We actually ditched our Apple Mighty Mouse awhile back ago because that little scroll ball stopped working (we admit our fingers might have occasionally had some crumbs and feline fur on it) and moved over to a Wacom Bamboo tablet and mouse combo. BUT, we've always wanted to return to the simplicity of the Apple mouse, which fit nicely in the hand and is still one of the nicer looking input devices out there. We're now excited to read that Apple may be looking to develop and release a mouse that eliminates the ball 'o crumbs design for a multi-touch scrolling...
MacBlogz reports the possibility of an updated aluminum Mighty Mouse with a sleeker profile with a touch-gesture input feature that mimics Apple's current touchpad offerings on their laptops. We're definitely intrigued, as we could imagine this could not only change the daily user experience for working within a UI, but the possibilities for integrating gestures into computer gaming could well be the saviour of the genre:
Apple’s touch technology has grown leaps and bounds since the debut of the Mighty Mouse. A 2007 patent application details an “arbitrary shaped grippable member” (don’t get any filthy ideas here) that incorporates positioning and multitouch detection to determine a users action. In essence, it would act as one seamless area from which a user could scroll and pan by dragging a finger over the device’s surface. The mouse would also have the ability to process various movements and gestures assigned to different functions on the computer. “For example, gestures can be created to detect and effect a user command to resize a window, scroll a display, rotate an object, zoom in or out of a displayed view, delete or insert text or other objects, etc.” The patent goes on to detail that “gestures can also be used to invoke and manipulate virtual control interfaces, such as volume knobs, switches, sliders, handles, knobs, doors, and other widgets that may be created to facilitate human interaction with the computing system.”
A little rubbing alcohol will fix your little scroll roller thing in a jiff. Just rub some in with a qtip and roll it around until the ball starts clicking properly.
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Comicgeek: thanks...it was actually the first thing I tried, but to no avail. It continued to skip, and when I eventually took the mouse apart, I discovered some serious feline hair and other particles had found their way into the scrolling mechanics within. Even after cleaning those, the mouse scroll button never worked like it once did.
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How did you take the mouse apart? I've been trying to figure out how to safely do this. There are no screws or hardware to give you a clue on where you should start.
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