Xref: utzoo comp.misc:7714 comp.cog-eng:1490
Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!clyde.concordia.ca!uunet!snorkelwacker!usc!samsung!think!Think.COM!barmar
From: barmar@Think.COM
Newsgroups: comp.misc,comp.cog-eng
Subject: Re: Multi-button mice (Re: Xerox sues Apple!)
Message-ID: <32329@news.Think.COM>
Date: 18 Dec 89 23:29:39 GMT
References: <172@comcon.UUCP> <7326@ficc.uu.net> <9320@hoptoad.uucp> <1989Dec18.081450.28019@psuvax1.cs.psu.edu> <2253@dataio.Data-IO.COM>
Sender: news@Think.COM
Followup-To: comp.misc
Organization: Thinking Machines Corporation, Cambridge MA
Lines: 52

In article <2253@dataio.Data-IO.COM> aez@dataio.Data-IO.COM () writes:
>In article <1989Dec18.081450.28019@psuvax1.cs.psu.edu> flee@shire.cs.psu.edu (Felix Lee) writes:
>>A partial fix is to use visual cues.  Label the buttons on the screen
>I worked on a project between MIT and Harris-ATD that tried this. It
>was called Schema (no not the PC-based schematic editor) and we were
>building CAE applications for the Symbolics Computer.

Just thought I'd point out that the "mouse documentation line" on the
screen is a standard feature of MIT-derived Lisp Machines (including those
from Symbolics), not something that was invented for this project.  Three
years ago Symbolics spruced up the Lisp Machine UIMS, adding the ability to
use chord keys with mouse buttons, and that's when they added the feature
where the documentation line changes depending on which shift keys are
being pressed (they added a second line that lists which shift keys may be
used with the mouse in its present context).

>The Symbolics had a three-button mouse and software scannable control 
>keys on the keyboard (control, meta, hyper, super, [shift counted as
>a double click]).

Please use the present tense when referring to Symbolics workstations.
Symbolics is still very much alive.

>The system also
>accepted chords like control-hyper, hyper-meta-super ....
>The effect was that each mouse key would provide 16 functions. 

Since there are five chord keys (shift, control, meta, super, and hyper),
each mouse button could provide 32 functions.  Just because shift is
equivalent to double click is no reason not to include it as a separate
function (it would be wrong to count BOTH shift and double-click, but you
included neither).

>What I would like to know is if there is anybody else that has used
>such a mouse-keyboard scheme in a system (we built the system but it
>did not get into general use).

Every current Symbolics workstation user has used such a system, since it
is used throughout the Symbolics software.

>P.S. Most of the work was started by Richard Zippel who I last heard
>was working for Symbolics. If he is on the net, I hope that my explanation
>of buckey keys agrees with yours.

Well, at least I now know where the nickname "bucky keys" for multiple
chording keys comes from.


Barry Margolin, Thinking Machines Corp.

barmar@think.com
{uunet,harvard}!think!barmar