Touch Mouse - Technology Supporting My Laziness

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by Heather Rakauskas 

I recently discovered a clever iPhone application called Touch Mouse by Logitech that turns an iPhone or iPod Touch into a wireless mouse and keyboard for any computer on your wireless network. At the office, I can earn some geek points by using this application to control PowerPoint presentations.  At home, I no longer have to get up from the couch to navigate Hulu and Netflix even though my TV and computer are across the room. This is a great example of how technology can be used to both support productivity and laziness!

Setup

The setup process was extremely easy and quick.

1. Go to www.logitech.com/touchmouse.
2. Download and install the Touch Mouse Server application to your computer (XP, Vista, Windows 7, Mac OSX).
3. On your iPhone or iPod Touch, go to the App Store and download the Touch Mouse application.
4. Note: Both devices must be on the same wireless network.
5. Open the application on your computer.
6. Open the application on your iPhone or iPod Touch.
7. Your computer should appear in the list, select it, and you are ready to use your phone as a wireless mouse and keyboard! See Figure 1.

Figure 1: Touch Mouse start-up screen.

Using the Mouse

How To:

• After selecting your computer, you will see the interface below. See Figure 2.
• Interacting with the mouse is fairly easy and straight forward.
  • Press on the Left, Center, or Right buttons as you would on a physical mouse.
  • Press one finger on the screen to point or select.
  • Move one finger around on the screen to move the mouse.
  • Drag two fingers along the screen to scroll (vertically or horizontally).
  • Press the Left button and move one finger around on the screen at the same time to drag an item.

The Good:

• The interface is very simple and maps well to physical mouse controls.
• For the most part, the mouse control is smooth and fairly accurate.
• Because it works over Wi-Fi, it can work at great distances. Therefore, you can be across the room and still be able to control the mouse on your computer. You also don’t have to worry about anything (e.g., furniture) getting in the way of a signal.
• You can use the mouse in portrait or landscape mode. See Figure 3.

The Not-so-good:

• Accuracy is not 100%. You may have to move your finger around on the screen a bit to get the mouse to exactly where you want. Difficulty is most noticeable when trying to access a small target, of course.
• There is potential for accidental clicks. If you are not deliberate in moving your finger across the mouse pad, your gesture may be interpreted as a click instead. It would be nice if you could turn this off because it is just as easy to click or select something by pressing the Left mouse button.
• While only a few key gestures are supported, there is no help if a user did not read the instructions for use online when installing the application onto their computer. Therefore, they may have missed key gestures such as scrolling (two fingers).

Figure 2: Touch Mouse mouse interface.

Figure 3: Touch Mouse mouse interface in landscape.

Using the Keyboard

How To:

• Press the keyboard icon to bring up the keyboard. See Figure 4.
• You can still use the mouse in the dark grey area while the keyboard is maximized.
• When not using the mouse, the dark grey area is used to show a preview of your text.
• Press they keyboard icon again to minimize the keyboard.

The Good:

• Typing is very responsive.
• The keyboard can be used in both portrait and landscape mode. See Figure 5.
• There is a preview of what you are typing. See Figures 6 and 7.
• Control, Alt, and Windows buttons are available.

The Not-so-good:

• Apple keyboard functionality is not supported which makes typing somewhat cumbersome. Specifically:
  • There is no auto-correction.
  • CAPS lock does not work consistently with the iPhone keyboard. Pressing the shift button once should only capitalize the first letter and then resume lowercase for subsequent letters. However, both the single press and double press of the Shift key function the same as CAPS lock.
  • There is no auto capitalization.
  • Double pressing the space bar does not insert a period.
• While you can see a preview of your typing, you can only see about two to three words at a time when in portrait mode. It would be nice if you could reduce the font size so you could see more characters. This would be good for entering longer URLs or longer search terms. The application can be used in landscape mode, which allows you to see more of a preview. However, in landscape mode the mouse pad area is much smaller though, so there is a trade-off. See Figures 6 and 7.
• There are no Tab or arrow keys.

Figure 4: Touch Mouse keyboard interface.

Figure 5: Keyboard interface in landscape mode.

Figure 6: Keyboard interface with text preview.

Figure 7: Keyboard interface with text preview in landscape mode.

Settings

The Good:

• There are advanced settings similar to those you would find when using any wireless mouse or keyboard. See Figure 8.

The Not-so-good:

• You can only use this application on Wi-Fi, which is okay for most purposes. (However, if you are planning to use this when giving a PowerPoint presentation, both your computer and iPhone must be on the same Wi-Fi network.)
• Two users cannot be connected to the application at once. So if another iPhone user signs on, then the first person can no longer control the mouse. War of the remote… er, mouse!

Figure 8: Touch Mouse Settings.

Summary

There is a coolness factor associated with the fact that you can wirelessly control your mouse and keyboard on your computer using your phone. Despite some minor usability issues with mouse accuracy and keyboard functionality, this application is a potentially great solution to controlling your computer from afar.

Best of all, did I mention this application is FREE?!  You can access the application here.

There are a handful of other similar applications out there that I may have to try out just to compare!

 

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