Optimoz, StrokeIt
While developers are still awaiting the backing of a major funder, the technology is quickly evolving beyond its perfunctory roots. Andy Edmonds, a programmer who helped create the Optimoz project in Mozilla, said the project owes its inspiration to Opera.
But he said the project has since branched out in new directions aimed at harnessing specific features in the Mozilla browser, such as tabs, which allow better management of multiple browser windows.
In addition, he said, Optimoz is being extended to other Mozilla-based applications, such as chat and mail, and work has begun on creating a general API (application programming interface) for gestures in Mozilla-based applications.
"We extended our function set well beyond the Opera set early on," he said. "My favorite gesture requires a karate game-like 'finishing move.'
By dragging over a set of links and finishing with right-up-left, all of the links will be opened in a new window. There's also Easter egg gestures hidden in the code" that reveal hidden features if users know the correct movements.
The development team is working on a learning component that will assist users as they try to master the mouse gestures vocabulary, Edmonds said.
One aspect of this will entail a translucent overlay of command strokes that can be called up and used as a legend. A second, interactive feature could involve a pie-chart menu that opens around the cursor and acts as a guide to direct the mouse movement.
Still, he said, inherent limitations in gestures will likely limit its usefulness outside of a handful of commonly used commands, as long as mouse developers remain stuck in a two-dimensional universe.
With the advent of 3D environments on the PC screen and the ability to simulate 3D manipulations with new generations of mice, however, he predicted gestures could become increasingly powerful.
That thought was seconded by representatives from Logitech, who said 3D CAD programs seem to be a natural fit for the technology.
"It might be very useful for designers who need to see an object from all sides, and turn them in virtual space," a spokesman said. Other attempts are under way to extend mouse gestures beyond the browser.
Jeffrey Doozan, founder of Kalamazoo, Mich.-based security and software consulting firm TCB Networks, has created a mouse gesture engine for Microsoft's Windows operating system called StrokeIt that is meant to provide general controls across any application running on the OS.
A sampling of plug-ins on his Web site shows varying implementations of command definitions for applications including the popular Kazaa file-swapping client, America Online's AIM instant messenger, Internet Explorer, Outlook Express and Windows Media player.
Doozan said he developed the gesture to be versatile and he gave users a roadmap for assigning their own commands to specific movements, including macros.
As a result, he said, his gesture engine has the potential to become a powerful, programmable automation tool for day-to-day activities as well as specific tasks such as data entry.
"StrokeIt has the ability to automate practically anything," he said, listing off examples from submissions recently posted to his Web forum. "Whenever you give people the ability to come up with arbitrary commands, they'll come up with something you never even thought of."
While it's unclear whether consumers will embrace the efforts to extend and improve the capabilities of the mouse, they have the endorsement of the device's inventor.
Doug Engelbart, director of nonprofit Bootstrap Institute, said in an interview that he was unfamiliar with mouse gestures, but he applauded the efforts of its developers, saying an overhaul of the standard point-and-click interface is overdue.
"To me, that's like Pidgin English: point and grunt," he said. "It's a very limited vocabulary. The way you're controlling the interface wants to be richer than it is now."
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