Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site hp-pcd.UUCP Path: utzoo!linus!philabs!seismo!hao!hplabs!hp-pcd!hp-dcd!donn From: donn@hp-dcd.UUCP Newsgroups: net.micro Subject: Re: Orphaned Response - (nf) Message-ID: <1295@hp-pcd.UUCP> Date: Thu, 7-Jul-83 03:29:26 EDT Article-I.D.: hp-pcd.1295 Posted: Thu Jul 7 03:29:26 1983 Date-Received: Fri, 8-Jul-83 04:47:04 EDT Sender: netnews@hp-pcd.UUCP Organization: Hewlett-Packard, Corvallis OR Lines: 29 #R:mit-eddi:0:hp-dcd:16700001:37777777600:1085 hp-dcd!donn Jul 5 20:31:00 1983 I agree that the conventional light pen is a nightmare. What I simply don't understand is why the manufactuers havn't figured out that a pistol grip is 'the right answer'. I don't follow the field as closely as I did 5 years ago, but everyone I knew of at the time made light pens in the shape of a pen (more or less). At the time I was using an Imlac with a light pen that used fiber optics to take the light to a photomultiplier. It had lenses and everything. It was heavy (but would track a crosshair at 2 feet from the screen with the glare screen off!) and clumsy. We had a little box machined and mounted the switch as a trigger in a pistol configuration (and used a larger button on the switch). It was infinitely better than the old configuration. At the time there was even one of those 'how we spent your bucks' movies on computer graphics where whoever was doing it said that they had done about the same thing, only mounted it in a squirt gun body! I still don't see pistol grip light pens. Why? Donn Terry ..[ucbvax]!hplabs!hp-dcd!donn ...csu-cs!hp-dcd!donn