You're right. It's not usable for touch screens at all. I've suggested a way to handle this before:
- The first and most simple way is to enable scroll with the same overlay functions as you could have while using the numbers on a keyboard or remote. Touch the scroll bar, and the letters A, B, C and so on will quickly be updated as you scroll down. The letters could also pop up when you scroll fast down a list (without using the scroll bar). The idea is of course taken from Android and iPone/iPod again. Why not use it when it works that good?
- The second thing that could be done is to add a way to dynamically filter out media in views. Example: You have a Filter selection on the roller. This will open up a Filter section in the Info Pane. Here you can select the Genre field, and choose the genres you want to show. The artists, albums or tracks not containing this genre is removed from the view, even when you dig down in the view. You would need to be able to select more than one library field, and you'd have to be able to select which fields to show under the "info pane", so you don't clutter it with all the 50 library fields. You'd also have to be able to filter more than one library field. Genre, Watched/Not watched, actors, directors, ratings etc would be good filter options. This would be a most excellent addition for Movie collectors.
The second suggestion would take some work to accomplish I think. Some people can't understand the use of this either. So it might be a bit of a battle to get such functionality. I also doubt it will be looked at before some other pressing matters in Theater View have been fixed. The first one could be rather easy to implement though. At least I hope so.