Strange mouse failure

[cameo]

Then you need to clean the rollers, which is nowhere near as easy, and
in my experience, almost always involves dismantling the mouse. I was
very glad when I got rid of my last rollerball mouse and went over to
the optical scanning ones. A quick spray of furniture polish on the base
occasionally to make them slide more easily and clean the clag off the
window and you're done.

I just hate to throw out something that serves my purpose adequately as
this ball mouse does.

 

[cameo]

The problem here may be that some of the lint gets wrapped very
tightly around the roller shaft, near the bearing and may be
overlooked when cleaning the rollers. I have used a fine pointed
tweezers to pick this lint away from the shaft near the bearings.

This was the case in my situation, but now that I know how those rollers
are embedded under the cover, I think I would be able to remove those
lint balls without disassembly.

 

[Gene E. Bloch]

LOL! As I just said to Jim Silverton, the sentence that you replied to
said " ball mice are essentially gone, and I no longer have to deal
with them." That means that dust bunnies don't end up inside the ball
mouse because I don't have a ball mouse.

But do they get into the laser recess? These bunnies are pretty
resourceful...

BTW, I'm also *much* happier with the optical mice. Although once I quit
smoking (which, come to think of it, was before computer mice), I have
had the breath to blow the dust bunnies away.

Oh - I just recalled. I used to use (wooden) Q-Tips and alcohol to clean
the rollers.

 

[Ken Blake]

But do they get into the laser recess? These bunnies are pretty
resourceful...

BTW, I'm also *much* happier with the optical mice. Although once I quit
smoking (which, come to think of it, was before computer mice), I have
had the breath to blow the dust bunnies away.

I quit smoking when I was 30, in 1967 or 68. I don't think there were
any mice yet. It was certainly before my first personal computer,
which was in 1987.

Oh - I just recalled. I used to use (wooden) Q-Tips and alcohol to clean
the rollers.

I might have done the same. But again, it was too long ago for me to
remember any details.

 

[Paul]

I just hate to throw out something that serves my purpose adequately as
this ball mouse does.

The problem I had with ball-based mice, is the rubber ones would
get out-of-round, and wouldn't roll smoothly. Cleaning them was
one thing, but they would still not turn smoothly, and would
feel "lumpy".

The mouse with the steel balls (Hawley), it didn't have that problem.
Of course, the steel didn't grip very well, so you needed
a good mouse pad for traction. So the steel ball would turn.

"Steel balls FTW"

http://farm6.staticflickr.com/5058/5518305322_775956089a_z.jpg

If you think that mouse was outlandish, you should see the
chip we made, to read out the mouse position. An entire chip
was dedicated to counting X and Y pulses...

Paul

 

[Desk Rabbit]

Then you need to clean the rollers, which is nowhere near as easy, and
in my experience, almost always involves dismantling the mouse. I was
very glad when I got rid of my last rollerball mouse and went over to
the optical scanning ones. A quick spray of furniture polish on the base
occasionally to make them slide more easily and clean the clag off the
window and you're done.

Cleaning the rollers is of course required, my tip makes the ball
stickier and improves the longevity of the cleaning.

 

[cameo]

I quit smoking when I was 30, in 1967 or 68. I don't think there were
any mice yet. It was certainly before my first personal computer,
which was in 1987.



I might have done the same. But again, it was too long ago for me to
remember any details.

Last Sunday on the CBS "60 Minutes" show there was a segment on
California inventor David Kelley and his IDEO company and the show
attributed the invention of the mouse to that guy at the request of
Steve Jobs in the late '70s. That's strange, because I thought that even
Apple's got the mouse idea from Xerox PARC.

http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=50138327n

 

[Gene E. Bloch]

Last Sunday on the CBS "60 Minutes" show there was a segment on
California inventor David Kelley and his IDEO company and the show
attributed the invention of the mouse to that guy at the request of
Steve Jobs in the late '70s. That's strange, because I thought that even
Apple's got the mouse idea from Xerox PARC.

http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=50138327n

Doug Engelbart at Stanford Research Institute (now SRI), around 1972. I
got to play with a homemade mouse at his lab during a visit. It was
perhaps the world's only mouse at the time.

 

[Tim Slattery]

Last Sunday on the CBS "60 Minutes" show there was a segment on
California inventor David Kelley and his IDEO company and the show
attributed the invention of the mouse to that guy at the request of
Steve Jobs in the late '70s. That's strange, because I thought that even
Apple's got the mouse idea from Xerox PARC.

Exactly right, it was invented by Doug Englebart
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_Engelbart)

But the mouse that he developed at PARC was unwieldy, to say the
least. It would also have been *very* expensive to manufacture. Those
are the problems that Kelley's group solved at Jobs's request. They
made the mouse practical.

 

[Char Jackson]

Last Sunday on the CBS "60 Minutes" show there was a segment on
California inventor David Kelley and his IDEO company and the show
attributed the invention of the mouse to that guy at the request of
Steve Jobs in the late '70s. That's strange, because I thought that even
Apple's got the mouse idea from Xerox PARC.

http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=50138327n

To be fair, they said it was the first mouse FOR APPLE (emphasis added), so
there may not have been any intent to mislead.

 

[Gene E. Bloch]

Exactly right, it was invented by Doug Englebart
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_Engelbart)

But the mouse that he developed at PARC was unwieldy, to say the
least. It would also have been *very* expensive to manufacture. Those
are the problems that Kelley's group solved at Jobs's request. They
made the mouse practical.

Doug Englelbart developed the mouse at Stanford Research Institute, now
SRI International.

Your link doesn't show him ever working at PARC, and the mouse that I
saw was at SRI. It didn't look like the one in the picture, so I
probably saw a later version (it had switches).

 

[Gene E. Bloch]

To be fair, they said it was the first mouse FOR APPLE (emphasis added), so
there may not have been any intent to mislead.

Thanks for that. It clarifies things

 

[cameo]

Exactly right, it was invented by Doug Englebart
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_Engelbart)

But the mouse that he developed at PARC was unwieldy, to say the
least. It would also have been *very* expensive to manufacture. Those
are the problems that Kelley's group solved at Jobs's request. They
made the mouse practical.

I don't know ... I remember those Xerox word processors from the '70s
and the mouse seemed to work fine with them.

 

[Char Jackson]

Thanks for that. It clarifies things

I normally muddy the waters, so this one goes in the win column.

 

[Gene E. Bloch]

I normally muddy the waters, so this one goes in the win column.

Wasn't that a Blues musician?