Despite my diversity in mice I still have a sore shoulder and hand. Anything which helps is welcome so I added a small Wacom drawing tablet. Pen input on a tablet PC works very well, pen input to my desktop is worth the try. The physical implementation of the device was somewhat disappointing, the Wacom thing is built as cheap as possible. Very light and only two out of the four feet are rubber. As a result the thing is somewhat slippery. But works. The pen is a reasonable substitute for the mouse. Clicking is a tap, double clicking is two taps. Works without a problem, just like the tablet PC pen you can adjust the tolerance in the distance of the two taps.

To right-click there is a button on the pen. This is imho flawed by design. When you want to right click something you first point at it, then you finger has to find the button after which you click it. While finding the button your hand is most likely to move. As a result you're pointing at something else and will right-click that. A real tablet PC recognizes the click and hold action. Press something with the pen, like you want to drag it, but don't move the tip. After a short (again configurable) amount of time has passed the action is considered a right-click. The tablet does give a clear visual feedback:

when the circle of dots is complete the mouse picture pops up. Works like a charm: press, hold, ready.

The combination of a tablet and a desktop does not feel quite like a tablet yet. Attaching the (external) tablet to the tablet PC is quite another story. More on that in an upcoming post.

Peter