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Nine button mouse

 
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My office machine had a regular 3 button mouse but recently I got a Logitech G300 9 button mouse (which is actually meant for gaming), which I am now using for office pc. I am trying to make the mouse more interesting by assigning short cuts/meta keys to the additional buttons such as like Ctrl+C, Ctrl+V, Ctrl A, Ctrl +O, Alt+Shift + O, Ctrl+Home, Ctrl+End

If you use such a mouse, please share the short cuts that you assign to the buttons.
 
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Of course, the best key assignments depend on what programs you use most. Does Eclipse, or whatever your foavorite IDE is, have any non-standard key bindings?

If the mouse doesn't already have dedicated Back and Forward for your web browser, I'd suggest those. Alt-LeftArrow and Alt-RightArrow.


 
Paul Anilprem
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Ryan McGuire wrote:Of course, the best key assignments depend on what programs you use most. Does Eclipse, or whatever your foavorite IDE is, have any non-standard key bindings?

If the mouse doesn't already have dedicated Back and Forwarded for your web browser, I'd suggest those. Alt-LeftArrow and Alt-RightArrow.



I use NetBeans and I have assigned Ctrl+O and Alt+Shift+O to two of the buttons for that.

The default for two of the buttons was indeed Browser Back and Forward but I rarely use that functionality so I have reassigned them to Ctrl+Home and Ctrl-End (to move on top or bottom of a document or page.).

 
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My mouse:



with gestures replacing any number of buttons. Couldn't be happier with it, and completely frees me from worries about RSI.
 
Paul Anilprem
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Bear Bibeault wrote:My mouse:



with gestures replacing any number of buttons. Couldn't be happier with it, and completely frees me from worries about RSI.


Cool! So how many gestures have you configured?
 
Bear Bibeault
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All of them!

In reality, there are probably only about half a dozen or so that I use regularly.

I stopped using a mouse in 2002 due to RSI, switching to a trackball. When the trackpad came out, it took me about 30 minutes with it to ditch the trackballs.
 
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A nine-buttons mouse ?? Wow. Are they selling three-headed hammers too ?
 
Paul Anilprem
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Christophe Verré wrote:A nine-buttons mouse ?? Wow. Are they selling three-headed hammers too ?


 
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Bear Bibeault wrote:All of them!

In reality, there are probably only about half a dozen or so that I use regularly.

I stopped using a mouse in 2002 due to RSI, switching to a trackball. When the trackpad came out, it took me about 30 minutes with it to ditch the trackballs.



I have no idea how it works so I ask this out of curiosity - as you start having more and more gestures, wouldn't that risk uniqueness of the gestures resulting in wrong translations?

Half a dozen sounds a lot more than 6 so practically you are using an 6+2 (assuming 2 clicks) = 8 button mouse. Is that correct?

Leaving aside RSI for a moment, do you find it easier (and faster) to do the gestures than the button clicks on a multi button mouse?

 
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Paul Anilprem wrote:
I have no idea how it works so I ask this out of curiosity - as you start having more and more gestures, wouldn't that risk uniqueness of the gestures resulting in wrong translations?


The gestures aren't completely free-form. There's a list of known gestures, each of which can be enabled./disabled, or re-assigned.

Half a dozen sounds a lot more than 6 so practically you are using an 6+2 (assuming 2 clicks) = 8 button mouse. Is that correct?

Sort of. There's only one physical click by pressing down on the pad. But a single finger tap is (by default) mapped to left click, and a two-finger tap to right-click. You can also make a tap near a corner the right click. And so on...

Leaving aside RSI for a moment, do you find it easier (and faster) to do the gestures than the button clicks on a multi button mouse?


Without a doubt. I had a bunch of extra buttons on my trackball, but I never used them because I'd have to move my eyes away from the screen to make sure I was clicking the right button. I couldn't just do it by feel.

I originally thought that the idea of gestures was kind of dumb, but once I started using them, I was quickly hooked.
 
Paul Anilprem
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Bear Bibeault wrote:
I stopped using a mouse in 2002 due to RSI, switching to a trackball. When the trackpad came out, it took me about 30 minutes with it to ditch the trackballs.



On a side note, I started having symptoms of RSI in the very beginning of my career (15 yrs ago). I didn't know then that it was RSI. Fortunately, at that time, I started using the mouse by my left hand (without changing the settings from right handed to left handed) and that worked like a charm!
 
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I never liked using a mouse. Whenever possible I configure all shortcuts for the keyboard (one of the nicest features of Eclipse). Like Bear, I prefer to use the trackpad. Only difference is that mine is built into my Mac.
 
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At home I had a 5 button mouse with the two explorer back and forward buttons.
One of my friends had a 7 button mouse, which he configured for gaming shortcuts, but as said by Bear above, he was not always able to reach out the correct button on time, so he gave up using the extra buttons.
 
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Maneesh Godbole wrote:I never liked using a mouse. Whenever possible I configure all shortcuts for the keyboard (one of the nicest features of Eclipse). Like Bear, I prefer to use the trackpad. Only difference is that mine is built into my Mac.



I have seen many people complain about mouse and how keyboard is more efficient but I have observed that it is true for them because they haven't put as much effort in mastering the mouse as they have in mastering the keyboard. I feel that the combination of mouse and keyboard is significantly more powerful than both hands on the keyboard for tasks such as browsing (which is what we spend most of our time on anyway ).

Of course, for activities that require a lot of typing, both hands on the keyboard is most efficient. But then again, even for such activities, the amount of typing that is required has been gradually reducing because of IDEs. There are so many macros in IDEs that it is impossible to remember keyboard short cuts for all of them. Yet, they are easily and quickly accesible using the mouse.

Overall, I think some form of gesture capturing device adds a lot of value as compared to having just a keyboard. Buttons on a mouse (or touchpad) is a bonus
 
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See, I would be apt to press those extra buttons accidentally all the time.
 
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Paul Anilprem wrote:

Of course, for activities that require a lot of typing, both hands on the keyboard is most efficient. But then again, even for such activities, the amount of typing that is required has been gradually reducing because of IDEs. There are so many macros in IDEs that it is impossible to remember keyboard short cuts for all of them. Yet, they are easily and quickly accesible using the mouse.



Back when I was a youngin, I used to program in Visual C++ 1.5, and the IDE had hotkeys for everything. I would never leave the keyboard. Once, I was looking at a critical problem and my boss decided to help me with it. So, she sat down next to me, and said "You take the keyboard, I'll take the mouse. It will be faster" I said "ok". SO, we are looking at the problem, talking as we go along. She would move her mouse to do something and boom I've already used hotkeys to do it. I just couldn't let her do it. I couldn't, even when I wanted to. It was like the hotkeys were second nature to me. I thought of it, and my fingers would be on hotkeys. Half an hour of that and she left I still don't know if she thought I was an ass, or incredibly competent, or both. I just didn't get fired.

Then the integerated Visual Developer environment came along and they messed all the keys up, and I had to go to using the mouse, and never bothered learning it. I was so mad at Microsoft, for changing it. Then I moved to Eclipse, and again the hotkeys didn;t do everything I wanted to, so I fell back to the mouse. I know you can configure Eclipse hotkeys to anyway you want, but somehow I've just never got around to mapping the keys

 
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Jayesh A Lalwani wrote:

Paul Anilprem wrote:

Of course, for activities that require a lot of typing, both hands on the keyboard is most efficient. But then again, even for such activities, the amount of typing that is required has been gradually reducing because of IDEs. There are so many macros in IDEs that it is impossible to remember keyboard short cuts for all of them. Yet, they are easily and quickly accesible using the mouse.



Back when I was a youngin, I used to program in Visual C++ 1.5, and the IDE had hotkeys for everything. I would never leave the keyboard. Once, I was looking at a critical problem and my boss decided to help me with it. So, she sat down next to me, and said "You take the keyboard, I'll take the mouse. It will be faster" I said "ok". SO, we are looking at the problem, talking as we go along. She would move her mouse to do something and boom I've already used hotkeys to do it. I just couldn't let her do it. I couldn't, even when I wanted to. It was like the hotkeys were second nature to me.


Apples to oranges comparison. You can't compare the coding/develop skills of a manager with a coder/developer. You should compare the skills of a developer who uses mouse/kb combo with another developer who uses only kb, in their familiar environment.

IDEs are way beyond what they were 10 yrs ago. You can't have hotkeys for all the functionality and you can't remember all the hotkeys that exist, IMHO.
 
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When I first saw this thread, I thought that the ranch had a new iconic mascot. I was confused, why does a moose need buttons?
 
Ryan McGuire
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Paul Anilprem wrote:
IDEs are way beyond what they were 10 yrs ago. You can't have hotkeys for all the functionality and you can't remember all the hotkeys that exist, IMHO.



Well... kinda. Just to use Excel as an example. I certainly don't have all the "suggested" hotkeys memorized. Instead I use the keyboard to access the menus. e.g. Now that I look, the hotkey for the Visual Basic editor is Alt-F11. However, I'm much more likely to use Alt-T M V (Tools menu -> Macros - Visual Basic Editor). I find it quite reasonable to use that type of keyboard shortcut for pretty much anything in the menu hierarchy. In contrast, I'd say that Ctrl-C, X, V, Z, Y and A are "universal enough" for Copy, Cut, Paste, Undo, Redo and SelectAll to be worth memorizing. Either type of keyboard shortcut would be faster than reaching over for my mouse.

Surprisingly, I have seen co-workers suing Excel use the mouse to select Copy from the Edit menu, shift to the keyboard to use End-DownArrow to get to the last filled-in row and then move back to the mouse to select Paste from the Edit menu.
 
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Bear Bibeault wrote:My mouse:



with gestures replacing any number of buttons. Couldn't be happier with it, and completely frees me from worries about RSI.


Me too. After becoming addicted to the trackpad on my MacBook Pro, I was elated when this came out as a peripheral.
 
Jayesh A Lalwani
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That trackpad is sweet. Does it work on XP?
 
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In the pre-youtube time, I've seen someone on TV that was playing chords on a five button mouse.
Each chord represented a character. The computer didn't have a keybord (or he hid it ;) ).
He was typing a text with his mouse by playing the chords.
He was quite good at it. Had some novelty value at the time.
 
Bear Bibeault
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Jayesh A Lalwani wrote:That trackpad is sweet. Does it work on XP?


That particular trackpad is OS X only, I believe.
 
Jayesh A Lalwani
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Bear Bibeault wrote:

Jayesh A Lalwani wrote:That trackpad is sweet. Does it work on XP?


That particular trackpad is OS X only, I believe.



Curses!!. Foiled again!
 
marc weber
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Sometimes I use an 77-button mouse. I call it a keyboard. With 9, you're well on your way!
 
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Okay, but your keyboard doesn't roll around on wheels. Here's a link about a 40-button mouse which splits the difference: The original 40-button mouse. Lots of keys, but still supports rolling around.
 
marc weber
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Paul Clapham wrote:Okay, but your keyboard doesn't roll around on wheels...


Not yet, but I'm buying some casters to bolt on.
 
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Here ya go!

 
marc weber
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Bear Bibeault wrote:Here ya go!


Perfect! I'm on my way to dual-handed, 77-button (DH77B) mousing!
 
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