>Now, having two such "lists" that act like a hierarchical menu (for
>example, "topics" in the left list, "articles" in the right list, anyone
>remember EasyView?), I need to keep the current selection hilited on both
>fields to visually keep the user informed about "where" he/she is.

Actually a much easier way would be what HIG suggests. When they click on a
"topics" item, you highlight the item they clicked on AND you draw a
highlight around the outside of the rect that comprises the whole list.
This shows the active "list" and it shows the active selection.

When the user clicks on an item in "articles", the highlighted item in the
"topics" list unhighlights around the outside of the whole list rect and
then leaves a 1 pixel selection rect around the item itself.

Most two list software that I have works this way and it conveys the
information pretty well as to what the user is doing. It also make more
sense than having two fields highlighted since as others pointed out, you
need to know what item will be receiving any action thats performed.

I can supply a couple of screen shots of the effect if you want to email me
direct.

Mel Patrick
mel@...