IBM Corp scientists at the Thomas J Watson Research Center in Yorktown Heights, New York are very proud of a prototype of a computer pointing device they have developed, which they say can be operated from a keyboard using an index finger: imaginatively called the Pointing Stick, it is designed for rodent-phobes and all those too busy with real work to have time to clear a space on their desks to run the pesky critter around; it goes between the G and H keys to be equally in reach of either hand, and protrudes 2mm – 0.1 – above the surface of the keys and does not interfere with normal typing; bar keys at the lower edge of the keyboard, adjacent to the space bar, serve the same functions as the selection buttons on a mouse; the stick simply responds to pressure – don’t waggle it around – and it is governed by an algorithm determined empirically to provide a comfortable match between the force applied to the stick and movement of the cursor; with the finger resting lightly on the stick, the cursor remains steady but as force is increased in any direction, the speed of the cursor increases up to a constant speed determined by a user’s ability to follow its motion; maximum force shoots it to the edge of the screen; the scientists also have a version with two sticks, one either side of the H key, so that the user can make selections in the menu area with one and perform functions in the working area of the screen with the other IBM said.
