[killerstorm]

> On desktop (using a mouse or trackpad), drag and drop actually works quite well.

Strong disagree here. It is intuitive, it is easy to demonstrate. But it's not really convenient, especially on a trackpad. I have enough mouse agility to play RTS games but not to do a reliable drag-and-drop, especially in a complicated case - across windows, with scroll, etc.

[jrowen]

Yes, it can get tricky if you have to scroll a bunch, e.g. moving a file in a big directory into a subfolder, trying to hit that one pixel where it will scroll up, or using two other fingers to attempt to scroll, while holding the drag finger down...(CLI pros, you win this one).

I would like a desktop pick and place that works like drag and drop, you click and then it sticks to the cursor, but you are free to do whatever gestures until you click again.

[sunrunner]

> while holding the drag finger down

I'm not sure if this is common on other desktop operating systems but the 'Drag Lock' feature on macOS allows you to double-tap an item, then drag it without holding the button down to begin a drag. At that point lifting your finger continues the drag until you tap once to release it.

I would be amazed at how many people using macOS have never found this option except I'm not sure I've ever seen it being called out as a feature, and nowadays it's also buried deep under Accessibility settings (the irony) instead of just being a Trackpad option, so a lot of users might not even think to go there.

[stonecharioteer]

Double tap or double click is to open a file. If you're using it to do anything else, that's so counter intuitive.

[sunrunner]

I never said it was intuitive, only that it exists ;)

I’d argue that double-click to open a file is also not intuitive, but it is now the expected behaviour. Documents don’t have to be touched twice in real life to have them open and reveal their secrets. Plus, I do use Drag Lock, so that behaviour now does feel intuitive to me.

There’s a lot to be said for what is effectively learned behaviour in intuition.

[jotaen]

On macOS, I find “3 finger drag” very convenient to use, and for me it works a lot better than “press and hold”. (https://support.apple.com/en-us/102341) It even allows you to briefly lift your fingers to reposition them on the trackpad without stopping the drag action.

[chuckadams]

Found the well-hidden setting (you'd think "Trackpad" would be an obvious place for it), enabled it, and wasn't exactly jazzed: if I lift my fingers for more than half a second (say, to cmd-tab with the same hand), it releases. And you can't have both three-finger-drag and drag lock enabled, so drag lock it remains for me.

[RHSeeger]

> But it's not really convenient, especially on a trackpad

From my experience, there's nothing convenient about a trackpad; pretty much ever. About the only thing they do better than a normal mouse is scrolling left/right, and that's only marginally. I bring a mouse with me when I take my laptop somewhere because I hate the trackpad so much.