I'm not sure why I don't like this...

Not sure whats broken and how its being fixed..

I would rather see FARTSCROLL http://theonion.github.io/fartscroll.js/ as the default scroll than EVER have my scrollbar replaced with this.

I'll probably catch some heat for this but... this feels so much like something a really smart engineer would do and not think/care about how important the touchy-feely part of it matters.

Never mind the fact it natively covers up content, but it's also missing a core function that exists in scrollbars today and is still used by a lot of people... the ability to grab said bar and pull it up or down to move up/down throughout the content more quickly.

Yikes.

The scroll bar on Yosemite is teeny tiny - and it disappears when not in use. It's lovely. And then as you scroll it tells you a) where you are and b) how far you've got to go, in 1 quick glance.

This does neither of those things.

When applied to the chinese scroll it's super cool though.

Hello everyone.

I am the developer of Intence. Actually the web-page is not fully finished, but I am happy that someone has revealed the project and has been inspired enough to share it :-)

Some comments on the feedback.

1. First of all (this is actually the most typical feedback I am getting so far) considering the absence of scrolling controls. There are two concerns about scrolling: controlling the scrolling position, and indicating of that an area is scrollable. The scrollbar provides the solution for both of them, and therefore this is something what is naturally expected from a scrollbar replacement. But Intence is only about indication and does not provide any controls, and this was done intentionally. The last two paragraphs on the web-page explain it, but I will repeat myself here. The idea is that controlling the scroll position is performed by other means. On my personal opinion, in most cases there is no need provide any additional controls, since scrolling with a mouse wheel / touch screen should be enough (we will see soon if I was wrong). But of course there might be some special cases when additional controls may be suitable, or when more exact information about scroling position is demanded. The solution is suppposed to be searched by a particular application developer. Currently they avoid searching for alternatives, since ordinary scrollbar does the job somehow (like a shit on my opinion). Intence is designed to take no space and be transparent to mouse events.

2. The indicator must not be bright and annoying. See the example with code, and with the map. Scrollable area is indicated not by a highly contrast image, but by a content fading out. On the web-page I used highly contrast images to take attention of a reader.

3. Considering the issue of when you start scrolling the page, and then your pointer gets into an inner scrollable area and starts scrolling it instead. This is not actually related to Intence, but of course should be avoided by an application developer. On the web-page of Intence I could not find a simple solution, because I needed to show many scrollable areas. In other applications the solution could be to simply avoid nested scrollable areas (like either a big scrollable page with static content, or an application split into several scrollable frames / areas).

The awesome thing about this is that it is offering a new approach to scrolling because it's now such a natural interaction because of our hardware.

The problem is that it's taking something that's becoming so minimally visible to our eye and making it hugely visible and annoying to look at.

No to mention those textures.

This seems like the kind of skeuomorphism that could have helped when people were first getting acquainted with computers. It looks like a literal scroll. You can tell where you are based on the proportions of the rolls on either side.

I think this is really backwards. PThe thing about skeuomorphs is that they're a great stepping stone to interfaces that no longer need them, but people are already well versed in scroll bars. This is like if someone said "we really need buttons to look like actual buttons, rounded rectangles don't speak the language of humans!" Well, yes, they do, because the language of humans has evolved to include these new buttons as well as scroll bars.

Like many people have said, this is a solution without a problem.

The size of a scroll bar and it's position is a visual cue that tells the user exactly how long the document is relative to the size of the viewport, and where exactly the viewport is relative to the entire document. Intence abstracts these cues and makes them much harder for a user to interpret.

those progress bars you see as you scroll through news sites is a much better way of solving this problem. example

I can see this being used in some cases but don't see it being a replacement for scroll bars

I need an adult.

I thought I was experiencing screen burn for a moment.

Feels like a solution without a problem.

This seems to be solving a non-existent problem. As far as i know, no one has really complained about the current scrollbar. Not only does it give pretty much exact numbers )1/6th of the way down, 1/5th in view, etc), but it also is pretty non-intrusive. This seems to go in the complete opposite direction; not giving me a clear indication of where i am, and taking over a lot of the content.

Interesting way to indicate how much content is above or below.

I don't think this could replace the scrollbar though. The scrollbar not only shows page position, but also an estimate of page length and most of all it can be interacted with. This alternative is an indicator, the scollbar is an indicator and controller.

I know that most of us, myself included, swipe either on screen or on our mouse to scroll down. However the scrollbar is pretty good at providing a fast way to navigate a page.

My scrollbar has been jacked.

Creating a huge distraction with this. Not to mention it looks awful, makes it look like my screen is broken.

The small demos of it look better, the actual implementation is not so good.

I appreciate the irony: http://cl.ly/382a3t2E1J2p