Don't automatically scroll in AI Chat Assistant

pbronez

On iOS 17.5.1, open https://kagi.com/?m=assistant&mode=7&sub_mode=2 from a home screen link. Ask a question. After a moment, response text streams in. As text flows past the bottom of the screen, the browser scrolls down, keeping the newest text in focus. It moves so fast that you cannot read the beginning of the answer.

It would be better to maintain focus at the top and allow the user to scroll down manually.

Luis

Hi all, Assistant automatically scrolls to display the assistant's output if the user is at the bottom of the page.
But we give users the option to pause autoscroll:

If the user scrolls up and shifts focus, the response will keep streaming, but the page will not autoscroll and will stay at the current position
Manually scrolling up before the assistant begins to respond prevents autoscroll from activating

With autoscroll we think this is the most intuitive experience. What are your thoughts? Do you think there should be an option to disable autoscroll completely?

e.g.:

CrunchyFritos

Luis I think the default should be not to autoscroll, but maybe if the user manually scrolls to the bottom of the page as the response streams in, the behavior to shift to autoscroll. Not sure if that would be confusing or annoying, but I'd much prefer the default to not autoscroll with the option to autoscroll should I choose since the autoscroll is almost always too fast for me to read anyway making it fairly useless beyond looking cool.

pbronez

Luis yes, I would appreciate an option to disable auto-scroll.

andrew-rivera

The default behavior should be not to scroll. At the very least I should be able to turn it off. I never want the page to auto scroll. Auto scrolling simply makes the text unreadable, especially as the models continue to get faster.

ATOMIC

andrew-rivera my problem is that whenever the answer generate it never scrolls down for me so i have to scroll down, how to fix?

Elifino

ATOMIC
I have the same issue (web browser). I always have to click the down arrow as the window never autoscrolls.
I get that people don't want the autoscroll at all time, but the behaviour should be a toggle.

What @Prostagma proposes I think is a solid default:

after issuing a prompt, scroll until start of reply reaches top of screen
When submitting new prompt, jump to bottom and scroll until reply reaches top of screen.

At this point, unless you manually click the button, the screen won't move :/ This is quite annoying if you are a keyboard warrior.

Prostagma

The way that OpenAI handles autoscroll works best. When you send a query, they scroll the page ONLY to the point where the first line of new text reaches the top of the page.

It allows you to start reading the new text immediately, without having to worry about manually scrolling back up in the initial response generation.

Prostagma

Make the auto scroll of Assistant more in line with how ChatGPT's auto scroll is. When a query is sent in, the window only scrolls to the point where the response reaches the top of the page.

This eliminates the need to scroll back up every time a long response is being created.

ChatGPT implementation:

Current Assistant implementation:

By implementing this feature, it will be a better experience for users who read the response immediately after it is being generated since the auto-scroll won't force them to scroll back up to read the first part of the response.