h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

The main ergonomic problems with the computer mouse (notice how I cleverly avoided using the plural there) apparantly are when you have to hold down a button rather than just clicking (e.g when using scrollbars). This can damage the joints in your fingers and cause RSI. Are there any models (he does it again) which don't have this problem?

Haven't tried it myself, but I read a letter from a guy singing the praises of a graphics tablet for everyday use. One aspect of that is that everything stays in the same place, i.e. the "close window" button is always at the top right on a PC. You can get one for around 70 of your British pounds, which makes it an expansive experiment, I guess.

Still, what price your health, eh?

I use a tablet nowadays - with the "Mouse" object on top, it behaves just like a mouse, but with the "Pen" object everything stays where it is relatively between screen and tablet, allowing you to trace over post-card size graphics, should you feel an overwhelming urge to do so...

I've seen the mice/mouses/meeces with the all-in-one transparent cover/button... One question, when you need to drag an object further than you have desk space for, and thus must lift the mouse up while holding the button down, how do you do it without the mouse popping from between your fingers and adding bruising to your RSI...?

First off, , when I ordered my desktop system recently, I insisted they included a 'don't panic' button.. it is a rocker switch on the back of the thing, just above the power supply cooling fan. It's there so I can kill the power if the thing freezes -- it never has, so far, touch plastic.

Regarding pointing devices, I have used the single, two and three button mouse, trackballs, those weird little nipple-like joysticks on some laptops, graphic tablets of various sizes, and touchpads.

My Visionbook has a touchpad, and I really like it. It is easy to use, never sticks, and can be customized to respond to double tapping, so you can use only one of the two buttons as a right button for things like context menus, and use double taps for dragging items.

I am currently using an el-cheapo two button mouse on the desktop system, as I am awaiting delivery of a touchpad.

I can't say I really like any computer system, at this stage of the computer's evolution. I currently use PCs, but I have worked with Macs and with Silicon Graphics, and they were just as buggy and weird as PCs.

The newer, quality systems seem to be a good deal faster, and more stable, but the Micro$oft OS in particular requires a lot of tweaking and fiddling before it will work right. The hardware is quite good, but the OS is, well, you know.

As far as Windoze OS is concerned, the problem seems to be the basic design... the OS resembles a house of cards, with everything depending on everything else -- that is why it suddenly breaks, without much warning -- I am told Unix is a better system, but unfortunately it is not even as user friendly as Windoze... I remember setting up a Unix-based animation rendering network, but I still don't understand how I did it! It required two all-nighters, figuring out arcane command lines, and enough coffee to keep Godzilla wired for a month.

I helped trouble-shoot a media 100 video workstation, running Mac OS, and that was no picnic, either.

I want a computer system that is self-repairing, impervious to malicious or stupid code, can carry on a reasonably intelligent conversation, and can make a decent cup of coffee.

Then I will like computers. Until then I will merely use and tolerate them, albeit grudgingly.

easy... your computer is smart. it keeps turning its self on because it knows you have work to be done.

When working in a 3-d environment and having to either use menus, which can take a ling time, or to have funcions that are used alot programmed on the mouse I would rather have them on the mouse... I never use the defaults of corse, as they are pretty stupid...

The scroll button is good for rapid shifting of weapons and a duck button, right click is jump or crouch, left click primary weapon, first thumb button secondary fire, second thumb button is cycle targets or even better yet a hold button (in some games you can click it and then rotate around while moving in the same direction and shoot at the same time...

It would take me 3 times as long to do my work witout at least three buttons and the scroller. I would porbably put about another mile of time on my mouse if I didnt have one at work...

Oh and if you can touch type I see no reason you cant use a five button mouse...

Peet, the Apple optical mouse has a squeeze function - if you're doing a drag and drop and you run out of mouse mat, you squeeze the sides and it'll hold position until you find some more mat and then let go. Sounds great, but I haven't had occasion to use it yet.

Hi Lentilla,

"I was lucky enough to get a G4, and have noticed that there is no manual eject button for the Zip drive. "

Actually, my ancient 266 G3 has a built-in Zip drive and no little hole to stick things into. It also has never jammed a Zip disk. I simply drop the icon into the Trash or hit Command-Y and it pops out. The only problem I've ever had in this respect is being unable to grip the Zip disk once it's ejected. The manual eject buttons are found on the externally-mounted Zip drives, which can also by controlled by keyboard shortcuts.

The number of Windows users who are lamenting the poor design of their machines should tell them something about the nature of the beast. Mac was built from scratch with the user in mind. It's Human Interface Guidelines are almost a computer-standard for how to design well for any product.

Fruitbat

I use that squeeze function often. While I no longer need a mousepad, the one that I have has this great squishy wrist rest that keeps my wrist up and in the right position. It's about 5"x6" and kinda small. In fact, I could use the mouse on my leg if I wanted to! (I have - yeah, I'm easily amused)

Good point, Peet - but in my line of work, I fortunately only need one button. When I play games I go to my Playstation (yeah!) Is this a Doom-type game you're playing or a Mech Warrior sort? Sounds addictive!

Well, I'm a relative Mac newbie, but I do use PCs a lot as well at work. Macs are certainly more elegant to use for some things, but PCs now have so much horsepower that they can all but disguise their shaky foundations. I bought a Mac for myself, but only because it was better specified for the audio editing program I use.

When you have to spend your own money, though, your perspective changes as you find that nobody in the high street shops can tell you anything about Macs ("Oh no sir, that printer won't work with a Mac." It would. Sale lost: I bought it direct from the manufacturer.) and all the software, well what little you can find on the high street, costs 30% more for Mac. Then you find the little things you take for granted as being on all computers have been left off the newest Macs (floppy drives, audio inputs, etc), and you're expacted to pay the Apple price for an add-on. So I would say I have a love/hate relationship with my Mac right now...

As far as the single button optical mouse goes, unless you're gaming, you don't need it, because there's this contextual menu thingy. You either press Command before you click, or you click and hold until the alternative message pops up. Okay, maybe long-time Mac users know this, but it was news to me...

"Oh no sir, that printer won't work with a Mac." = "Oh no sir, we don't have anyone on our staff who could troubleshoot any problems you have using that printer with a Mac, and since we don't think you look intelligent enough to do it by yourself we'd rather not make this sale as the number of hours we'd anticipate spending on hand-holding you through the installation would eat up any meagre profit we might make from it. Have a nice day."

Ahh the games, The games I play are, Tribes, Wing Commander (yes I know...), Sim City 3k, Quake1 and 2, Descent, Unreal, Half-life/opposing forces, and quite a few more. I,of corse, havent played any comuter games like that since December 12th last year as I havent had a computer... the games I have played since them are Everquest and freecell . I enjoy 3-d designing (gaming levels) I work with a milling machine that you draw out what you want in 3-d and then the machine makes it... Ohh what fun that is... I also restore Photos for fun... I had about 4 photos recently that had been torn up had water damage and so I fixed them up (using nothing more than Adobe Photoshop Deluxe Business edition) and then take them to a printer that can create photo quality prints... Oh they look so good you would never know that I replaces amost one inch of the total photo, not couting touch ups on scratches... this is WHITE space! Ohh I love it!!!

Steady on, PyRex! Sit down and have a glass of water. Such enthusiasm! You'll do yourself a mischief.

LOL, Pete! You got that right!

PyRex, are you sure it isn't Adobe PhotoDeluxe Business Edition? Photoshop is a different (and *much* more expensive!) product...

I have a copy of PhotoDeluxe Business Edition in my hand as I type (versatile, ain't I? ) which came free with my Epson Stylus Photo 700 printer.

Umm yeah, the Photoshop is the one on my Dad's laptop... sorry... but I got it free with my free scanner... I beta tested the HP 5200 scanner... it was the highlight of my system... a cool-ass (can I say that?) scanner and stuff... FREE! Oh... it works wonderful, but one thing I didnt look at til after the beta testing phase is that the support through the scanner for the printer is sorta shaky... Hmm... whatelse? I am sorry if I sound excited... I am just easyly amused... I will take an optical mouse and use it on my face! I love to restore pictures though.

I've done a little restoration in my time too...

The Guide's pre-BBC incarnation was pushing the Fotango service (see obvious URL) - it lets you upload the restored version of your photo as a high-res JPEG, then order a proper photographic print of it. When I restored an old (about 40 years old, and very faded!) print of a friend's parents, I was able to get a 10" x 8" print on proper Kodak paper for £2 plus VAT. It looks noticeably better than just using an inkjet with "photo paper"...

I take my photos to the Kodak processing stations found in photo stores (at least on our military base) you can scan, take it from a negative, slide, disk, digital camera, or advantix roll, customize the picture (do last miniute touchups) and then print out the size you want on REAL photo paper... Looks like new... I just they had non glossy photo paper...

That's I just WISH they had....

I'm eager to get our PC up to speed (the crappy one we have at the house) so I can play Sim City 3000. What I'm most interested in is The Sims - I keep seeing the expansion packs in the store. It looks like you can create everything from drunken bums to Generation Xers, and I love the simulation games anyway - the SimCities, Theme Park, Theme Hospital, Populous, etc. I actually have Descent for the Playstation, but hardly play it anymore...

What do you have at the moment, Lentilla? (CPU, memory etc.)

Upgrading has never been cheaper than it is at the moment - I've seen 256MB of RAM going for £38!