Waking up to quite an extra-ordinary news this morning. Okay, I admit
, this is the only company I know whose launch of a mouse can be classified as “extraordinary” but those in the know how now how true it is. Apple has released Mighty Mouse and no, though the name might suggest otherwise, it is not a joint venture between the two Jobs companies (Pixar and Apple).
You just knew it would have to be something special for Apple to (finally) come up with a multi-button mouse and admit that the “more-than-one-button-confuses-users” crap was just that – crap and that it’s just that it didn’t want to introduce just another mouse. I’m sure dozens of prototypes of multi-button mice produced internally Apple during the years (you can be pretty sure they were working on it, no matter what the public line) just didn’t pass the Steve-Jobs-test-of-quality and thus never made the market. But this one obviously has and the early impressions look pretty cool I have to admit – well who am I kidding – I am a “fan boy”, of course I love it!!!
So will Apple come out with new user interface guidelines now that multi-button mouse is “official”. One of the main points of the current guidelines is that all features of an application should be accessible with left-click only. This is to ensure that a “lazy” programmer doesn’t come up with (say) a preferences pane that is accessible from the contextual menu at the main windows only and not from the menu or the toolbar. This constitutes lousy UI design according to Apple, presuming I have understood the guidelines correctly, and with some merit as well. One of the arguments given by the minority in favour of continuing with the one button mouse is that you would legitimize such bastardization of the UI (pardon my french).
Except of course I don’t see why the two need to go hand in hand. There is no need for Apple to change the UI guidelines – all features should still be accessible with a single-click only but the other button(s) just add a faster/ more convenient way. And I think that is how the guidelines will stay – guidelines which Apple itself violates every once in a while, but that’s a story for some other time.
Right now let’s sit back and soak in the fall of another Mac bastion this year – this one definitely for the good. Can’t wait to read about user experiences about the mouse – how the touch sensitive and squeeze thingys work out. I feel It’ll do just fine – think the iPod click interface which (having experienced it) is just a pleasure to use. All in all a pretty neat concept – and check out the link before you say “big deal”. Never mind, I know you’re gonna say it anyways…
One of the reviews of the mouse over at Ars. Surprisingly positive review for a guy who admits to having set out to bash it up, like they love to do over there it seems.