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3-button Optical Mice?
proclus asks: "Does anyone else think that scroll wheels are a clunky replacement for the middle button? Mice are supposed to have three buttons, right? It was such an improvement when the three button mice started appearing for PC hardware, but I'm wondering, where are the optical ones?"
I have a friend who has a three button mouse; no scroll wheel. I find myself sitting there stroking the middle button like some sort of pervert.
The scroll wheel makes life so much easier - just checking through /. this morning I used it at least as often as the left mouse button. Why on earth would anyone want to get rid of it, particularly when you can click it as well?
I love the scroll wheel. It is possibly the most significant UI innovation of the last ten years.
:-/
But I hate having it clickable as the third button.
Particularly in Konqueror, I find myself scrolling through a document, and suddenly I press too hard on the wheel and it jumps me to some random hyperlink that I hadn't even noticed let alone intended to click on. *grrrrr*
Personally I'd rather have a scroll wheel than a third button. The third button is nice, and I always liked having it, but the wheel is better, and the two don't co-exist too well.
(Spudley Strikes Again!)
If a mouse is going to have numerous buttons, they need to have clear, discernable functionality within an OS. LMB = select, RMB = context, Scroll = move view. These make sense, but I'm not sure what else would, please feel free to enlighten me. Can anyone make a case for features that other mouse buttons could use? I'm not talking about customising buttons for starting file managers or browsers, as these are just shortcuts, but clear-cut functionality that help users navigate and operate withint the GUI metaphor.
Even when I use a Mac, I find that having a single button was a hindrance. I'm a guy who's big on shortcuts, so consequently I did a lot of my navigation in Mac OS by using nothing more than keyboard commands (I loved being able to type the name of a folder or file and get it selected, then to expand all trees by hitting Shift-Command-Right Arrow, or collapse). But I always wanted that same kind of ease-of-use with the mouse as well. I always felt that you should be able to navigate solely by using the mouse or keyboard alone.
The idea of context menus was something I was very happy with when I started using PCs. I was very glad when Apple decided to include context menus in OS9, but I was angry that you couldn't use a two-button mouse to accomplish that. What's the point of having context menus if you have to hit Command-Click to use them?
..can you 'accidently' click on a wheel/button?
Christ, no wonder the lot of you have RSI.
Here's a tip - Don't hang on to your mouse for dear life. It isn't going anywhere.
Lots of replies of the form "But I always need my scrolly button so you must be stupid."
I have eight Logitech three button mice. I like them a lot. I reprogram the middle button to double-click, because I don't like RSI and I think the double-click idea really sucks. I use the keyboard 95% of the time and only reach for the mouse when some lazy application programmer couldn't be arsed to take the 5 microseconds needed to put a keyboard shortcut in for a specific function.
I hate the scrolly wheel. I don't want a scrolly wheel. Yes I know they can be clicked, but they are designed to be scrolled, not clicked, so the click spring is much stronger than the spring on the other two buttons. Besides, you can scroll with the keyboard (or at least you will be able to when Mozilla works out that the currently selected tab is the one that should have the keyboard focus, not the one that's just finished loading). I'm not saying YOU, dear Reader, need to, just that I do, and I don't want to be reaching for the mouse when I can move my fingers to the up/down keys.
So, I personally can guarantee a market of eight optical three button mice for Logitech when they come out at a decent price. Oh, I had a look at the MX700. It's a fucking air traffic control centre that needs at least 23 people to operate. OVERKILL, people! I want an OPTICAL version of my three button mouseman, that's all. And the MX700 costs about $90. I'm NOT buying eight of those. (if you're wondering, 8=3 at work+3 at home+2 spare. Yes, I really like them a lot. Every time I get a computer with a mouse with a clitoris I replace it with a 3BMM.) Three button mousemen are currently going for about $25 in the UK. I'd pay $40 for an optical version, cos I'm bored with cleaning dirty balls and rollers. But I'm not going to buy ANYTHING that has a scrolly wheel on; I'd rather stick with my current mice.
So if anyone's with me, mod me up, and someone pass a reference to this article to Logitech.