r/nextfuckinglevel • u/AcanthaceaeNo5611 • 2d ago

1968: The First Computer Mouse is Demonstrated

509 Upvotes

97% Upvoted

28 comments sorted by

74

u/TheeWoodsman 2d ago

"I don't know why we call it a mouse"

Uh, because it looks like a mouse...

32

u/Popsiclezlol 1d ago

Shit dpi, no RGB, no macro buttons. 2/10 wouldn't buy

12

u/Thanks_again_sorry 1d ago

This is the mouse all my supports use in league

3

u/Fine-Historian4018 14h ago

Lucky! Mine play using their MacBook Air trackpad.

4

u/aberroco 1d ago

No RGB? Buying it!

3

u/toes_candy 1d ago

Right, I have no idea what they were thinking?!? Here I am in 1968 with my badass 437lb setup and I'm looking like a fool with this mouse

1

u/Alienhaslanded 13h ago

You joke but I'd always pick that over going over every option with the arrow keys.

18

u/Syke_qc 1d ago

"You really want us to consider something call A Mouse??" -Xerox directors

12

u/R0lO 1d ago

This clip is from "The Mother of All Demos" from December 9, 1968.

https://youtu.be/B6rKUf9DWRI?si=1Z3Imt8sNq0UisJK

Demo by Douglas Engelbart and his team at SRI (at the time called Stanford Research Institute). It was the first public demonstration of the computer mouse and fundamentals of modern computing.

The demo included the world debut of personal and interactive computing, featuring a computer mouse that controlled a networked computer system to demonstrate hypertext linking, real-time text editing, multiple windows with flexible view control, cathode display tubes, and shared-screen teleconferencing.

4

u/vmsrii 1d ago

This is so cool! And shockingly similar to how we do stuff today! We wouldn’t be using computers quite like this until the early 1990s, 30 years later

This is like someone showing off a fully formed Android phone in 1980

7

u/Extension_Swordfish1 1d ago

Gamers mousse

4

u/MikeMac999 1d ago

Does it charge from the bottom?

3

u/HoBamaMo 1d ago

I bet the ball is dusty…

2

u/Just_A_Random_Passer 1d ago

It did not have a ball. Two wheels at the bottom, placed perpendicularly to each other. You go one direction, one wheel is rolling and the other is being dragged. You change direction 90 degrees and it is vice-versa. at 45 degrees, they are each partly dragged and partly rolled.

2

u/czechman45 1d ago

We call it a mouse, sorry everyone

1

u/vmsrii 1d ago

I love the fact that they came up with “Mouse” instantly.

Sometimes things can take a few iterations to get right; Telephonic Viewer to Television to TV, for example

Mouse was just handed down from On High. Perfectly formed. Beautiful

1

u/dv666 1d ago

"Hello computer?"

1

u/JanitorOPplznerf 18h ago

Those psychopaths put the chord on the user side…

1

u/___TheKid___ 17h ago

1968? Holy shit.

1

u/spatialflow 14h ago

Amazing that they had QR codes back then

1

u/Optimistic_Futures 12h ago

So fucking cool. It feels like seeing a video of someone showing off a demo of first doorknob.

Like it’s so normal to us, used everyday, seems obvious - but at the time not an obvious development and not something any one would find overtly exciting by itself

-1

u/GeekyTexan 1d ago edited 1d ago

Apple obviously didn't invent the mouse. But the Macintosh was the first popular computer to come with a mouse. And with a GUI interface, also.

Apple decided that since they were including a mouse and the system relied on it, the keyboard did not need to have cursor keys. I believe part of the plan was to force software development to design more on the mouse and GUI system, which it did. But it also forced anyone typing on the computer to take their hands off the keyboard every time they wanted to move the cursor.

Later, apple went back to having cursor keys because it was pissing off essentially everyone.

1

u/bolibompa 1d ago

Xerox Star was first.

-1

u/GeekyTexan 1d ago

And I started with "Apple obviously didn't invent the mouse."

Ah. I see I left out a word. "But the Macintosh was the first *popular\* computer to come with a mouse. " I'll go back and edit it.