Hypertext is a great thing. But I hate the chording keyboard - I'm not a piano player, I have trouble doing this stuff, and I can't remember the stupid chords - and I hate the mouse - a wonderful tool for certain limited applications, way overused by programmers on the "If what you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail" principle.

What I wonder is, should I blame Englebart for this?

Yeah, I'm not keen on chording keyboards, and I'm an *accordion* player -- I'm *used* to playing chords with my right hand and navigating the 120 buttons on my left.

Chording keyboards break the Donald "Design of Everyday Things" Norman's priniciple of "keeping knowledge in the world, not the head". There's no simple way of marking a chording keyboard to show what all the possibilities are, so you have to memorize what different chords mean. Worse still, is that the chords are likely to change from application to application.

(Playing chords on a piano is a different thing entirely: each key always plays the same note, and spelling out a chord is a matter of learning music theory. Change one of the keys in the chord, and you'll still hear something related -- on a computer, changing a key in a chord could easily mean a completely unrelated command.)

As for the mouse, it's a horrible drawing tool, but I find it all right for text selection. Speaking as a user interface programmer, I'm curious as to what it is you don't like about the mouse -- what applications do you think it's suitable for, and what applications do you wish you had something else?

I remember seeing this. It's kind of freaky knowing that these technologies existed way back then. Makes one wonder what other little-known but potentially revolutionary technologies exist right in the here and now that we won't see in general use until maybe 20 or so years in the future. Anti-gravity devices? Some form of time travel (by communications means)?

Joey: Actually I'd define the mouse as a pretty good drawing tool, once one has gotten used to the odd orientation. Certainly it's better than a keyboard. And what it's really good for is picking a spot from a graphic (e.g. recentering a map) or jumping great distances on the screen (remember when the arrow and page keys were the only way to move around a text document?)

What I most hate the mouse for is its use in many programs to choose items from a list of possible commands. Most standard Windows programs now have chording alternatives (which are often such a nuisance or so hard to remember that the mouse is still easier), but there's a lot of programs out there where the only practical option is to take your hand off the keyboard and move the mouse. I miss hot keys, a fad of the early 80s which entirely vanished when GUI became fashionable. Chording only became common after a long, very painful interval, and in any case is no substitute for hot keys, which are as similar to chording as the Roman Empire was to the Holy Roman Empire.

I also hate those web pages which require either a mouse or a lot of awkward tabbing to reach an "OK" or "Submit" button. (Good for QuickTopic that it only takes one tab from the text-enter box.)

There's more, but enough ...

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