Back when I was a bona fide CAD monkey, I had carpal tunnel like the rest of us. After successfully convincing my employer that they needed to ditch the mice and get Wacom tablets, the wrist pain went away.
For intensive work, the pen is such a superior form factor to the mouse that Swedish company Penclic melded the two to create a new type of input device. It looks a little strange—something like a pen sitting in an inkwell—but that hasn’t stopped it from being nominated for “Best Work Environment Product” by the Swedish award of the same name. “The nomination…presents an excellent opportunity to increase awareness about our device’s many advantages over the traditional mouse, both ergonomically and precision-wise,” said Penclic CEO Stina Wahlqvist.
The Penclic mouse’s ergonomic benefits are achieved by eliminating the need for the unnatural, twirling arm movements associated with traditional mice. The pen-shaped design extends the body’s natural movements, allowing the user to work with the underarm kept linear, in a rested, flat position against the work surface.
But the advantages go beyond ergonomics. The device not only looks, feels and moves like a pen, but it also has a pen-like grip that provides a level of precision that makes it well-suited for demanding creative tasks such as photography, design and architecture. Advanced technology in combination with the ergonomic design delivers fast and precise cursor movements with minimal effort and hand motion.
The scroll wheel placement doesn’t seem ideal—as you can see in the vid, when she uses the wheel, the base moves around a bit, which I can see causing havoc with fine-point navigation—but I’m still looking forward to trying one of these out.
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