A computer mouse is a small device that makes your computer input tasks easy. However straightforward it may be, it is a potent device in the computing industry. A lot of things can be done by a single click of a computer mouse.
What is it?
A computer mouse is an external computer hardware input device. Its primary use is to act as a pointing device. Maybe I should point here that the word mouse about computer hardware is not an acronym for “manually-operated user-select equipment.” The computer mouse got its name from its looks because it resembles the rodent.
Types
Technological advancement has led to the proliferation of different kinds of computer mice. The most commonly used mouse on desktop computers is the USB mouse while most laptops have the touchpad for a mouse.
There are various types of computer pointing devices, and mice include cordless mice, optical mice, wheel mice, and J-mice. We also have joysticks, trackball, and TrackPoint. Depending on the type of ports, we have Bluetooth, infrared, serial port, PS/2 Port and USB mouses. With technological advancements, your computer mouse will soon be more user-friendly or replaceable with the human finger. Furthermore, there have been indications that the latter is more likely to happen than the former.
Functions
As noted earlier, a computer mouse is an input device. It controls the mouse cursor, selects text and moves files and folders from one location to the other on your computer. You can also open and view data or programs using a mouse. Sometimes, a mouse is used to hover over trigger areas or objects having hover information. It is also beneficial in most computer games.
Usage
As we have suggested the importance of the mouse to a computer, one might wonder whether a computer can be used comfortable without a mouse. The answer is a big yes. There are keyboard shortcuts that activate all the functions of the mouse, and if you have mastered them, you don’t need to worry about using your computer if your mouse has broken down.
You can easily set and enable mouse keys on your keyboard and work with that. However, it is worth noting that a mouse makes work more comfortable. Thus, unless you have a touchscreen computer, you will find it difficult to perform simple tasks such as scrolling, selecting, cutting, copying and pasting using the keyboard, especially if you have not mastered all the keyboard shortcuts. It will also be more challenging to drag and drop objects using the keyboard than using the mouse.
Future
The computer mouse is being replaced by the use of fingers in touchscreens as pointing devices in the recent days. Touchscreen computers are here with us, and we may not need a mouse in the future. The physical keyboard is also being replaced as an input device, and the computer users of the future will only need to use their fingers as a multipurpose input device.
