Slashdot Mirror
Airborne Mouse
edpin writes "CNN is reporting this new mouse that works without a surface. You hold the device in your hand and tilt it to where on screen you want it to go. It uses a similar technique to "rock and scroll" developed by Compaq (now HP) a while ago."
If it flies it's a bat, not a mouse.
Imagine what a lanparty would look like with a buncha guys throwing their hands up in the air to avoid being railed...
This isn't a good way to get out of that geek stereotype....
Good quote, too many chars. Seriously, the slashdot 120 char limit sucks!
This isn't anything new - for about the last year or so, we've had a mouse just like that for presentations here at my university - in fact, I think we've got one in each of electronic classrooms for instructors to use. And it doubles as a laser pointer!
"What we have here, is a failure to communicate." - Cool Hand Luke
It's been done before
its been around for what.. two years now? and its at least 5 times smaller.
But is this really any more accurate than, say, a joystick? The advantage of a mouse is that mouse movements by your hand map directly to your screen. With practice you can just move it and get very close to the desired point. A joystick like device lets you control the rate of change of pointer position, not the position directly itself. While useful for some things, for aiming my railgun or getting work done this gadget is junk.
We've been using the Gyromouse Pro from these guys for a while now. It works great and the recharging base is a plus. The only difference I can see from what we use and the new one is that the new one is optical when you use it on the desk, whereas the gyro pro still uses old ball technology.
Geek used to be a four letter word. Now it's a six-figure one.
...is a gyro mouse like this, but one that attaches to your hand.
The problem I have with this mouse is, you have to constantly pick it up and put it down when you need to use it. Granted, we have to take a hand off the keyboard to operate our current meeses, but sliding a mouse a quarter-inch across the table is somewhat less involved than picking one up, re-orienting it with the screen (after all, once you've picked it up, the cursor has moved), pointing and clicking at what you want, and finally putting it down again.
Why not a small device, mounted to the top of your wrist? When you want to point, hit a hotkey that activates the mouse, raise your hand slightly from the keyboard, point-click, hotkey, back to work. The mouse in this article seems more suited to presentations than personal computing.
If this idea gets patented in the future, can I use my slashdot post as 'prior art'?
We had an earlier version of this (Gyro Mouse, same company I think).
I never really liked it. Control is not so good. I think the only place I would want one of these is for giving a presentation in a lecture hall where you need more functionality than "next slide/last slide."
We were using it in a small conference room, everyone seated around a table. Eventually we switched to a cordless trackball. Much better, in my opinion. I also use a cordless trackball when I use the computer and the TV together. (It sits on the armrest of the sofa.)
Several years ago, Till Harbaum added a tilt sensor to his Palm Pilot. Then he wrote Mulg, which is kinda like Marble Madness; if you have the sensor, you can play by tilting the Palm to roll the marble around.
This is STILL the all-time best Palm HW hack I've ever seen.
I've had a "flying mouse for over 4 years now. Made by Handykey and built into their twiddler device.
you simply press the mousing button and gesture to move the mouse.
and in fact I remember back in 1993-1994 many MANY people using nintendo powergloves as mice for windows 3.11 and Logitech had a wireless "airmouse offering back in the mid 90's.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
A few weeks ago, the laptop I gave to my parents packed up (well the win98 installation gave up)... and my Dad; the definate 'luddite' who doesn't like stuff he doesn't understand, had gotten used to the laptop mousepad.
I caught him trying to use another workstation I had set up, and he was stood there moving the mouse through the air, then followed by shaking it violently (while cursing under his breath that is wasn't working) and then he found the ball at the bottom of the mouse actually moved, and started using his finger to move the ball (and cursor) around... I nearly sh*t myself from laughing. So I guess an airboune mouse might have come in handy.
I've since sorted them another workstation up, and decided a mouse might not have survived.. so I got a thumb-trackball mouse from Logitech, which is great, especially considering you don't need half the room needed for a mouse mat and movement room.
Are you local? There's nothing for you here!
The mouse does take some getting used to if you're going to use it without a surface. Instead of using it like a normal mouse, it's designed to be held and pointed like a flashlight. Wherever the "flashlight" would shine on the screen, that's where the mouse goes. I must admit, this isn't really practical for most uses outside of things like presentations and such. The best part about these mice isn't the gyroscope feature, it's the wireless range. The model I purchaced is supposed to have a 25ft range, but in practice the real range is closer to 35ft. There's also a 50ft model that's significantly more expensive. These things are great for home theatre PCs. It's really difficult to find an RF wireless mouse and keyboard with a range greater than 6ft.
Funny this should come up; I was just reading RFC 1 this morning (read it; it's cool), and they mentioned the Lincoln Wand. "What's that?!", I asks myself; so I looked it up. 1966, guys.
I think this may set a new record for Slashdot missing the boat.
"Offtopic, Inflammatory, Inappropriate, Illegal, or Offensive" -- hey, that's me!
I've got ya beat. I've had flying mice since I started playing Doom. ...of course the flights weren't all that long and they usually shattered upon impact.
Now that I think about it, I'd have to admit I've had a few flying keyboards too...
"Ask not what your country can do for you." --John F. Kennedy
The Gyromouse is gyro based in the air, but put it on the desk and it reverts to being an optical mouse. It needs no external sensors to detect position and it also has, in the pro version, a 30M range... It is actually a very slick pointing device , and it feels really solid in your hand.
"You know you want me baby!" - Crow T Robot