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1. INTRODUCTION The computer mouse was invented in 1960s and it went through many revisions regarding its functionality and features since then. According to folks from Celluon who came up with EvoMouse, it is the evolution of the computer mouse which allows you to emulate the mouse with gestures of your hand. The EvoMouse works on a similar principle as the Mouse less interface we wrote about last year, but its design is more polished and it looks like a small digital animal. Its two infrared sensors which form the eyes of the animal project an area in which your hands can function as if you really were using a mouse. The EvoMouse is the evolution of the computer mouse. Meet EvoMouse Pet, a dog-shaped device that turns any surface into a touchpad. Tracking your fingers, it lets you do anything a regular mouse can do, and then some. The EvoMouse works on nearly any flat surface and requires very little space. It tracks effortlessly to your comfortable and natural movements. With the EvoMouse, you can perform common mouse operations using only your fingers. You can control the cursor, click and select, double-click, right-click and drag with basic hand gestures. - 1 - 2. HISTORY 2.1 EARLY MOUSE The first functional mouse was actually demonstrated by Douglas Engelbart, a researcher from the Stanford Research Institute, back in 1963. The respective peripheral was far away from what we know today as “mice,” given the fact that it was manufactured from wood and featured two gear-wheels perpendicular to each other, the rotation of each single wheel translating into motion along one of the respective axis. It’s not exactly very clear where the name “mouse” originates, since, apparently, the name came from the fact that the device had a “tail” behind it, connecting it to a computer and a display and was the idea of Bill English, a colleague of Douglas Engelbart’s and the person who actually built the prototype device. Engelbart's product was not the first pointing device, though. In fact, it seems that the first such product, the trackball, was invented a lot earlier, namely at some point in 1953, by Tom Cranston, Fred Longstaff and Kenyon Taylor from the Royal Canadian Navy, as part of the secret military project DATAR. The name “trackball” comes from the fact that the respective device actually used a standard Canadian five-pin bowling ball. - 2 - Fig: 2.1 Earlier Mouse’s - 3 - 2.2 MECHANICAL MOUSE German company Telefunken published on their early ball mouse, called "Rollkugel" (German for "rolling ball"), on October 2, 1968. Telefunken's mouse was then sold commercially as optional equipment for their TR - 440 computers, which was first marketed in 1968. Telefunken did not apply for a patent on their device. Bill English, builder of Engelbart's original mouse, created a ball mouse in 1972 while working for Xerox PARC. It is also called as Roller ball mouse. The ball mouse replaced the external wheels with a single ball that could rotate in any direction. It came as part of the hardware package of the Xerox Alto computer. Perpendicular chopper wheels housed inside the mouse's body chopped beams of light on the way to light sensors, thus detecting in their turn the motion of the ball. This variant of the mouse resembled an inverted trackball and became the predominant form used with personal computers throughout the 1980s and 1990s. The Xerox PARC group also settled on the modern technique of using both hands to type on a full-size keyboard and grabbing the mouse when required. Fig.2.2 Mechanical mouse, shown with the top cover removed The ball mouse has two freely rotating rollers. They are located 90 degrees apart. One roller detects the forward – backward motion of the mouse and other the left – right motion. Opposite the two rollers is a third one (white, in the photo, at 45 degrees) that is spring - loaded to push the - 4 - ball against the other two rollers. Each roller is on the same shaft as an encoder wheel that has slotted edges; the slots interrupt infrared light beams to generate electrical pulses that represent wheel movement. Each wheel's disc, however, has a pair of light beams, located so thata given beam becomes interrupted, or again starts to pass light freely, when the other beam of the pair is about halfway between changes Simple logic circuits interpret the relative timing to indicate which direction the wheel is rotating. This incremental rotary encoder scheme is sometimes called quadrature encoding of the wheel rotation, as the two optical sensor produce signals that are in approximately quadrature phase. The mouse sends these signals to the computer system via the mouse cable, directly as logic signals in very old mice such as the Xerox mice, and via a data-formatting IC in modern mice. The driver software in the system converts the signals into motion of the mouse cursor along X and Y axes on the computer screen. The ball is mostly steel, with a precision spherical rubber surface. The weight of the ball, given an appropriate working surface under the mouse, provides a reliable grip so the mouse's movement is transmitted accurately. Fig.2.3 Mechanical Mouse Operating an optic-mechanical mouse: 1. Moving the mouse turns the ball. 2. X and Y rollers grip the ball and transfer movement - 5 - 3. Optical encoding disks include light holes. 4. Infrared LEDs shine through the disks. 5. Sensors gather light pulses to convert to X and Y vectors. 2.3 OPTICAL MOUSE Optical mice make use of one or more light-emitting diodes (LEDs) and an imaging array of photodiodes to detect movement relative to the underlying surface, rather than internal moving parts as does a mechanical mouse. A laser mouse is an optical mouse that uses coherent (laser) light. The earliest optical mice detected movement on pre-printed mouse pad surfaces, whereas the modern optical mouse works on most opaque surfaces; it is unable to detect movement on specular surfaces like glass. Laser diodes are also used for better resolution and precision. Battery powered, wireless optical mice flash the LED intermittently to save power, and only glow steadily when movement is detected. Fig.2.4 Optical Mouse Often called "air mice" since they do not require a surface to operate. It uses a tuning fork or other accelerometer to detect rotary movement for every axis supported. The most common models (manufactured by Logitech and Gyration) work using 2 degrees of rotational - 6 - freedom and are insensitive to spatial translation. The user requires only small wrist rotations to move the cursor. Usually cordless, they often have a switch to deactivate the movement circuitry between use, allowing the user freedom of movement without affecting the cursor position. A patent for an inertial mouse claims that such mice consume less power than optically based mice, and offer increased sensitivity, reduced weight and increased ease-of-use. In combination with a wireless keyboard an inertial mouse can offer alternative ergonomic arrangements which do not require a flat work surface, potentially alleviating some types of repetitive motion injuries related to workstation posture. Fig.2.5 Wireless optical mouse 2.4 LASER MOUSE The laser mouse uses an infrared laser diode instead of a LED to illuminate the surface beneath their sensor. As early as 1998, Sun Microsystems provided a laser mouse with their Sun SPARC station servers and workstations. However, laser mice did not enter the mainstream market until 2004, when Paul Machine at Logitech, in partnership with Agilent Technologies, introduced its MX 1000 laser mouse. This mouse uses a small infrared laser instead of a LED and has significantly increased the resolution of the image taken by the mouse. The laser enables around 20 times more surface tracking power to the surface features used for navigation compared to conventional optical mice. - 7 - Fig.2.6 Structure of Laser mouse Glass laser (or Glaser) mice have the same capability of a laser mouse but can also be used on top of mirror or transparent glass with few problems. In August 2009, Logitech introduced mice with two lasers, to track on glass and glossy surfaces better. These mice are considered as effective, sensitive and accurate devices as they support better tracking ability. With its user – friendly interface, this mouse is used by those users, who perform highly skilled jobs. One of the positive outcomes of this mouse is its energy efficient component that consumes lesser electricity when in use. Fig.2.7 Laser Mouse - 8 - 2.5 GYROSCOPIC MOUSE There are a number of computer pointing devices (in effect a mouse) on the market that have gyroscopes inside them allowing you to control the mouse cursor while the device is in the air! They are also wireless so are perfect for presentations when the speaker is moving around the room. The gyroscope inside tracks the movements of your hand and translates them to cursor movements. Fig.2.8 Gyroscopic mouse 2.6 3D MOUSE Also known as bats, flying mice, or wands, these devices generally function through ultrasound and provide at least three degrees of freedom. Probably the best known example would be 3D connexion / Logitech's Space Mouse from the early 1990s. In the late 1990s, Kantek introduced the 3D Ring Mouse. This wireless mouse was worn on a ring around a finger, which enabled the thumb to access three buttons. The mouse was tracked in three dimensions by a base station. Despite a certain appeal, it was finally discontinued because it did not provide sufficient resolution.