The Computer Mouse Turns 40

It is hard to imagine that computers originally did not have a mouse. The humble computer mouse has been part of life for 40 years, but it could soon be facing extinction.

The computer mouse was created by Doug Engelbart and his team at the RIC (Research Institute of California), because they needed an easy way to effectively control their computers. It was only ever meant to be a prototype, but time has proved that it was destined to be so much more than that.

The mouse was debuted in 1968 at a presentation in San Francisco. It was only designed to show off a functioning network computer system, but the creators found that the mouse itself was winning all the competition categories because it had never been see before. They were onto something big.

Fast track 40 years ahead to today, and the mouse that so changed the way we connect with computers is at risk of disappearing like any other extinct animal. We have now entered the touch-screen and sensor generation, which is all about making physical contact with the computer or gesturing at it, because it is generally faster and easier for humans to control their own movement rather than a devices.

Whether is survives or not we definitely owe a debt of gratitude to Engelbart and his team for shaping the past 40 years if computer science.

(Picture: Courtesy shoppingblog(dot)com)