Mouse survey

I didn't either. But is sure is nice. If battery life turns out to be not so good I'll try NiMH. And when that won't do the trick and I have some time maybe I'll loop some coils underneath the desk and do a magnetic power transfer plus a large electrolytic to cover any bursts.

Any link for those of us who don't have kids and don't know a thing about video games? I mean, other than the Pong game...

On a sunny day (Thu, 05 Apr 2007 16:43:30 GMT) it happened Joerg wrote in :

Dauwe Egberts is OK, drink it all the time, like right now (Aroma Rood).

Is anyone using one of the high-resolution 'laser' optical mouses?

I don't like the idea of a wireless mouse, keyboard or trackball. Dealing with batteries just to get rid of a short cord seems like a bad trade-off. Besides, if my desk gets messy, I an always trace the cord back to find it. ;-)

Apparently the Spaceball is used in conjunction with a regular pointing device, one in each hand. According to a friend, she was using them for 3D CAD (Unigraphics, IIRC) in China-- interesting considering the cost (almost $500) was about two week's overheaded pay for a junior engineer there. So they should be easily justified at North American pay rates, at least for 3D CAD applications.

They don't come much more flexible than that! :)

Bye. Jasen

shop..

Dunno...the scary price on tablets keeps me away from reading any documentation. I've yet to hear that it's the latest fashion in CAD control. Maybe the software for the tablet can emulate a mouse in some way so it can be compatible with any program.

I've tried very hard to doodle schematics with a schematic capture program and I still prefer paper. More scribble freedom.. Once I've finished my bizarro sketch on paper, I'll draw a schematic on the computer.. That might change with a tablet..

I'd like to know how long a super capacitor can keep a wireless mouse alive. It'll just need a quick charge up if plopped onto a charger station. I'll get around to doing the math someday but if anyone wants to volunteer an answer I'll be interested.

D from BC

shop..

I designed both the Pen and the Tablet chips for the Kurta (now Mutoh or...) Pad. Lovely.

I use a mouse and can draw a (complex) schematic faster "on-screen" than on paper... being able to drag stuff around to "fit" helps a bunch.

...Jim Thompson

shop..

Nah, in this day and age a wireless (magnetic) energy transfer is all the rage. Even our toothbrushes do that.

When I retire I'd be game but right now that mouse has to do some work on the other PC. Some day I'll scope it out and maybe butcher one and add a coil, rectifier etc. Then a larger loop under the table, a series resonant oscillator to drive it and it should fly. If it ain't enough then maybe a smaller loop the size of a mouse pad, underneath where I normally use the mouse.

shop..

Vellum and a soft pencil still wins IMHO. Also, after using a wireless mouse for the first time I found that it easily gets buried under databooks and then you can't tug on the wire to figure where it is. Cause there ain't no wire...

shop..

My wireless mouse eats batteries faster than I'm happy with (apparently cheap batteries, but I bought a bunch) so I dug a Genius brand EasyPen tablet out of a box of stuff I got at a yard sale some years ago. The drivers (which I found in the "legacy" files on the Genius site) of course weren't certified to work with XP but as it's a serial device (BTW using the ONE serial port my XP computer has) I figured if it didn't want to play nice with XP I could still use my mouse to shut down and uninstall it.

Turns out both work just fine at the same time, no conflicts (the mouse/keyboard combo is USB) though in a very few instances some programs don't recognize the pen's "clicks" (it has two outputs- the tip retracts for left-click, there's a button on the side for right- click) and I have to reach over and click a mouse button. Other than that it does everything a mouse can do.

And yes, even the ancient (2001) software this thing uses is user- adjustable for screen resolution, absolute/relative tracking, click speed, landscape/portrait orientation, button assignment, whether the tablet maps to the whole screen or a user-definable part, yadda yadda yadda. The tablet is physically only 3x4 inches but that's not a handicap so far.

I don't do CAD but I doodle in M$Paint and am learning GIMP, both of which work great with the tablet. The tip is a tiny bit wiggly making selecting a particular pixel a bit iffy while you're learning it and it prefers to be perpendicular to the pad, but anyone who can draw can get used to it.

Side benefit, no more carpal tunnel worries. Side drawback, writer's cramp. ;>)

One thing you might want to look for in a new pad/stylus gizmo is does it have someplace to park the stylus upright for easy retrieval when you're not using it. I use a stripped-out relay coil from my junkbox.

I'm an old-school pencil and paper kind of guy but I have to admit that the tablet is a lot more intuitive than a mouse, making paperless drawing much more painless.

One thing I don't like is the damn wire attaching the stylus to the tablet, but I understand there are wireless versions out there.

Mark L. Fergerson

Yosemite Sam: "Ah kin out-draw any o' yuh whippersnappers three tuh one! Yuh got THREE SECONDS to draw a gun!" Bugs: [draws furiously for 2.9 seconds, presents image of Colt .45 Police Issue]

Cheers! Rich

On Thu, 05 Apr 2007 16:01:25 -0700, Joerg wrote: [snip]

It can be a coffee warmer too :) Maybe boost the field strength and pick a frequency that produces lots of eddy current in a metal coffee cup.

How about a wind-up mouse?? zzzt zzzt zzzzt zzzzzt :) Maybe like the wind up lantern as seen on

Not to mention that "Copy and Paste" is a lot neater than the earlier "Rubber Stamp" layout. ;-)