Articles - The week that...

December 9, 1968: A presentation by Stanford Research Institute engineer Douglas Engelbart introduces the computer mouse to the world. Engelbart's first mouse (pictured here) was carved out of wood and had only one button. Underneath the mouse were two wheels connected to potentiometers to record the mouse's movement along the x and y axes. The mouse was just one part of Engelbart's vision for the future of computing; he also proposed "what you see is what you get" editing, windows, hyperlinks and other concepts which have become staples for non-academic people who use computers to aid them in the workplace and home. While the mouse was what people latched onto at the time, the gist of Engelbart's presentation was about making technology more accessible, an idea which created the foundations of personal computing.