reverse scrolling for touch screens, Apple's touch-screen Mac line is a little thin on the ground at this time, if you get what she means.

Uncle Steve's Taking Mac OS X Lion to the Max should hit the shelf by Autumn.

Hugs,

Auntie T.



 

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samusazul

This didn't work for me, I am using a mac mini mid 2010 and have no trackpad connected, thus, when I go to the trackpad settings all it does is scan for a connected trackpad and since none is present, it does not take me to the settings for it, the scroll wheel on my mouse is still reversed, sigh!

January 18 2012 at 2:48 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Benjamin Hetrick

Is there a way to use Natural Scrolling for the trackpad, while keeping normal scrolling for mice? I use a mouse with my MBP but switch to trackpad for certain actions. I love it on the trackpad, but I prefer normal for the mouse

August 01 2011 at 11:32 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Nikolaus Arnold

Reverse scrolling is a joke. If they had an iCar they would put the controls on the right side. Pure arrogance! Thank you also for no longer supporting Tiger on G5, some people actually don't trash everything every other year. The old iMac has a much cleaner design and works great as a file server (squeezebox audiophile etc). Too bad that iTunes is no longer maintained and any Logitech 'squeeze-server' software is as close to a nightmare as possibly can be. I also can't get used to the new iTunes logo. It sucks. Plus I find the typical 'sales associates' in the Apple stores super annoying. I never thought this would happen but I am beginning to sympathize with Bill Gates.........and finally Ubuntu runs pretty good on (aspire one) netbooks, never crashes, no Viruses and Programs are free as in free of charge.....so they don't pay for Steve's Centurion card.

July 31 2011 at 12:12 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Dark Morford

Any chance there's a Terminal command to change the behavior per-axis? For me, the "natural" scrolling feels right when moving between Spaces—er, sorry, Desktops—but I like the "reverse" scrolling in the vertical direction for browsing and such.

July 28 2011 at 3:16 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
skwidspawn

So, I use a Logitech mouse, and when I checked the system preferences pane there were no options to enable or disable this function (and I don't have a trackpad so it wouldn't let me past the discovering screen). I had to go dig out my old USB (or Bluetooth on the new macs) Mighty Mouse and connect it to my computer to get the preference pane to load the option. Quite frustrating. I'm sure someone will find the Terminal command for this soon enough, but until then this may be the only option.

July 21 2011 at 3:15 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
sn0man1

I may have rose tinted glasses but I really wish there was a way to tell which desktop backgrounds came from which version of OS X. I have done some googling (and binging and yahoo-ing (sp?)) on the subject, but to no avail. Is there a comprehensive list somewhere of which desktop backgrounds came with each version. I'd love to set a few spaces to each type of background on rotation.

July 20 2011 at 10:23 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Eideard

Thank you, thank you, oh thank you.

July 20 2011 at 10:05 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
henryhbk

The problem is that you have to have either a trackpad or magic mouse installed to be able to uncheck this. I so far have found one application that doesn't like it enabled (in Eclipse, you can't scroll projects and class files in the package explorer until you have normal direction with the mouse's scroll wheel)

July 20 2011 at 1:35 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
dlmtechnology

how does one do this if they don't have a trackpad, without a trackpad, no options come up to disable the reverse scrolling, even with a mouse

July 20 2011 at 11:46 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
2 replies to dlmtechnology's comment
dlmtechnology

I suspect that I don't get the options because I have a Microsoft IntelliMouse Explorer 2.0 mouse installed and Wireless comfort Keyboard. Are there perhaps terminal commands that I can use to reverse the reverse scrolling "feature"?

July 20 2011 at 12:08 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Joey Connick

Exactly... I have a Microsoft mouse, no trackpad, and I need to change this back.

July 20 2011 at 5:22 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
2 replies to Joey Connick's comment
Joey Connick

Okay, here you go: http://blog.pilotmoon.com/post/4041089648/scroll-reverser-get-in-practice-for-lion

Works if you don't have a Magic Mouse or trackpad!

July 20 2011 at 5:24 PM Report abuse +1 rate up rate down
Marty Mankins

Thanks for the link, Joey. Works great for the Microsoft Mouse.

July 21 2011 at 9:14 AM Report abuse rate up rate down
Michael Langford

The feeling of HATE HATE HATE turns into love after about 1 week of use.

July 20 2011 at 11:27 AM Report abuse +1 rate up rate down Reply
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