Selection (user interface)

In computing and user interface engineering, a selection is a list of items on which user operations will take place. The user typically adds items to the list manually, although the computer may create a selection automatically. Selections are enacted through combinations of key presses on a keyboard, with a precision pointing device (mouse or touchpad and cursor, stylus), or by hand on a touchscreen device. The simultaneous selection of a group of items (either elements in a list, or discontinuous regions in a text) is called a multiple selection.

Context menus will usually include actions related to the objects included in the current selection - the selection provides the "context" for the menu.

Simultaneous editing is a technique in End-user development research to edit all items in a multiple selection. It allows the user to manipulate all the selected items at once through direct manipulation. The technique also appears in data wrangling tools, allowing the user to make the same changes to several records of the same kind in a table.

The term simultaneous editing is also used to describe collaborative editing in collaborative real-time editors.

A column selection is a text selection feature found in text editors which allows the user to select characters in a grid-like fashion, selecting characters in several lines at the same columns. This is usually initiated by pressing the alt key (instead of the shift key, which createas a continuous selection) to select text when dragging. Some applications also enable text to be typed in multiple lines at once using this method as a limited form of simultaneous editing.

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