This is an automatic mouse mover. This is an essential if you work from home and your job requires a software that monitors your mouse movements to see if you're active. The mouse mover physically moves your mouse so it is undetectable by any software that an employer may use.

If you've ever used a computer, chances are you've used a mouse. This handy little device has been a staple of computing for decades, but few people know its origin story. So how did the computer mouse come to be? Let's take a walk through history and find out.

The Birth of the Computer Mouse
The very first computer mouse was invented all the way back in 1963 by Doug Engelbart, a researcher at Stanford University. Engelbart was working on ways to improve human-computer interaction, and he realised that a hand-held pointing device would be much more effective than using a keyboard alone. He created a wooden shell with two metal wheels on the bottom, and attached it to a computer with a cord. The device was nicknamed the "X-Y position indicator for a display system." Not exactly catchy, but it did the job.

The First Commercial Mice
It wasn't until 1981 that the first commercial mouse hit store shelves. That year, Xerox released the Star 8010—a office computer that came bundled with a newfangled pointing device called the "mouse." The design of this mouse was quite similar to Engelbart's original prototype, with a few key differences. Notably, it had only one button instead of three, and swapped out Engelbart's metal wheels for rubber ones. still, it wasn't an instant hit with consumers. In fact, one reviewer called it "a five-fingered smack in face of advance[d] man-machine interface." Ouch!

The Apple Macintosh Mouse
The next major advance for the computer mouse came in 1984, when Apple released its first Macintosh computer. This machine included a new kind of mouse designed by engineer Dean Hovey. Hovey's design ditched the cord in favor of using an optical sensor to track movement, making it much more accurate than previous models. It also had a sleek new look that proved to be much more popular with consumers than Xerox's boxy design. Thanks to its association with Apple's groundbreaking Macintosh computer, this mouse quickly became iconic.

Today, mice come in all shapes and sizes—from traditional designs to wireless ergonomic models—but they all trace their roots back to Doug Engelbart's original prototype from 1963. So next time you're using your trusty old mouse to surf the web or edit a document, take a moment to think about how far this humble little pointing device has come over the last few decades.