Technology

I don't think mice were a mistake, but they're worse for most of the tasks I do. I'm a software engineer and I suck at art, so I just need to write, compile, and test code.

There are some things a mouse is way better for:

• drawing (well, a drawing tablet is better)
• 3d modeling
• editing photos
• first person shooters (KB works fine for OG Doom though)
• bulk file operations (a decent KB interface could work though)

But for almost everything else, I prefer a keyboard.

And while we're on a tangent, I hate WASD, why shift my fingers over from the normal home row position? It should be ESDF, which feels way more natural...

It's also an age thing. My visual processing is getting worse and worse. My disorientation facing a busy screen with literally thousands of objects that can be interacted with by mouse is a cognitive drain compared to a textual interface where I do most of the work abstractly without having to use visual processing at all. Like reading a book vs watching a movie.

I probably have a lot more experience using pre-mouse era computers than most people. It's like being asked to start using a different language when you are 20. Yeah, you'll become perfectly fluent for a couple decades... but you'll also lose that language first when you get old.

I have noticed that millenials navigate multilayer mouse interfaces (like going down a few chained drop down menus) way faster than I ever did. And zoomers use touch screen keyboards almost as well as I ever touchtyped. Brains are only plastic to a degree, and it just plain feels good to use all those neurons that you first laid down when you were young and your mind was infinite.

Hey they made new technology where you can just yell at the computer and it'll understand 60% of what you're saying.

I kept every mouse ball I ever obtained and display them in my china cabinet.

I feel your pain and irrelevancy with crystalline clarity. The world isn't interested in doing things the right way, or even in a good way; consumers are too perversely enthralled by capital's interests. I kind of hate that computers ever became a consumer good.

Yes, the mouse is useful in many situations (esp 3d modeling), so I don't think anyone is arguing that it shouldn't exist.

The problem, however, is that we've standardized on it for everything, to the point where software often ignores a better KB-driven workflow because the mouse one is good enough. "When all you have is a hammer..."

We've prioritized "intuitive" over "efficient." There's nothing wrong with learning to properly use a tool, and it's sad that we don't expect users to put in that modicum of effort. In the 80s and 90s, that's just how things were, you either learn the tools (often with a handbook) or you don't use them. The net result was a populace that didn't need support as much, because they were used to reading the docs. If a component died, the docs would tell you how to diagnose and fix it. These days, those docs just don't exist, so if the solution isn't intuitive, you replace it (both hardware and software).

That's where this frustration comes from. Making things intuitive also means reducing the average person's understanding of their tools, and the mouse is a symptom of that shift.

I have no idea what you mean by "fell out of favour". Does your keyboard not have pips on F and J? People still touch type. Dunno what to tell you.

You're getting hung up on "home row". You still have to move your hand from the keyboard to the mouse and back. It's the same problem, whether or not you know how to type well and stare at your hands, except now you have to add steps for "look at the screen" and "look back at your hands".