Lo, on Saturday, February 17, John Galt did write: > On Sat, 17 Feb 2001, Richard Cobbe wrote: > > >Greetings, all. > > > >Over the last several months, I've been having increasing pain in my > >right wrist. A co-worker suggested that this is due to problems with > >standard mice and recommended that I try a trackball instead. > > Look at the Mouse Systems one--3" diameter ball... Logitech makes a good > one as well, but I'd go with a larger ball with RSI injuries: some of > the movement can be pushed back up the arm...
Well, I tried to look at that, but it would appear that Mouse Systems has gone out of business. The mousesystems.com domain is up for sale, at least. > >* I'm using potato and kernel 2.2.18, so I'd need a PS/2 connector. > > ?! I've used various kernels/Debian distributions and NEVER got limited > to just a ps/2 mouse. In fact, I was prevented FROM using a ps/2 mouse > oftener than I should've, but never had issues with a good old fashioned > serial. Sorry, I wasn't clear. I wrote this just after I'd browsed through the offerings at the local MicroCenter---I think you'd be hard-pressed to *find* a new serial mouse or trackball, so I hadn't even considered that possibility. I meant PS/2 as opposed to USB. Serial would be fine, but I don't know that anybody actually sells those any more. (My current mouse is a PS/2, and I've never had any difficulties with it, at least under X.) > >* the ball should be under my fingers, not my thumb, as it generates the > > most pain. > > Again, go with a 3" or larger trackball. The larger the ball, the less > often you're wrist is going to move. Remember the old Centipede > trackballs that you used your palm to control because they were so big? If I can find one, great. That may be difficult. > Have you considered a touchpad? Cirque and Synaptics are well supported. > You can actually use a touchpad without any wrist movement at all... Touchpads are certainly worth consideration. However, getting one looks to be a bit tricky. If www.synaptics.com is correct, they sell primarily to OEMs, not end users---all their product descriptions have pictures of PCBs. Cirque (www.cirque.com) seems to sell to end-users, but none of theirs have 3 buttons. :-( Thanks for your advice, Richard