GB2447451A - Flywheels giving inertial effects for a computer mouse ball - Google Patents

Abstract

The invention relates to the addition of a flywheel to each orthogonal cylinder driven by the ball of a mechanical computer mouse or to other mechanical sprite-driving mechanism. By way of the flywheels, the transfer of energy between linear and angular kinetic energy may be used to give the computer mouse a feel of mass or inertia. Cogs may connect the cylinders to the flywheels, and effects may be fine-tuned with an electric motor.

Description

MASSIVE MOUSE

Eveiyone who uses a computer is familiar with a computer mouse. There are a number of different technologies behind the design of computer mice but they are all aimed at transmitting to the computer information pertaining to the position and motion of the mouse (as well as the states of the buttons and wheel). The infonnation pertaining to mouse position and movement is generally used to establish the position and movement of a cursor or sprite' on the user's computer screen. No information is communicated back to the user via the mouse itself. A computer mouse has no direct feedback mechanism.

In reality, moving an object around requires a force, and by Newton's laws there would be an equal and opposite force exerted by the object on the mover. This is not the case in virtual space where a sprite is essentially massless. It has no mechanical inertia and therefore may be moved without a material force and without an inertial response.

The invention outlined here relates to a modification of the traditional computer mouse. The modification may be understood by way of a comparison with a child's mechanical toy car.

Most children's toys of 50 years ago had no built-in electronics, yet some still had significant elements of virtual reality. I had a working model steam engine, for example. One common device was a flywheel attached via cogs to the wheels of a toy car. Appropriate cogs allowed one to force the flywheel into rapid motion by dragging the car's wheels smartly along the floor.

Releasing the car when the flywheel was in motion enabled the car to travel considerable distances not otherwise possible without this inertial force behind it. Essentially it made the car appear to be quite massive in response to the starting force as well as in response to the frictional stopping forces.

imagine a mechanical computer mouse is built like such a child's mechanical car. The ball inside the mouse drives two orthogonal cylinders. Imagine these cylinders were connected via cogs to two separate flywheels. Pushing this mouse along a table-top would take some effort to get it moving. It would then continue to move by itself by extracting energy from the flywheels, until eventually it would come to rest due to frictional forces or due to user intervention.

The effect of this is to make the sprite feel massive. Moving it would require noticeable effort and stopping it would also demand noticeable effort from the hand gripping the mouse. This would give the sprite an element of tangible reality not otherwise present.

Further control using electric motors and gears to alter properties and states of the flywheels could be added to effect fine-tuning of specific effects such as gravitational attraction, resistance from barriers and feedback from collisions as seen on screen.

Claims (1)

1. CLAIM

   By attaching, through cogs or otherwise, relatively massive flywheels to the cylinders on each axis of a mouse's driving motion mechanism, it is possible to give an impression of inertial mass to objects on screen, making it possible to convey plausible tangible virtual reality feedback to a computer user directly via the mouse.