MultiScroll: Using Multitouch Input to Disambiguate Relative and Absolute Mobile Scroll Modes

We propose MultiScroll, a general purpose hybrid scrolling technique that uses multitouch input to allow for a combination of rate based scrolling for navigating short and medium distances and zero-order scrolling for navigating large distances. The design challenges of supporting both scrolling modes on mobile devices are discussed, including the use of ‘drift zones’ and ‘edge proximity warnings’ to resolve potential problems of touch controlled mobile rate-based scrolling. Evaluations with participants both stationary and walking show the complimentary benefits of the techniques over flick scrolling across a variety of scrolling tasks.