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."

Re:airborne mouse

[Anonymous Coward]

I am thinking video games could be one market? If I hook up my computer to my tv, it's unlikely I'll have a desk in front of it...

Obviously...

[suman28]

this has very limited applications. I think it will be difficult to play games with this, since I use the keyboard also. Then there is the issue of whether I want to hold my hand up in the air when using my mouse in the first place. That has to hurt after a few minutes.

9 hour charge?

[Howwie]

Installation involved popping the receiver into a USB port and giving the mouse a nine-hour charge in the supplied charging pod.

The review doesn't say how long the charge lasts but I certainly hope it lasts a while if you have to charge it for 9 hours.

Hrmmmm...

[EatHam]

I wonder if it's anything like this device [pricegrabber.com]. Seriously though - a pointing device that works without a surface? Possibly that old thumbpad wireless mouse (which was also used primarily (AFAICR) for powerpoint presentations? Possibly a trackball?

Need a one handed keyboard...

[GweeDo]

This device seems like it would have very limited uses. When I am using my computer for work and play I normally don't have my left hand dedicated to my mouse (like right now, I am typing with it). It is nice to just lay my hand right on top of the mouse and be ready to go. With this I would actually have to pick it up and that would take just a second longer, but it would be enough to irritate I think. Any application where you use your hand exculsivly for your mouse (or 90% of the time atleast) might be a use for this, but then there is a question of control. Do I get fine precision with this new airborne mouse? I have to think I wouldn't...but I don't honestly know.

Re:airborne mouse

[lrohrer]

"hands free" operation. For instance in some warehouse implementations I've done we mounted laptop computers on fork lift equipment. First it was a pain to get the "big burly hands" to use nipples on the machine and tailed mice still had to have a place to play on. There are hand activitated computers but these cost 3X times as much as a normal PC/laptop.

Whould it not also work for presentations?

What I want is my screen focus to shift based upon eye movement. Well maybe most of the time. I don't want the wife and kid to be assilmilated!

Here's what I want...

[jerkychew]

...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'?

Where bats have been before?

[phorm]

There was a 3d-input device like this out sometime ago, but it never caught on. From memory, it was simply called "the bat", but this could be a general term much the same as "mouse."

I haven't been able to find any links on google, but a gyroscope-driven bat was definately out several years ago, as I remember considering it as a cool tool for playing descent or quake games (had they come up with proper support for it). It it catches on now, it might indeed be a cool tool for 3d-gamers and developers alike.

Wiggly

[eMilkshake]

I just purchased the two different models of these for our University -- they work as you would expect.

Unfortunately (and this sounds obvious, but comes as a surprise when using it), your wrist lacks the precision that your fingers have. Circle points of reference is easy, but clicking on links is difficult.

Torture

[nick_davison]

I have friends in the S&M scene who have their submissives hold things out at arm's length for long periods of time as a painful punishment. You'd be amazed how quickly just the weight of your own arm starts to hurt.

Next : a mouse, shaped like a dime, that you have to press against the wall with your nose?

Re:Back in the 80s

[AngryPuppy]

This is more revolutionary than the mercury-switch controllers. The Atari system controllers were just five switches. One for each of up, down, left, right and one for a fire button. diagonals were achieved by closing two switches. There was not the fine control you ordinarily want with a mouse. A simple mercury switch is only an on/off device. It would not measure degree of tilt.

use for those on respirators

[markwusinich]

I was amazed when my father was in the hospital, on a resparator and unable to talk, that they had no implementation of a device like this! Does anyone know of an application that uses a wireless mouse to help someone on a resparater. These are people who often find themselves in a hospital bed, with a tube down their throat, unable to talk, and often with their hands tied to the beds. (I was told this is because of all the drugs the patient has often results in halutinations).

I am not much for tinkering, but I would guess that you could set something like this up pretty easy.

If you know of such a device, please reply. I now have a cousin who fell down a flight of stairs over the weekend, and is on a resparator.

Mark

It was new in 1966.

[theonomist]

Funny this should come up; I was just reading RFC 1 [ietf.org] this morning (read it; it's cool), and they mentioned the Lincoln Wand [packet.cc]. "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.

Nothing new here

[Anonymous Coward]

I saw something like this around six years ago. It wasn't wireless at the time, but a few years later the company had a wireless one. It worked by using gyros when the mouse was picked up (you could use it as a standard mouse when it was down) and was descent for presentations.

Reminds me of Atari's "Le Stick"

[Peachy]

Produced in the 80's, a joystick which was freestanding, see picture [classicgaming.com].

For those of you who haven't tried one...

[Dj]

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.