Hardware Component - The Computer Mouse

In 1963 two very important things were created – me and the mouse! I had not thought the mouse was around as long as I’vebeen but when researching same, I discovered it has indeed. Douglas Engelbart, Stanford Research Institute, was the person who invented the mouse though poor Douglas never received any royalties as his patent ran out before it became an integral part of personal computers. He envisioned people holding the mouse in one hand and typing on a five key chord keyset with the other hand. It was called a mouse in that it resembled an actual mouse with the cord looking like a tail. Funny enough the cordless mouse of today without its “tail” is still called a mouse! Trackballs had been used previously to mouse devices and the first trackball is traced back to 1952 to three men Tom Cranston, Fred Longstaff and Kenyon Taylor who invented a five-pin bowling ball to use on the Royal Canadian Navy DATAR system, part of a military secret. It was in 1981 that the first marketed integrated mouse accompanied the Xerox 8010 Star Information System and we have been introduced to many mice since then in many shapes and forms.

At the start it was mainly mechanical mouse devices as in the ball mouse, wheel mouse, color mouse and analog mouse. Then the computer industry progressed to offering optical mouse devices, which differs mainly from the mechanical mouse in that it “uses a light-emitting diode and photodiodes to detect movement relative to the underlying surface, rather than moving some of its parts, as in the mechanical mouse.” Infrared, Laser and Color are all example of different type of optical mice. The mouse most commonly used today with PC and Mac computers is a mixture of elements of both optical and mechanical. Other mouse devices that are worth a mention along the way are Inertial Mouse, 3D Mice, Double Mouse System, Tactile Mouse, Microsoft IntelliMouse, Typhoon Mouse, and Apple’s Mighty Mouse. I’m beginning to think that there are more mice of this kind than the animal version!

A mouse is used to control the position of the cursor on the monitor. A mouse is made up of a small jude held beneath users hands with one or more buttons. It has been the subject of great debate as to how many buttons a mouse should have. Up to 2005 Apple recommended just one single button as more user-friendly though many now agree that the three-button scrollmouse works best and is more precise. Gaming Companies prefer to add more buttons because players need easy and quick access to many functions, sometimes simultaneously. The regular mouse is capable of activating/initiating many functions on the computer. Clicking on the right or left button or moving the scroll wheel all initiate different functions. Sometimes it is necessary to click the mouse along with holding a key on the keyboard simultaneously to make specific functions happen. Other noted functions are its capability to drag and drop, move around text/images/graphics, point, scroll, select and highlight.

Other interesting factsI learned that there are two acceptable plurals in the Oxford Dictionary for computer mouse – one being computer mice the other computer mouses. Also, I learned that though Douglas Engelbart’s original mouse did not actually require a mousepad, most mouse devices run more efficiently when using a mouse-pad. And apparently some run most efficiently when using in addition mouse foot-covers, which I had never even heard of before. These are made of low-friction or polished plastic and enables the mouse to glide more smoothly on the mousepad. The best though most expensive in the market are teflon feet so for Christmas we have new mouse accessories to consider☺