The first mouse for a computer. The evolution of the computer mouse: history of creation and review of the most unusual devices

In the modern world, there are objects without which, in the literal sense of the word, it’s like being without hands. A computer mouse is one of those devices that a user practically cannot do without. Its main purpose is to transform the mechanical movements of a computer user into the movement of a cursor on the screen. Of course, we can get by with just one keyboard, touchscreen or touchpad, but we can still compare working at a computer without a mouse to riding a bicycle without pedals. Let's find out in what year the mouse was invented and who its creator is.

Why was the mouse called a mouse?

There are two versions why this device was called a mouse. Some people believe that an American engineer gave it this name because its drive looked like a tail. Others note that the name comes from the English word mouse, which is similar to the abbreviation for Manually Operated User Signal Encoder (“user signal encoder that is manually controlled”).

“What year was the computer mouse invented?” - you ask. As Engelbart himself said in an interview, the idea of his brainchild appeared in the 50s, while studying in the laboratory. There, as a scientist, he worked on radar installations that belong to NASA.

The history of the creation of the first mouse

Telling what year and what she looked like, one cannot help but recall the significant day of December 9, 1968. On this day, Engelbart first introduced others to his new invention, which had the official name “computer manipulator.” The first mouse was not wildly popular among people, because it was very bulky and uncomfortable. But when the creator showed real-time graphical control, it was like a bolt from the blue.

Douglas is one of the founders of human-machine interface research. He also became the creator of a text editor and online group conferencing. He has written more than 25 works, has 20 patents for technological inventions and has received numerous awards.

Having dealt with the question of what year the computer mouse was invented, we can smoothly move on to using it. In 1986, the computer mouse, like Engelbart’s other creations, remained unclaimed and did not bring the creator the expected income. But still, this is an amazing device, and no computer process can do without it now.

It was not developed by chance. Conventional manipulators (joystick, keyboard) simply slowed down the work of the windowed environment, and Douglas quickly came up with an addition that could make existing processes easier. This device turned out to be a truly ingenious find that had never existed in the world.

In what year was the mouse invented and what did it look like?

Engelbart, together with his colleagues, created a table with the characteristics of all known manipulators at that time, including leg, knee and others. After some time, a very awkward structure appears in the form of a thick wooden box with a small red button and an uncomfortable “tail” under the user’s hand. Inside there were two metal disks that made the mouse move back and forth, right and left. The first working prototype was presented by Engelbart's colleague, Bill English, and the illustration programs were written by Jeff Rulifson.

NASA did not appreciate the created manipulator; moreover, Engelbart did not know how to competently present his developments from a commercial point of view, naively believing that smart people would figure everything out themselves. In 1986, he received a patent for an “x and y indicator coordinator for a display system,” necessary for the creation of a new mouse. This model was very different from the first sample - it already had three buttons, but it was still very far from the modern version.

The first computer set that included a mouse was the Xerox 8010 minicomputer, which was introduced in 1981. The mouse from this company consisted of three buttons and cost $400. In 1983, the famous company Apple created its unique mouse with one button for the Lisa computer, its price dropped to $25.

Awards

We found out in what year the computer mouse was invented. It was in 1968 that Engelbart received a reward for his invention in the amount of 10 thousand dollars. But already in 1997, the engineer’s work was rated much higher - he was awarded the Lemelson Prize (in the amount of 500 thousand dollars), and a little later he was awarded the prestigious Turing award.

In 2000, on December 1, he was awarded the National Medal of Technology for his inventions, including the computer mouse. This is one of the highest US awards for achievements in the IT field. Engelbart was not rich and successful, he led a modest lifestyle, and few people remembered him. And in 2013, at the age of 88, he left this mortal coil.

About future

Now we have found out in what year the computer mouse was invented and who did it. Then the question remains open - what awaits her in the future? No one knows for sure, but the fact that it will remain an attribute of interaction with a computer in the coming decades is difficult to dispute. Another thing is in what form this will happen - sensory, virtual or biomechanical. Time, of course, will put everything in its place, and we just need to wait for progress to move further.

Nowadays, when it is already difficult to imagine life without a computer, any technology related to it has also become an integral part of our existence. It is quite difficult to use a modern computer and even a laptop without a computer mouse. However, this name for the device that controls the cursor on the screen appeared a little later. But everything is in order.

The history of the creation of a computer mouse begins with the idea of Douglas Engelbart to make a similar manipulator. His goal was to invent a device that could coordinate the actions of man and machine. First of all, the manipulator was not created to control personal computers, but for the needs of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). They needed a device that would allow them to interact interactively with objects on the screen. Engelbart managed to create such a device, which was originally called the “X and Y position indicator.” Bill English worked with Douglas on the manipulator, and he brought his colleague’s idea to life. The device with a wire connected to it turned out to look like a mouse with a tail. This is where the name “computer mouse” came from. However, the invention did not arouse much interest at NASA, since it was impossible for them to work in zero gravity conditions. Engelbart, unable to find any other use for the device, sold the patent and clearly made it cheaper. He was bought for only 10 thousand dollars.

But Engelbart’s colleague Bill English decided not to stop there and talked about the Xerox company’s manipulator. It was there that they first decided to try using a mouse to control a personal computer, but the device was considered unpromising. A new stage in the history of the computer mouse is associated with Steve Jobs, the head of Apple; it was he who saw the potential in English’s invention and immediately bought the license from Stanford University. After this, the computer mouse was released in combination with Apple's new computer, Lisa. The device was appreciated by all leading computer equipment manufacturers. Perhaps it was the creation of the computer mouse that inspired Bill Gates to create Windows.

It is impossible to imagine any modern computer without a computer mouse, although other input devices have become widespread today - touchpads, touch screens, graphics tablets, and so on. However, the history of the computer mouse does not end; every year new models of these devices appear, differing from their counterparts in the absence of a wire, the presence of additional buttons, a more convenient shape and weight adjustment using weights. By the way, a computer mouse is currently being developed that will hover above the table surface; the creators ironically called this device “Bat”.

He won't say anything. But nevertheless, almost 1 billion people a day use his creation, namely a computer mouse. Karl himself came up with a name for the device. The mouse brought him awards and fame, but 30 years after its creation. The patent issued for his invention, which had already expired, was poorly drafted: its effect did not extend to the idea of a manipulator, but only to the reading mechanism using two orthogonally located wheels. Modern mice have different reading mechanisms, and the companies that produce these devices are free from obligations to the inventor. Engelbart's authorship was recognized by the public only in 1998, when he was awarded the Lemelson-MIT Prize and 500 thousand in greens.

So where did it all start? Back in 1964, when Comrade N.S. was removed from power. Khrushchev, D. Engelbert and his team worked on the oN-Line System project - an operating system (NLS), where the concept of a “window” interface took place. As a side effect of this project, a mouse was born... The device was developed by accident: all the manipulators that existed then, namely the keyboard, joysticks, light pens, slowed down the process of working with windows, and Engelbert quickly came up with a convenient device that was designed to make working at the computer easier . The device received the name “mouse” at Stanford, where Douglas and his team worked, because of the similarity of the signal wire to the tail of, believe it or not, a mouse. It is noteworthy that on early mouse models it came out from the back of the devices. The device itself was invented even a little earlier in 1963, a year later the first working prototype was made.

In 1970, the inventor of the mouse, Douglas Engelbart, received the same patent for a device called a “mouse” or “x and y coordinate indicator for a display system.” Yeah... That mouse, of course, was far from the current one and looked like a box with two wheels.

The first computer to include a mouse was the Xerox 8010 Star Information System, introduced in 1981. The Xerox mouse had three buttons and cost approximately $400 (at current exchange rates, this is about $1,000). The two wheels in such a mouse were replaced by a bearing, the movements of which were controlled by two rollers inside the device itself. The appearance of the mouse has become much closer to the modern one. In 1983, Apple, of course, released its own one-button mouse for the Lisa computer. The cost of the Apple mouse was reduced to $25. In general, the mouse gained worldwide popularity thanks to its use in Apple Macintosh computers and, somewhat later, in the Windows operating system for IBM PC.

In mass models of mice, a ball drive, familiar to older generations, was used. In such a drive, the movement of the mouse is transmitted to a rubberized steel ball protruding from the body (the weight of the ball and the rubber coating provide good adhesion to the working surface, for example, a rug). Rollers pressed against the ball record its movements for each measurement, transmitting them to sensors, which, in turn, convert the movements into electrical signals. The main disadvantage of the ball drive is the contamination of the ball and rollers, all of which together leads to the mouse jamming and the need to periodically clean it. Metallization of the rollers solved the problem only partly.

There were two sensor options for the ball drive:

Contact sensors. The contact sensor is a textolite disk with radial metal tracks and contacts that are pressed to it. This type of sensor was inherited from the direct drive. Its disadvantages are oxidation of contacts, rapid general wear and poor accuracy.
Buttons. These are the main mouse controls that serve to perform basic manipulations: selecting an object by clicking, actively moving with a button pressed, for drawing, selecting text, the starting and ending point when moving an object.

The number of buttons on a mouse is limited by the concept of using them blindly, similar to the keys of a chord keyboard (an input device in which characters or commands are formed by pressing multiple keys at once, similar to the production of chords on a piano or other keyboard-based musical instruments). Moreover, if the chord keyboard can easily use 5 keys (one for each finger), the mouse still needs to be moved with three (thumb, ring and little fingers) and two (thumb and little fingers) fingers. That is, you can make two or three full-fledged buttons for use in parallel with moving the mouse on the table - under the index, middle and ring fingers (for a three-button mouse). The buttons are named according to their position - left (under the index finger of a right-handed person), right and middle, for a three-button mouse.

For many years, the confrontation between two-button and three-button mice continued, which ended after the advent of scrolling (scrolling the screen). On a mouse with two buttons, a small middle button appeared (to turn on/off scrolling, and also a middle button), which soon turned into a scroll wheel, clicking on which works like a middle button. On a mouse with three buttons, of course, the middle button is simply combined with the scroll wheel.

Apple went its own way. Thus, considering even a second button superfluous, for a long time Yabloko built all its interfaces for a mouse with a single button. Mice manufactured by Apple can be programmed to use from one to four buttons.

Ball mice, still widespread at the end of the 20th century, are gradually being forgotten and are being replaced by optical mice.

The first optical mouse was created back in 1999 by Microsoft. Now there are many companies producing a wide variety of optical mice, of different designs, with additional multimedia buttons. But first things first.

An ordinary mouse with two, three or more buttons will no longer surprise anyone, but the appearance of the mouse has changed very seriously over the past 20 years, so radically that it is difficult to recognize its predecessors in new devices. The scroll wheel mentioned above appeared quite a long time ago and it is generally accepted that this was due to the release of the Windows operating system. Then it became possible to tilt the wheel from left to right and thereby scroll (scroll) to the left or right, i.e. horizontally. The next update consisted of replacing the wheel with a trackball, which rotates in any direction and allows you to move in the window in all directions.

The first trackballs were developed for a long time, at the same time as computer mice, and at first, as usual, for military purposes. Specialists from Canada working for the country's navy proposed the idea of a trackball, which the military department, alas, did not support. By analogy with the mouse, the technology entered the civilian sphere and began to be used in the development of devices for precise positioning of the cursor on the screen. In the 1960s, the usual controls were a keyboard and switches, but a system with a video interface required a new means of control. So we decided to use a ball with a smooth surface. According to legend, the first trackball was a bowling ball.

The first mice were connected to the computer using a wire and an adapter via the RS serial communication interface. Later, IBM offered a special PS/2 connector. This port became widespread and began to be used for keyboards. Gradually it began to be included in the motherboard standard. Over time, a USB port was added to the connection ports for mice and keyboards.

After a little more time, the mouse “lost” its tail. Wireless mice appeared. They are deprived of the limiting factor - wires, but have another drawback - the lack of stationary power and are forced to be autonomous, from batteries or accumulators, which are still far from perfect. Also, the disadvantages include not always a stable connection, higher prices compared to wired mice. It is clear that the solution to these problems will come with time. There are many new wireless mice coming out that can be used to control multimedia functions on your desktop PC, i.e. like a remote control for a computer.

Among the interesting developments of recent times, it is worth noting the development of the Englishman Tobias Jones, who invented a very interesting manipulator. Perhaps just such a device will replace the mouse in the future. His invention is a glove with sensors that track the movement of the hand and sends data to a computer.

Even 20 years ago, no one could imagine what a mouse would look like. It is likely that in another 20 years, when mice are replaced by other devices, we will remember mice with a smile on our faces. The development of new devices is actively underway and some of them will probably end up on the assembly line.

It is generally impossible to imagine a modern computer without this gadget, which greatly simplifies the process of managing a PC. But only a few users know in what year the computer mouse was invented and who its creator is. Let's remember how this gadget appeared, and what it was like from the very beginning.

In what year was the computer mouse invented?

December 9, 1968 - it was on this day that the world saw the prototype of all modern computer mice. Of course, this was just a prototype. However, before this time, there were special computerized radars and manipulators, which became the basis for the creation of a modern mouse.

The very first prototype appeared in the early 50s. Then, according to the Cossacks of the Canadian Navy, computerized radars with the first graphical interface were created. They required a special cursor positioning system, which used a simple device based on a smooth ball. It was called a trackball, and it was the first step towards creating a modern computer mouse.

A little later, in 1951, Douglas Engelbart (the creator) was already thinking about developing a manipulator, and in 1955 he took part in the manufacture of radar systems. In particular, he developed information display systems within the NASA computer program. According to Douglas himself, he and his team created a table with the parameters and capabilities of all modern manipulators at that time, determined their functions and required parameters, which did not yet exist. During research in 1963, the idea was formed to create a display pointer that would move in an X-Y coordinate system.

First prototype

In 1964, based on a design by Douglas Engelbart, Stanford Research Institute graduate student Billy English assembled the first prototype of a computer mouse. At the same time, a program was written to demonstrate its capabilities.

It was a large, square, brown wooden box with a large red button at the very top. The cord was located in the front, but over time it was moved back. So he practically did not interfere. Inside there was a plane displacement sensor, which consisted of two metal disks. They were located perpendicular to each other: one rotated when the device moved to the side, and the other was responsible for moving forward or backward. Given this design, the mouse could not be moved diagonally, it could move forward or backward.

Speaking about the year in which the computer mouse was invented, it is worth clarifying that some people rightly believe that this invention was “born” in 1946. After all, it was in this year that the prototype device for all modern computer gadgets appeared.

First presentation of the mouse

A little later, on December 9, 1968, Douglas Engelbart presented a more advanced modification of this device to a group of engineers. It worked as an oN-Line System OS manipulator. The mouse had three buttons, although Douglas Engelbart himself claimed that he wanted to make 5 buttons (for each finger). And although at first they planned to call the device a “bug,” later the name “mouse” stuck - because of the thick connecting cable, reminiscent of rodent tails.

So, if it is logical to calculate in what year the computer mouse was invented, then we can talk about two dates: 1964 and 1968. In 1970, the inventor received a patent, which recorded the authorship of a manipulator based on the use of two perpendicularly located wheels. However, the principle of the manipulator itself was not patented.

In 1972, this research was actively pursued by Xerox PARC, which significantly improved a similar gadget. In particular, then the disks were replaced with a small ball or rollers. This is how new types of computer mice appeared.

In 1979, Xerox created the Xerox Alto computer, which was a research prototype and was not included in the series. But it was equipped with a computer mouse and had a graphical interface in the form of a desktop. Several thousand of these computers were created.

The appearance of a rubber ball inside the case

In 1979, the Stanford Research Institute (where Engelbart's team worked) sold the mouse project to Apple for $40,000. Having received a license for such an invention, Apple commissioned Hovey-Kelley Design to improve the mouse. As a result, instead of a steel bearing, it received a comfortable rubber ball that rolled freely in the body. The introduction of this innovation made it possible to get rid of the complex system of coding wheels and electrical contacts. Instead, simple optoelectronic converters and wheels with slotted slots were implemented.

Further development

In 1983, a dozen companies were already producing and selling different types of computer mice. That same year, Apple released the Lisa one-button mouse. It was developed for Apple in downtown Palo Alto. Engineers were able to create a cheap modification of this device, making it compact and collapsible. It was possible to remove the ball from the inside and clean it of dust. This mouse was included with the Apple Macintosh home computer.

In 1987, Douglas Engelbart's patent expired and only in 1998 the merits of this inventor were officially recognized. Engelbart himself received the Lemelson-MIT Prize in the amount of $500,000.

Since 1999, optical mice have begun to appear that work on any surface. Many models released after 2000 have survived to this day. Moreover, some of them are successfully used.

Finally

The history of the creation of a computer mouse is short. In about 30 years, it was possible to create a high-tech gadget from a primitive and very expensive device, which is cheap today. As for modern models, they are radically different from the first computer mouse. All that remained from it was the idea of positioning the cursor on the graphical interface.

Now you know who invented the computer mouse. In this regard, no one has any doubts. But as for the date of creation, there are 2 opinions:

In 1964, a graduate student at the Stanford Research Institute created a prototype of this gadget (based on Engelbart's design).
In 1968, Engelbart himself presented a working, improved version of the mouse.

Here, everyone decides for themselves when the first computer mouse appeared. However, it is generally accepted that she first saw the world on December 9, 1968.

Once upon a time, the computer was controlled exclusively using text commands that were entered into the command line via the keyboard. This continued until the 1980s, despite the fact that back in 1963, engineer Douglas Engelbart began work on a pointing device for pointing objects on a screen.

In the same year, using Engelbart's work, his colleague Bill English created the first prototype of the device: a wooden box with a button on top and two perpendicular metal wheels inside to indicate horizontal and vertical positions on the display.

By tilting the device, the wheels could be operated separately to move the pointer precisely along the X or Y axis. In 1968, Engelbart publicly unveiled the pointing device, and his presentation was called "The Mother of All Demonstrations."

Douglas Engelbart's presentation is considered the first time the mouse was shown to a mass audience.

It wasn't until 1973 that the PC with a graphical user interface was introduced. The Xerox Alto was controlled using a keyboard and a three-button mouse. The metal wheels for changing the cursor position have been replaced with a metal ball and rollers. Until the 90s, the basic operating principle did not change significantly.

From the first days of its existence, the mouse was not widely used. It began to gain widespread popularity only with the release of the Apple Macintosh 128k computer in 1984. The M0100 model for this PC cost only $15, not several hundred as previously. So the mouse not only became accessible to people with average incomes, but also became the main pointing device for Apple's graphical interface.

The promotional video said: “If you can point to something, you can control the system.”. Steve Jobs, as with smartphones and tablets, did not invent the mouse, but clever marketing and user-friendly design were responsible for its success. In 1985, Microsoft began producing its own mice for Windows 1.0.

And then events began to develop at crazy speed. The rubberized ball has been replaced by optical sensors and lasers because they position the cursor more accurately and do not require cleaning. Wireless mice have given people greater freedom of movement while working. On the other hand, laptops have appeared with a touchpad, which is an alternative to a mouse: you can work on them while on the go, even if there is no flat surface at hand.

Meanwhile, office workers often complain of typical occupational ailments such as computer mouse syndrome. There have been numerous attempts to change the design to improve ergonomics (for example, by installing a trackball to control the cursor), but so far they have not been very successful.

Currently, touch screens have become a good alternative, since such control is more intuitive and does not require additional equipment. However, it is not yet known whether this control method can completely replace the mouse in offices.

1963

The world's first wooden mouse prototype appears.