dave@murphy.UUCP (10/06/86)
Summary: what about a mouse-based editor with a one-handed keyboard?
Line eater: enabled
As long as we are talking about editors and user interfaces, how about
this: As several people have pointed out, one of the big problems with
mouse-based editors is that you have to take your hand off the mouse in
order to type. Well, there is a company whose name I don't recall that
makes a one-handed keyboard. (It's intended for people who have lost
the use of a hand due to accident, illness, or whatever.) The thing is
dome-shaped and has several rows of about 10 keys and is supposed to be
able to transmit the entire ASCII character set. (Most characters are
typed by 2-finger combinations; some require three fingers, but
difficult combinations like pressing down with your middle and pinky
fingers while keeping your ring finger up are avoided.) Now, if you had
one of these beasties and could afford to take the time to master it,
you could type with one hand and keep the other on the mouse, full
time. (Only trouble is, it doesn't leave a hand to drink your Coke
with. :-)) The maker claims that it's possible, with practice, to move
along at a good 40-50 wpm clip, which is better than any hunt-and-peck
typist and some touch typists.
Of course, having to master a new keyboard runs counter to the primary
purpose of most mouse-based editors, which is to provide an interface that
the casual user can handle without a lot of practice. Still, it's an
intriguing concept. Any thoughts?
---
It's been said by many a wise philosopher that when you die and your soul
goes to its final resting place, it has to make a connection in Atlanta.
Dave Cornutt, Gould Computer Systems, Ft. Lauderdale, FL
UUCP: ...{sun,pur-ee,brl-bmd}!gould!dcornutt
or ...!ucf-cs!novavax!houligan!dcornutt
ARPA: wait a minute, I've almost got it...
"The opinions expressed herein are not necessarily those of my employer,
not necessarily mine, and probably not necessary."zellich@ALMSA-1.arpa (Rich Zellich) (10/08/86)
I have a system on my desk similar to that described by Dave Cornutt, except that it doesn't have the special for-the-handicapped one-hander keyboard. What it does have, is a mouse on the right - a standard keyboard in the middle - and a 5-key "chord" keyboard on the left. In practice, you leave your left hand on the chord keyboard and your right hand on the mouse, and your eyes on the screen. Only when you are typing lots of text (as opposed to single-character commands or brief snatches of insert or replacement text) do you move your hands to the qwerty keys. Since the mouse can be used to point to anything on the screen (and it's a multi-window system, allowing the same or different views of the same or different file(s) in each window), you seldom need to type even short pieces of text with the chord keyboard - you just point to what you need. 5 keys gives you lower case alphabetics, which takes care of the command words; using one of the mouse buttons with the chords gives you upper case, and using a different mouse button gives you numerics. With 3 mouse buttons and 5 keys, you get the entire ASCII character set; it takes a while to learn, but once the chord keyboard is touch-typable, it's the fastest and most intuitive system I've ever seen. What all this is called is an "Augment workstation" and it was invented some 15-20 years ago by Douglas Engelbart at SRI (the system was then known as NLS); it is now marketed by Tymshare and runs on DEC 10's and 20's - it does not (yet) run on Unix machines, although I think it is being ported to the VAX VMS environment. The whole thing is essentially modeless - actually single-mode - since you're always in "command" mode. There is a special pseudo-mode for running insertion of multiple paragraphs of text (a RETURN delineates the end of a paragraph and normally terminates the input phase of an Insert command so the system is looking for a new command word) that is essentially just a Repeat Last Command function; but it takes deliberate and non-standard effort to get into it so it's quite clear when you're using it (and if you forget, your next command just goes in as text anyway, so it's safe). Eat your hearts out... -Rich Disclaimer: I'm no longer even a Tymshare customer, using Augment on someone else's system (the NIC's, for the list-of-lists), so I have no interest at all in the commercial viability of the product; I'm just a very satisfied user who far prefers Augment's BASE editor to ed, vi, or emacs.
marcus@ihlpl.UUCP (Hall) (10/08/86)
In article <95@houligan.UUCP> dave@murphy.UUCP writes: >Summary: what about a mouse-based editor with a one-handed keyboard? > >As long as we are talking about editors and user interfaces, how about >this: As several people have pointed out, one of the big problems with >mouse-based editors is that you have to take your hand off the mouse in >order to type. Well, there is a company whose name I don't recall that >makes a one-handed keyboard. ... The thing is >dome-shaped and has several rows of about 10 keys and is supposed to be >able to transmit the entire ASCII character set. ... Now, if you had >one of these beasties ...you could type with one hand and keep the other on >the mouse, full time. (Only trouble is, it doesn't leave a hand to drink >your Coke with. :-)) What you should do with this is to build the mouse into the single-handed keyboard. It is a bit larger than most mice, but not unreasonably large. As mentioned above, it is dome shaped, so just put the trackball (or photo- transistors, or whatever) on the underside and there you have a single handed mouse/keyboard. I'm sure that such a system could be built light enough so that the mouse wouldn't be too massive, and the way that the keyboard is held seems reasonably natural for holding a large mouse as well. The mouse's button(s) could either be a particular combination of the keys, or else there could be yet another key to press for this (however, the fewer keys the better, I think). I don't normally like mouse-based interfaces, but this would solve the problem of having to switch between keyboard and mouse. Another solution could be to put a trackball on top of the keyboard, just under the space bar where it is convenient to the thumbs without moving your fingers off of home row. I know that this isn't original at all, but I don't remember ever seeing any mention of the single-handed keyboard combined with a mouse. For what it's worth.. Marcus Hall ..!ihnp4!ihlpl!marcus
brian@apollo.uucp (Brian Holt) (10/09/86)
In article <95@houligan.UUCP> dave@murphy.UUCP writes: >....As long as we are talking about editors and user interfaces, how about >this: As several people have pointed out, one of the big problems with >mouse-based editors is that you have to take your hand off the mouse in >order to type... I'm not exactly sure why this is in net.unix, but does anybody have a better suggestion? Although I use a mouse at home on my Macintosh, at work I have discovered the touchpad. It is built into the keyboard on the right hand side (sorry, south- paws), and is about 3.5" square. The sensitivity is easily adjustable, so I can have the cursor zip around at the slightest movement, or crawl across the screen with sweeping strokes on the pad. It is positioned so that I can almost reach it with my little finger without moving my right hand, and in any case only have to move my hand about 4" from home position. The editor I am using is the built in Apollo Display Manager editor which also supports mouse, trackball, etc. Now, if someone could only build a keyboard with a small trackball located in front of the space bar, we would have the best of all worlds. This is one of those ideas that everyone has had (or at least since pointing devices became popular) but noone has built. -- -------------------------------------------------------------------------- "If you can't say something nice, say something surreal" - Zippy's latest Usenet: ...{mit-erl,mit-eddie,yale,uw-beaver,decvax!wanginst}!apollo!brian BIX, Delphi: brian GENIE: b.holt and assorted other identities... Brian R. Holt Apollo Computer Chelmsford MA. (617) 256-6600 x7610 --------------------------------------------------------------------------
cds@root44.uucp (Chris Seabrook) (10/22/86)
Something just occured to me. If the problem with mouse+keyboard is that you have to take your hands off the keyboard why not build the mouse into the keyboard. After all most terminals have separate keyboards designed to wander around the desk anyway, so just build the ball into the underside of the keyboard and bingo !! It all seems so obvious, so what have I forgotten ?? -- Chris Seabrook cds@root.co.uk +44 1 726 6501
mangler@cit-vax.Caltech.Edu (System Mangler) (10/26/86)
HP 9836 workstations have this thing called a "wheel". Turning the wheel moves the cursor rapidly across the screen, much like a trackball. Holding the shift key while turning the wheel moves the cursor vertically. The wheel is fast, precise, simple, and since it is built into a corner of the keyboard, doesn't take your hands far from the keys. Don Speck speck@vlsi.caltech.edu seismo!cit-vax!speck