in this scenario we have 16 elements with a range of 0-170. If we drag the mouse across from a node and then click the background first we get a print of "click (pointer) 0 (the initialised y position), then we will get a print output equivalent to the number of nodes with the y values of each node multiplied by 2 (why x2 ?).
Surely we must be able to capture this output

sliderbank-vanilla-debug.pd

Ok delays didn't work as it just delayed the onslaught, but [route] works well by sending an Id from the struct click to [route] then [spigots] dispersing the cental ping bang to the correct [slids-2] (obviously the [table] at the top right would be hidden)
slids-2-ping-test.pd
slids-2.pd

@Balwyn Getting better and more useful!
The ping seems to control dataflow with the gui....... maybe to ensure audio continuity.
If you put a gui in the patch and change it's value then a stream of pings are generated. Seems to be a message from the Pd gui saying "ready, send next chunk".
s_inter.c

/* ---------------------- sending messages to the GUI ------------------ */
#define GUI_ALLOCCHUNK 8192
#define GUI_UPDATESLICE 512 /* how much we try to do in one idle period */
#define GUI_BYTESPERPING 1024 /* how much we send up per ping */

David.

@Balwyn PS....SSSSS.. P
I know it doesn't perfectly fit your criteria (Vanilla only) but a mouseup plugin might be acceptable?
It is more reliable than the old extended mousestate.
mouseup.zip
Please no laughter about the simplicity of the code!
David.

@whale-av No laughter here, I think this is amazing in its simplicity. It took me a while to work out to put the 'mouseup-plugin.tcl' in the extra folder, but now its working, I'll see what I can do with it. Are there other mouse events that can be bound in this way?
Cheers and thanks
Balwyn

@Balwyn I am on a show today..... but I am sure other mouse functions can be dealt with in the same way. I will have a go at expanding the plugin tomorrow.....
David.
PS.... sorry for the lack of explanation for the plugin. They need to be in a path that Pd opens at startup.

i modified the mouseup plugin, now you get the coordinates from mouseup mousedown and motion.mouse_coordinates_plugin.zip

any idea how to modify the plugin or the patch to specify a pd window or a canvas where i get the coordinates from? at the moment i get the coordinates from the mouseposition in every pd window.

I have no real agenda here apart from wishlist, but surely a mouse up event would be a necessity in any programming language and is seriously missing in Pure Data.
So here I offer yet another clunky work around where line is giving an immediate update then the y output is forced into a matrix
slider-line.pd

You know that you can get mouseup from [iemguts/receivecanvas], right?