A DIY Mid-Air Pointing Device

Werner Heuser writes with an article in Linuxdevices on building your own handheld pointing device that works in mid-air. There is a YouTube video showing the Soap in action and detailed instructions to make your own Soap. From the article: "'Soap,' which resembles a bar of soap, is based on hardware found in a common wireless optical mouse, and is relatively easy to make, according to its inventors. Imagine numerous situations in which one might wish to control an appliance while standing or walking, for example, when giving a slide presentation or interacting with a wall-sized display."

Comments

Don't feel like reinventing the wheel?

[Total_Wimp]

...you can try an Air Mouse from Gryration. I know we're all really excited about the Wii and all, but, honestly, it wasn't the first, and isn't the only, device that does motion sensing.

I know it's not home made, but it does the job pretty well.

TW

Re:Don't feel like reinventing the wheel?

[Tmack]

rtfa... this isnt a motion-sensing device. This is a Do It Yourself (hence the DIY tag) project to basically make a wireless mouse operable in mid air by changing its enclosure and sticking it in a sock.

Tm

Re:The sensor beam's for position in space...

[roscivs]

Mousing with the Wiimote using IR pointing is actually fundamentally different from mousing with the Wiimote using the accelerometer. (The Wii itself uses IR pointing.) To get a better idea of the difference, check out these videos:

Wiimousing on Linux with IR pointing

Wiimousing on Windows [Half-Life] with the accelerometer