The best laid plans of mice and men: The computer mouse in the history of computing

Design Issues

Volumn 23, Issue 3, 2007, Pages 46-61

  Atkinson, Paul ^a  

^a NONE

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

COMPUTER CONTROL; COMPUTER PROGRAM;

EID: 34548270010     PISSN: 07479360     EISSN: 15314790     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1162/desi.2007.23.3.46     Document Type: Article

References (45)

1. Interview with Doug Engelbart at the headquarters of Logitech Inc., Fremont, California, April 10, 2006.
2. Ibid. Engelbart's experience with radar in WWII led him to believe that the light pen was the potential device to enable interaction with a computer network. "I knew implicitly, and with surety, that if a computer could punch cards, that it could also electronically display text and draw on a CRT. And if radar attached to a CRT could respond to operators, then people could also interact with a computer that had a CRT. I could see electronically that, If other people were connected to the same computer complex, we could be collaborating." (Logitech Inc., Douglas C. Engelbart: A Profile of His Work and Vision: Past, Present and Future, Oct. 2005 [unpublished report]).
3. Ibid.
4. Ibid.
5. Logitech Inc., The Computer Mouse: Adapting Computers to Human Needs: The Evolution of Computer Pointing Devices, Aug. 1993 (unpublished report).
6. Interview with Doug Engelbart, April 10, 2006.
7. D. Engelbart, quoted in B. Moggridge, Designing Interactions (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2006), 15.
8. Engelbart's paper "Augmenting the Human Intellect: A Conceptual Framework" was published in 1962. In this, Engelbart refers to a "pointer" that would allow the knowledge worker to navigate through items on the screen.
9. It was called "NLS" rather than "OLS," because that already was used to indicate an "Off Line System." When the NLS was taken into the commercial world, it was renamed "Augment."
10. In a way similar to a stenographer using a stenotype, a five-key chordset device can recreate any alpha-numerical character by different combinations of the five keys. According to Wikipedia, "Researchers at IBM investigated chord keyboards for both typewriters and computer data entry as early as 1959" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chord_keyset, accessed Sept. 20, 2006).
11. Logitech Inc., Douglas C. Engelbart A Profile of His Work and Vision: Past, Present and Future.
12. Ibid.
13. Interview with Stuart Card at Palo Alto Research Center, Palo Alto, California, April 10, 2006.
14. Larry Tesler, cited in M. Hiltzik, Dealers of Lightning: Xerox PARC and the Dawn of the Computer Age (Orion Business Books, 2000), 203, recalls trying to convince Xerox colleagues that the Engelbart system was too complicated, and that it was not realistic to expect people to train for six months to become literate with it.
15. M. Hiltzik Dealers of Lightning: Xerox PARC and the Dawn of the Computer Age (Orion Business Books, 2000), 166.
16. Ibid., 210.
17. Ibid., 209.
18. Ibid., 366.
19. A detailed description of this work can be seen in the form of primary documentation in the online archive from Stanford University, "Making the Macintosh, Technology and Culture in Silicon Valley" (http://library. stanford.edu/mac/, accessed Aug. 1, 2006).
20. A. S. Pang, "The Making of the Mouse" in American Heritage of Invention and Technology 17:3 (Winter 2002), 49.
21. Rickson Sun, interview with Dennis Boyle, Jim Yurchenco, and Rickson Sun at the offices of IDEO, Palo Alto, California, April 7, 2006.
22. Jim Yurchenco, Ibid.
23. The first Logitech mouse was based on the hemispherical "Depraz" mouse developed by Professor Jean-Daniel Nicoud at LAMI (LAboratoire de Micro-Informatique) in Switzerland, but was technically complicated as well as economically flawed. A more recent example of a circular form in mouse design (and one as economically bad as the Depraz mouse) was the original mouse for the Apple iMac, designed by Jonathan lve in 1998. ABC News commented "The two-tone design looks nice, but Apple has reportedly received dozens of complaints about the discomfort of using it...A quick search of newsgroup postings turned up over 500 posts dealing with the mouse, most complaining about its poor design" {ABC News, "The Rodent Revolution" at: www.crews.org/curriculum/ex/compsci/7thgrade/intel/ mouse-revol.htm, accessed Sept. 21, 2006).
24. Interview with Paul Bradley at the offices of IDEO, Palo Alto, California, April 7, 2006.
25. Ibid.
26. Paul Bradley, quoted in Bill Moggridge, Designing Interactions (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2006), 45.
27. Microsoft mice always had two buttons, while Apple went for the simplicity of one button. The decision to go with one button was a lengthy one since it meant designing the operating system software differently. Eventually, according to Jim Yurchenco, the decision to go with one button was made so that the instruction manual would be easier to write.
28. Interview with Paul Bradley at the offices of IDEO, Palo Alto, California, April 7, 2006.
29. The story of the Apple Macintosh advertisement is told in many places. One of the best descriptions appears in Steven Levy's Insanely Great: The Life and Times of Macintosh, the Computer that Changed Everything (Penguin Books, 1994), 169-171. The advertisement can be viewed at: www.youtube.com/ watch?v=0YecfV3ubP8 (accessed Sept. 28, 2006).
30. Apple Computer Inc., Macintosh Manual (1984), 13.
31. G. McComb, Macintosh User's Guide (Howard Sams & Co., 1984), 32-33.
32. J. Martin, et al., A Breakthrough in Making Computers Friendly - The Macintosh Computer(Prentice Hall Inc., 1985), 10-12.
33. Anon, "Mice for Mainstream Applications" in PC Magazine (Aug. 1987).
34. T. Stanton, "From Our Maus to Baumaus: Logitech vs. Microsoft" in PC Magazine (Feb. 16, 1988): 202. This, too, was in a section called "Alternate Input Devices," indicating that the mouse was in no way the preferred primary input method at this point.
35. Cited in Logitech Inc., The Computer Mouse: Adapting Computers to Human Needs: The Evolution of Computer Pointing Devices, Aug.1993 (unpublished report).
36. Jack Hawley's "The Mouse House" and Logitech Inc. were among the first companies to advertise mice. Their advertisements contained text explaining what a mouse actually did, and some included sectional views and electronic circuitry to show the complex technical nature of the device.
37. Interview with Stuart Card at Palo Alto Research Center, Palo Alto, California, April 10, 2006.
38. Ibid.
39. Interview with Paul Bradley at the offices of IDEO, Palo Alto, California, April 7, 2006.
40. This is the "multi-directional model" of the developmental process of any technological artifact from a social construction perspective. See The Social Construction of Technological Systems, W. Bjlker, T. Hughes, and T. Pinch, eds. (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1987), 28.
41. See V. Guiliano, "The Mechanization of Office Work" in The Information Technology Revolution, T. Forester, ed. (Basil Blackwell, 1985), 299.
42. See P. Atkinson, "The (In)Difference Engine: Explaining the Disappearance of Diversity in the Design of the Office Computer," Journal of Design History 13: 1 (2000), 59-71.
43. Hiltzik states that the Xerox Star computer's "deliberately stately design" was due to the fact that "its target users were not secretaries and clerks, but their bosses who were executives and professionals." The potential market for an easy-to-use computer for managers had not gone unnoticed by Xerox. A 1981 promotional brochure stated that the Star was "designed specifically for professional business people with little or no typing skills." (M. Hiltzik, Dealers of Lightning: Xerox PARC and the Dawn of the Computer Age, 247). The driver of this aim, though, was ease of use rather than an overt intention to overcome any gendered resistance to typing. In addition, as described above, the cost of the Xerox Star kept it from reaching the office.
44. T. Pinch and W. Bjiker, "The Social Construction of Facts and Artifacts: Or How the Sociology of Science and the Sociology of Technology Might Benefit Each Other" in The Social Construction of Technological Systems, W. Bjiker, T. Hughes, and T. Pinch, eds. (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1987), 44.
45. See M. Callon, "Society in the Making: The Study of Technology as a Tool far Sociological Analysis" in The Social Construction of Technological Systems, 84.