5 ms·

People have been putting Blackberry trackballs on QMK builds for quite a while. I'm odd - what I want is a stupidly big trackball, like 4 inches across or so.

by fidotron 10mo ago

People have been putting Blackberry trackballs on QMK builds for quite a while. I'm odd - what I want is a stupidly big trackball, like 4 inches across or so. And it should be able to detect rotation about the vertical axis. It infuriates me how optical tracking systems are designed to provide just translation and no rotation when there's a whole other DoF in play.

cfraenkel 10mo ago
You think you do. The issue is it's just about impossible to isolate translation from rotation. You would always be doing just a little rotating every time you touched the ball, whether you wanted to or not. And any time you tried 'rotating', you'd also be moving the cursor. 6DOF devices have been done (ie https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpaceOrb_360 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpaceOrb_360 or https://www.computinghistory.org.uk/det/12416/Logitech-Cyberman/ https://www.computinghistory.org.uk/det/12416/Logitech-Cyber...). They're sorta fun to use (at first) in CAD for browsing 3D models, but never caught on as once you get good at the CAD UIs, the extra degrees of freedom get in the way more than they help.
- GuinansEyebrows 10mo ago
  rotation works pretty well for scrolling on the kensington slimblade with a little bit of getting-used-to. when it detects rotation, it stops moving the cursor.
GuinansEyebrows 10mo ago
yeah, it drives me a little crazy that the only trackball that supports rotation is the Kensington Slimblade. I'd love to try a ploopy or something else out there, because i don't otherwise particularly like the slimblade (especially the software and the industrial design - ugly!) but i can't give up rotational scrolling. it's so much better than scroll wheels or scroll-mode buttons once you get the hang of it.
vunderba 10mo ago
My family had one of the Microsoft EasyBall's growing up - that thing was absolutely huge. https://imgur.com/a/Bu6aiUU https://imgur.com/a/Bu6aiUU The only use we got out of it was as a MAME controller for Marble Madness.

cfraenkel 10mo ago

You think you do. The issue is it's just about impossible to isolate translation from rotation. You would always be doing just a little rotating every time you touched the ball, whether you wanted to or not. And any time you tried 'rotating', you'd also be moving the cursor. 6DOF devices have been done (ie https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpaceOrb_360 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpaceOrb_360 or https://www.computinghistory.org.uk/det/12416/Logitech-Cyberman/ https://www.computinghistory.org.uk/det/12416/Logitech-Cyber...). They're sorta fun to use (at first) in CAD for browsing 3D models, but never caught on as once you get good at the CAD UIs, the extra degrees of freedom get in the way more than they help.

GuinansEyebrows 10mo ago
rotation works pretty well for scrolling on the kensington slimblade with a little bit of getting-used-to. when it detects rotation, it stops moving the cursor.

GuinansEyebrows 10mo ago

yeah, it drives me a little crazy that the only trackball that supports rotation is the Kensington Slimblade. I'd love to try a ploopy or something else out there, because i don't otherwise particularly like the slimblade (especially the software and the industrial design - ugly!) but i can't give up rotational scrolling. it's so much better than scroll wheels or scroll-mode buttons once you get the hang of it.

vunderba 10mo ago

My family had one of the Microsoft EasyBall's growing up - that thing was absolutely huge. https://imgur.com/a/Bu6aiUU https://imgur.com/a/Bu6aiUU The only use we got out of it was as a MAME controller for Marble Madness.