Today a computer mouse is 46 years old
If a particular day can be called a birthday of a computer mouse, then this day is today. On December 9, 1968, Douglas Engelbart showed a new type of manipulator in Mother of All Demonstrations, along with a graphical user interface, hypertext, a text editor with co-editing and other future inventions, including network conferences. Although Engelbart developed the first prototype back in the early 60s, it was after this presentation that the mouse became known to the general public.
About Engelbart is perfectly written in this article , and under the cut you will find a video from the very presentation and interesting facts from the history of the computer mouse.
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"Mother of all demonstrations"
In the same year of 1968, but a couple of months earlier - in October, Germany introduced its own mouse, very spherical. And it was the first mouse to use a ball - a design that became standard for many years, until the advent of optical mice.
The first commercial computer that came with the mouse was the Xerox 8010 Star Information System in 1981. This mouse had three buttons, and it cost as much as $ 400 - more than $ 1,000 in 2014, taking into account inflation.
Two years later, Apple Lisa came out. The company decided to limit itself to one mouse button and for a very long time adhered to the ultra-minimalistic principle. This mouse cost $ 25.
But here is the model range of Apple mice until 2009:
In the USSR, "mouse" graphic information manipulators were also produced. In 1991, the Kolobok manipulator began to be made in Tolyatti. It was more like a rat than a mouse, and inside it was a ball rather than a ball.
Another domestic mouse from the 90s - "Martian".
The optical mouse was invented in 1980, however, the commercially available model appeared only in 1999. The first prototypes of the optical mouse required special shading on the carpet and were sensitive to its pollution and location in space. Modern mice lack these disadvantages. As a sensor, they use a small but very fast photosensitive matrix ranging in size from 16x16 to 40x40 pixels and work on almost any surface. By the way, this technology has military origin - algorithms for tracking the position of a device according to information from an optical sensor were originally developed for precision weapons. And some craftsmen even made a camera from the mouse sensor.
With the proliferation of optical mice, the skill of quickly and carefully cleaning the " rollers of the viscera and genitalia " of mechanical mice, which was once necessary for all who dealt with computers, ceased to be relevant, and the mat turned from an absolutely necessary object that prevented the ball from slipping into optional accessory for everyone except maybe designers and gamers.
One of the first optical mice
An important role in the history of the computer mouse was played by Logitech. In 1991, a wireless mouse was released, working with a radio signal, but not with IR: Cordless MouseMan. In 2004, the company introduced the first MX1000 wireless laser mouse.
For years, the mouse and keyboard reigned supreme in the realm of mass input devices. Only recently they have pressed the touch screens. The mouse had many competitors, but none of them achieved the same popularity, although some alternatives were quite successful, for example, the famous trackpoint of the IBM ThinkPad notebook series. This is the only graphic manipulator that allows you to work with the cursor without taking your hands off the keyboard and without changing their positions.
The design of the mouse continues to actively develop and refine, offering sometimes very exotic innovations. For example, a flying wireless mouse :
And here is a gaming mouse with pulse sensors, a skin-electric reflex and a reaction that measures the player’s fear level during the game:
For several decades, the mouse has lived a very hectic life. Like any other technology in the mass market, sooner or later it will be replaced by something more convenient and simple for the user - in modern devices there is increasingly no place for a special “graphic manipulator”, its role is played by fingers, hands (like Leap Motion) or the whole body (like Kinect). But even when the mouse becomes an exotic niche device or disappears altogether, we will remember its role in the "domestication" of computers and their ubiquitous distribution.
About Engelbart is perfectly written in this article , and under the cut you will find a video from the very presentation and interesting facts from the history of the computer mouse.
')
"Mother of all demonstrations"
alternative history
In the same year of 1968, but a couple of months earlier - in October, Germany introduced its own mouse, very spherical. And it was the first mouse to use a ball - a design that became standard for many years, until the advent of optical mice.
The first commercial computer that came with the mouse was the Xerox 8010 Star Information System in 1981. This mouse had three buttons, and it cost as much as $ 400 - more than $ 1,000 in 2014, taking into account inflation.
Two years later, Apple Lisa came out. The company decided to limit itself to one mouse button and for a very long time adhered to the ultra-minimalistic principle. This mouse cost $ 25.
But here is the model range of Apple mice until 2009:
In the USSR, "mouse" graphic information manipulators were also produced. In 1991, the Kolobok manipulator began to be made in Tolyatti. It was more like a rat than a mouse, and inside it was a ball rather than a ball.
Another domestic mouse from the 90s - "Martian".
The optical mouse was invented in 1980, however, the commercially available model appeared only in 1999. The first prototypes of the optical mouse required special shading on the carpet and were sensitive to its pollution and location in space. Modern mice lack these disadvantages. As a sensor, they use a small but very fast photosensitive matrix ranging in size from 16x16 to 40x40 pixels and work on almost any surface. By the way, this technology has military origin - algorithms for tracking the position of a device according to information from an optical sensor were originally developed for precision weapons. And some craftsmen even made a camera from the mouse sensor.
With the proliferation of optical mice, the skill of quickly and carefully cleaning the " rollers of the viscera and genitalia " of mechanical mice, which was once necessary for all who dealt with computers, ceased to be relevant, and the mat turned from an absolutely necessary object that prevented the ball from slipping into optional accessory for everyone except maybe designers and gamers.
One of the first optical mice
An important role in the history of the computer mouse was played by Logitech. In 1991, a wireless mouse was released, working with a radio signal, but not with IR: Cordless MouseMan. In 2004, the company introduced the first MX1000 wireless laser mouse.
For years, the mouse and keyboard reigned supreme in the realm of mass input devices. Only recently they have pressed the touch screens. The mouse had many competitors, but none of them achieved the same popularity, although some alternatives were quite successful, for example, the famous trackpoint of the IBM ThinkPad notebook series. This is the only graphic manipulator that allows you to work with the cursor without taking your hands off the keyboard and without changing their positions.
The design of the mouse continues to actively develop and refine, offering sometimes very exotic innovations. For example, a flying wireless mouse :
And here is a gaming mouse with pulse sensors, a skin-electric reflex and a reaction that measures the player’s fear level during the game:
For several decades, the mouse has lived a very hectic life. Like any other technology in the mass market, sooner or later it will be replaced by something more convenient and simple for the user - in modern devices there is increasingly no place for a special “graphic manipulator”, its role is played by fingers, hands (like Leap Motion) or the whole body (like Kinect). But even when the mouse becomes an exotic niche device or disappears altogether, we will remember its role in the "domestication" of computers and their ubiquitous distribution.
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/363873/
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