Death Of The Mouse? • Hacker News Board

Re: Death Of The Mouse?

#41

Post by numix » Thu, Jan 13, 2011, 10:56 AM UTC

stratjakt wrote: post #29

cturner wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

mice .. are still quite necessary. They're not. There are plenty of examples of mechanisms for computer interaction that don't require a mouse and cultivate strong loyalty from people who could instead be using a mouse interface: Bloomberg, the unix console, tiling window managers. People who are into graphics tend towards tablets. The mouse's success is due to path dependence. New users like it, and so we end up wit…

Sure, if you live in vim, emacs, unix console, etc... I, and plenty of other people do not. Not everyone wants to live within a command prompt.

You can have a usable mouse-free GUI fairly easily with a tiling window manager (xmonad, awesome, etc) and a keyboard driven browser (vimperator or conkeror).

Re: Death Of The Mouse?

#42

Post by loewenskind » Thu, Jan 13, 2011, 11:38 AM UTC

vacri wrote: post #33

loewenskind wrote: post #24

I would absolutely expect the death of the mouse. In its current form that is. In my opinion the mouse interface introduced with the MBP and now purchasable as an external component is a sign of the future. It has the same precision as a regular mouse so you don't have the iPad's touch problem of lack of precision, but you move your finger on the device instead of moving the device. That alone wouldn't be enough to u…

That 'touchpad plate' of Apple's (can't recall the official name) isn't as precise as a mouse. Our web developer gets a new box from Foxconn about once a week as he pretty much buys one of everything Apple makes. A true afficionado of the touchscreen/pad, he just couldn't use that plate for the specific reason that it's just not accurate enough for serious work. Touch and mouse focus on different things - and the mou…

>isn't as precise as a mouse.

I'll have to take your word for it, but I haven't noticed anything in my minor gaming [1]. But even if it isn't today I don't see why it couldn't be and a mouse will never be able to keep up with multiple inputs a touch interface can. As more and more applications start making use of this feature mice will become less and less usable.

>and the mouse is venerable, not vulnerable

It was indeed a typo, but I would claim it's both at this point. :)

[1] Certain types of games I have, like "flying around shooting stuff" ones require finer control than what I was able to get from a $250 joystick. I had to use the mouse for finer control. I haven't noticed a problem using the touch pad for these.

Re: Death Of The Mouse?

#43

Post by BahUnfair » Thu, Jan 13, 2011, 11:50 AM UTC

xd wrote: post #27

Oh great, another "Death of .." article. When will we see the death of them. But seriously .. As an avid gamer I can't see the mouse going any place for a long time. Eye tracking or a USB port into the back of the head are the only viable-ish alternatives I can imagine due to the extremely precise and fast interaction needed.

Tell that to the console gamers...

P.S: I can't help but think the "death of.." articles are just to get page views with sensational titles and articles, mind you thats been the standard for newspapers since before the net.

Re: Death Of The Mouse?

#44

Post by motters » Thu, Jan 13, 2011, 12:00 PM UTC

I've recently started using a tablet/pen, and for most purposes it's a good mouse replacement, and it's also better for sketching. Using buttons on the pen is a bit fiddly, but tapping the pen is an equivalent in most situations. For playing traditional kinds of PC games I notice that the mouse is still by far the best option though.

Re: Death Of The Mouse?

#45

Post by electromagnetic » Thu, Jan 13, 2011, 12:02 PM UTC

BahUnfair wrote: post #43

xd wrote: post #27

Oh great, another "Death of .." article. When will we see the death of them. But seriously .. As an avid gamer I can't see the mouse going any place for a long time. Eye tracking or a USB port into the back of the head are the only viable-ish alternatives I can imagine due to the extremely precise and fast interaction needed.

Tell that to the console gamers... P.S: I can't help but think the "death of.." articles are just to get page views with sensational titles and articles, mind you thats been the standard for newspapers since before the net.

Actually for the longest time console games relied heavily on auto-aim features to actually make the online games competitive.

I play both between console and desktop and whilst I find console play more fun, I do find I'm far better at desktop. In Unreal Tournament I was known for my crazy Ion Canon bombings (alternate fire several times and then hit each one with a regular fire to make them explode from well across the map), this transferred over to Halo where I was known for my carbine headshots at similar crazy range... on Xbox I'm now known for shotgun and melee because the aiming fucking sucks, still generally lead on a server though so I can't complain too much!

Re: Death Of The Mouse?

#46

Post by xd » Thu, Jan 13, 2011, 12:05 PM UTC

BahUnfair wrote: post #43

xd wrote: post #27

Oh great, another "Death of .." article. When will we see the death of them. But seriously .. As an avid gamer I can't see the mouse going any place for a long time. Eye tracking or a USB port into the back of the head are the only viable-ish alternatives I can imagine due to the extremely precise and fast interaction needed.

Tell that to the console gamers... P.S: I can't help but think the "death of.." articles are just to get page views with sensational titles and articles, mind you thats been the standard for newspapers since before the net.

I was waiting for someone to bring this up :)

Does anyone know of an FPS multiplayer game that users can play from both a PC and consoles? It would be interesting to see the outcome .. and I know where my money will be.

Re: Death Of The Mouse?

#47

Post by viraptor » Thu, Jan 13, 2011, 12:05 PM UTC

BahUnfair wrote: post #43

xd wrote: post #27

Oh great, another "Death of .." article. When will we see the death of them. But seriously .. As an avid gamer I can't see the mouse going any place for a long time. Eye tracking or a USB port into the back of the head are the only viable-ish alternatives I can imagine due to the extremely precise and fast interaction needed.

Tell that to the console gamers... P.S: I can't help but think the "death of.." articles are just to get page views with sensational titles and articles, mind you thats been the standard for newspapers since before the net.

Well... there's a reason Quake-like fast-paced games are not popular on consoles. Sure - I have no problems playing slower games like Deus Ex on a controller, but for typical multiplayer FPSes that wouldn't work. Essentially you just learn now much you move the mouse to do a 180 turn and you have it in muscule memory. The moment you move the mouse, you start turning. With controllers where you actually control the acceleration of the movement, that experience is much worse. You simply cannot make a precise turn around on the spot without a lot of training. On top of that you're usually limited to the specific number of buttons unfortunately.

Of course you won't notice most of those issues on the console games... because they're designed so that you don't need more than N buttons, they're not as fast as promode quake, they add other elements to shift the idea from the raw fps (multiplayer q1/q3-pm being prime examples probably) to a goal based game, team play, etc.

Re: Death Of The Mouse?

#48

Post by iron_ball » Thu, Jan 13, 2011, 12:41 PM UTC

viraptor wrote: post #47

BahUnfair wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tell that to the console gamers... P.S: I can't help but think the "death of.." articles are just to get page views with sensational titles and articles, mind you thats been the standard for newspapers since before the net.

Well... there's a reason Quake-like fast-paced games are not popular on consoles. Sure - I have no problems playing slower games like Deus Ex on a controller, but for typical multiplayer FPSes that wouldn't work. Essentially you just learn now much you move the mouse to do a 180 turn and you have it in muscule memory. The moment you move the mouse, you start turning. With controllers where you actually control the ac…

I agree that mouse/keyboard is better for first-person shooters, but FPS games are still wildly popular on consoles. Halo and Call of Duty are the biggest examples.

Re: Death Of The Mouse?

#49

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Jan 13, 2011, 2:43 PM UTC

stratjakt wrote: post #29

cturner wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

mice .. are still quite necessary. They're not. There are plenty of examples of mechanisms for computer interaction that don't require a mouse and cultivate strong loyalty from people who could instead be using a mouse interface: Bloomberg, the unix console, tiling window managers. People who are into graphics tend towards tablets. The mouse's success is due to path dependence. New users like it, and so we end up wit…

Sure, if you live in vim, emacs, unix console, etc... I, and plenty of other people do not. Not everyone wants to live within a command prompt.

[deleted]

Re: Death Of The Mouse?

#50

Post by potatolicious » Thu, Jan 13, 2011, 5:56 PM UTC

Derbasti wrote: post #28

potatolicious wrote: post #18

Touch killing the mouse makes about as much sense as helicopters killing airplanes.

How so? It seems that you are proclaiming that touch would provide more flexibility at the expense of maximum speed and efficiency. I would actually say it is exactly the other way around: Touch killing the mouse makes about as much sense as airplanes killing helicopters . And you know what, I actually kind of prefer airplanes for most commercial flights just as I would say that touch interfaces are actually faster t…

Touch is superior for a lot of use cases - but not all, not even close. It will continue to gain more widespread use, sometimes at the expense of traditionally mouse-driven devices, but the mouse is alive and well and isn't going anywhere anytime soon.

The helicopters vs. airplanes thing is not a judgment on which is superior - you missed the point; the idea is that when helicopters came around, a lot of new possibilities opened up in flight, some of which were traditionally served by fixed-wings... but in the end both have their uses, and neither killed each other.