An interesting new patent has been filed which rather innovatively embeds a computer mouse function inside a cellphone. This would enable a person using a laptop computer when traveling to switch their mobile phone into acting as a standard optical mouse - finally getting rid of the need for the touchpad on laptops that many find difficult to use.
We would expect that the phone would connect via bluetooth to the laptop computer, but interestingly - the patent doesn't cover that - covering only infrared, cable or cellular network connections.
Naturally, a mouse-phone will need to large paddle buttons for clicking, and these could easily double up as the call and end call buttons.
There have been patents in the past that embedded a mouse function into a handset for manipulating a phone menu, but this seems to be the first we have seen that turns an entire handset in a PC style mouse.
The patent reference is: US 2005/0007343 A1"
Posted to the site on 27th January 2005
Posted to: www.cellular-news.com/story/11822.php