History of Mouse Cursors

This presentation is on the history of the mouse cursor.

The mouse was first invented by this man, Douglac C. Engelbart in the late 1960's. Later it became popularized when apple released the Macintosh in 1984.

The arrow and hand are the two dominant mouse cursors

here you can see the transition from pixelated to smooth as graphics become better over time

where did the slightly tilted mickey mouse style cursor originate?

Hypercard was a program for an old Mac OS which featured the first tilted mickey mouse hand.

The mac desktop brought some of the first realtable computer design to the home user

Of course we have to give credit where credit is due. Walt Disney created the iconic hand used in OS across the globe

The Mickey Mouse hand was probably used because its widely recognized by the world

"The open/grabbing hand cursor, though, is much older, and was designed by Susan Kare (who did most of the icons for the original Mac). MacPaint (on the original 1984 Macintosh) used it as the "pan" icon:"

these icons then changed over time to add things like countdown animation

classic mac cursors

additional mac cursor functions

evolution of Mac OS cursors

why is the mouse pointer not straight as depicted here?

as you can see when you naturally point to something on a screen with you hand, you don't point it straight forward, you point with your hand tilted.

Mac vs Windows cursors

Mac vs Windows cursors

cursors can take many forms. users often create packs for download to trick your cursors out.

cursors can take many forms. users often create packs for download to trick your cursors out.

cursors can take many forms. users often create packs for download to trick your cursors out.