Last year or so I spent some time with Blender on my MacBook Pro without mouse, and while I found the learning curve steep due to Blender not following the User Interface Guidelines, I made a good start learning the interface.
Last week, I tried to pick it up from where I left it, with new versions of Blender and Os X, and I found that I cannot possibly use the interface: even the most simple navigation commands, like zoom and rotate, behave eratically, usually making it completely impossible to see what I’m doing.
Did I hit a lethal combination of Blender and OS X that is not going to work for me, or are there settings that alleviate the experience?
I use Blender on a MacBook Pro without a mouse. I have enabled the two settings Richard mention. I think Blender works very well this way. You are also probably aware of it, but you can use gestures on the trackpad to perform some actions in Blender, such as zoom, rotate and move the viewport. Perhaps this is causing you some issues?
I am using the setting to emulate a 3-button mouse and numeric pad. I cannot get zooming to work, and discovered that it is the inertia scrolling which causes most of the issues: for instance, I am used to scrolling with a two finger swipe, which is not recognized by blender until I lift my fingers from the trackpad, giving me a very wild and uncontrolled zoom. R_KRI: how do you zoom?
I have noticed that zooming behaviour you mention a few times, but only in the UV/Image editor (I think?). It’s never bothered me much so I’ve never thought about it.
I use option/alt in combination with either ctrl or shift pluss one finger drag on the trackpad to do all viewport navigation. Option to rotate, option+ctrl to zoom and option+shift to pan.
That is strange… The only setting I know affect this is the previously mentioned ‘Emulate 3 button mouse’. I have this and the numpad setting enabled.
The option/alt + ctrl and/or shift key combos are also not Mac specific. I use the same keys on a portable PC I use sometimes. Works the same as on the Mac. I wonder if there is anything in the system preferences on your Mac that has to be changed to make this work for you? I wouldn’t know what that could be, though.