18 programmable buttons. E-I-G-H-T-E-E-N! Forget the 512k of flash memory, analog Xbox 360-style joystick, basic scroll wheel and whatever-else-is-in-there.
Open Office 18 Button Mouse
The OpenOfficeMouse, or OOMouse, isn’t exactly the most attractive piece of hardware, but its creator claims that 16 buttons divided into two 8-button halves were the maximum number of buttons that could be efficiently used by feel alone. They’ve set up profiles to make the OOMouse work with WoW, 3D Studio Max, Firefox, and many others — including, of course, the whole OpenOffice suite.
With a revolutionary and patented design featuring 18 buttons, an analog joystick, and support for as many as 52 key commands, the OpenOfficeMouse is intended to provide a faster and more efficient user interface for OpenOffice.org applications such as Writer and Calc than the conventional icons, pull-down menus, and hotkeys presently permit.
The OpenOfficeMouse is one of the first computer mice to incorporate an analog joystick and the first to permit the use of the joystick as a keyboard. In the three joystick-as-keyboard modes, the user can assign up to sixteen different keys or macros to the joystick, which provides for easy movement regardless of whether the user is flying through the cells of a large spreadsheet in Calc or on the back of an epic flying mount in World of Warcraft. It is also the first hardware to be permitted to make use of the OpenOffice.org brand in the nine-year history of the OpenOffice.org Community.
The OpenOfficeMouse supports Windows, Linux, and Macintosh operating systems and will retail for $74.99.
