The new Microsoft Touch Mouse combines the virtues of the old familiar mouse – which has been continually optimized since the 1960s – with multi-touch gestures. Now available online and in retail stores in late September, the new mouse offers the millions of people who use Windows 7 a natural way to navigate the operating system, said Scott Rockfeld, director of product management for Microsoft Hardware.
One finger allows users to scroll 360 degrees through the document they’re in.
Two fingers allow them to manage the active window they’re using and perform tasks such as maximizing and minimizing windows or snapping them left or right.
Three fingers allow users to manage their whole desktop by switching between different tasks or clearing all open windows.
A flick of the thumb allows users to move forward and back in programs such as Internet Explorer, PowerPoint, and Windows Photo Viewer.
Benko said he was excited to bring touch to a much broader range of devices. Touch is an increasingly popular way of interacting with technology, but it’s primarily taken hold in small handheld devices. “For desktop scenarios with large, vertical screens, you’d need gorilla arms to go longer than 10 minutes through touch alone,” he said. “In terms of optimizing the effort of controlling the real estate you have on large screens, it’s really hard to beat the mouse.”
“The Touch Mouse is our stake in the ground with multi-touch PC input devices, and it’s really just the beginning of things to come,” Benko said.
The product highlights the value Microsoft Research can deliver, Benko added. “This is a good example of how the algorithms and ideas and prototypes developed in research directly translate and make certain things possible for product teams that wouldn’t have been possible,” he said. “You could not make this mouse without the software.”
Check the Video of Microsoft Research Here
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1 comments:
Nice post:-)
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