The ubiquitous mouse / cursor / screen interface is in need of some tweaking. It seems the only way to adjust the mouse "speed" (screen pixels moved per unit distance of mouse motion) is hidden fairly deep in a submenu.
And for different uses, I like either rapid mouse motion, or the fine control of slow mouse motion. But I am generally forced to choose a compromise, to avoid having to dig deep into into menus.
Why not have the mouse "speed" adjustable by sensing the thumb-finger force on the side of the mouse? It seems intuitive to squeeze a bit harder to speed up the motion, but perhaps it could be adjustable over a slow/normal/fast range with selectable polarity (squeeze means either slow down or speed up.)
On second thought, perhaps there could be 2 sets of force sensors - one pair to speed up, one to slow down (and normal light grip would default to the Control Panel setting.)
This could be easily implemented using any of a variety of haptic force sensors, and a bit of driver programming. I think it would be fairly easy to learn to use.-- csea, Nov 15 2008 SlowMousion: Mouse Brake http://www.mystercrowley.com/sw_sm_en.phpChange mouse speed by pressing a keyboard button. How can you go wrong when the utility is named with such a fantastic pun? [Amos Kito, Nov 15 2008] I see what you're saying. It's the move and squeeze at the same time that would confuse me. Would I squeeze appropriately before movement?
Would it be possible to have mouse software that would produce fast mouse movement if the mouse was moved fast, and slow mouse movement if it was moved slowly. I'm not being facetious, I mean an automated sliding scale.-- Mony a Mickle, Nov 15 2008 //Would it be possible to have mouse software that would produce fast mouse movement if the mouse was moved fast, and slow mouse movement if it was moved slowly.//
Yes, and your computer almost certainly does this already. Try moving your pointer from one side of the screen to the other slowly, and then again quickly, and see how far your mouse actually moves for each.
It's called acceleration and can be modified in Control panel / system preferences / whatever it's called on your OS.-- Srimech, Nov 15 2008 Job done then?-- Mony a Mickle, Nov 15 2008 A thumb wheel on the side of the mouse might be a good way to control this. It could be done purely in hardware, with no support from the mouse driver.-- Wrongfellow, Nov 15 2008 This could be possible right now by rewriting the driver software for touchpads. Of course, squeezing would mean pushing... or perhaps pinching! Picture that action you can do on iPhones, controlling the size of the "bounding box" that maps to the size of the touchpad! (The new representative box would appear around the mouse, grow/shrink with your command, and then fade out.) It could even allow sub-pixel positioning of the cursor, something I'm curious about the current impossibility of--it would certainly help for drawing programs.-- derefr, Nov 15 2008 [AmosKito]'s link to SlowMousion is a (small) step in the right direction, thanks!-- csea, Nov 15 2008 random, halfbakery