Definition: mouse

Source: WordNet (r) 1.7

mouse
     n 1: any of numerous small rodents typically resembling
          diminutive rats having pointed snouts and small ears on
          elongated bodies with slender usually hairless tails
     2: a hand-operated electronic device that moves the cursor on a
        computer screen
     v 1: to go stealthily or furtively: "..stead of sneaking around
          spying on the neighbor's house" [syn: sneak, creep,
          steal, pussyfoot]
     2: manipulate the mouse of a computer

Source: Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913)

Mouse \Mouse\, v. i. [imp. & p. p. Moused; p. pr. & vb. n.
   Mousing.]
   1. To watch for and catch mice.

   2. To watch for or pursue anything in a sly manner; to pry
      about, on the lookout for something.

Mouse \Mouse\ (mous), n.; pl. Mice (m[imac]s). [OE. mous, mus,
   AS. m[=u]s, pl. m[=y]s; akin to D. muis, G. maus, OHG. &
   Icel. m[=u]s, Dan. muus, Sw. mus, Russ. muishe, L. mus, Gr.
   my^s, Skr. m[=u]sh mouse, mush to steal. [root]277. Cf.
   Muscle, Musk.]
   1. (Zo["o]l.) Any one of numerous species of small rodents
      belonging to the genus Mus and various related genera of
      the family Murid[ae]. The common house mouse (Mus
      musculus) is found in nearly all countries. The American
      white-footed, or deer, mouse (Hesperomys leucopus)
      sometimes lives in houses. See Dormouse, Meadow mouse,
      under Meadow, and Harvest mouse, under Harvest.

Mouse \Mouse\, v. t.
   1. To tear, as a cat devours a mouse. [Obs.] ``[Death]
      mousing the flesh of men.'' --Shak.

   2. (Naut.) To furnish with a mouse; to secure by means of a
      mousing. See Mouse, n., 2.

Source: The Free On-line Dictionary of Computing (2003-OCT-10)

Mouse

   A mighty small macro language developed by Peter Grogono in
   1975.

   ["Mouse, A Language for Microcomputers", P. Grogono
   <<a href="mailto:grogono@concour.cs.concordia.ca">grogono@concour.cs.concordia.ca> Petrocelli Books, 1983].

   (1994-10-31)

mouse

   <hardware, graphics> The most commonly used computer pointing
   device, first introduced by Douglas Engelbart in 1968.
   The mouse is a device used to manipulate an on-screen
   pointer that's normally shaped like an arrow.  With the
   mouse in hand, the computer user can select, move, and change
   items on the screen.

   A conventional roller-ball mouse is slid across the surface
   of the desk, often on a mouse mat.  As the mouse moves, a
   ball set in a depression on the underside of the mouse rolls
   accordingly.  The ball is also in contact with two small
   shafts set at right angles to each other inside the mouse.
   The rotating ball turns the shafts, and sensors inside the
   mouse measure the shafts' rotation.  The distance and
   direction information from the sensors is then transmitted to
   the computer, usually through a connecting wire - the mouse's
   "tail".  The computer then moves the mouse pointer on the
   screen to follow the movements of the mouse.  This may be done
   directly by the graphics adaptor, but where it involves the
   processor the task should be assigned a high priority to
   avoid any perceptible delay.

   Some mice are contoured to fit the shape of a person's right
   hand, and some come in left-handed versions.  Other mice are
   symmetrical.

   Included on the mouse are usually two or three buttons that
   the user may press, or click, to initiate various actions such
   as running programs or opening files.  The left-most
   button (the primary mouse button) is operated with the index
   finger to select and activate objects represented on the
   screen.  Different operating systems and graphical user
   interfaces have different conventions for using the other
   button(s).  Typical operations include calling up a
   context-sensitive menu, modifying the selection, or pasting
   text.  With fewer mouse buttons these require combinations of
   mouse and keyboard actions.  Between its left and right
   buttons, a mouse may also have a wheel that can be used for
   scrolling or other special operations defined by the software.
   Some systems allow the mouse button assignments to be swapped
   round for left-handed users.

   Just moving the pointer across the screen with the mouse
   typically does nothing (though some CAD systems respond to
   patterns of mouse movement with no buttons pressed).
   Normally, the pointer is positioned over something on the
   screen (an icon or a menu item), and the user then clicks
   a mouse button to actually affect the screen display.

   The five most common "gestures" performed with the mouse are:
   point (to place the pointer over an on-screen item), click
   (to press and release a mouse button), double-click to
   press and release a mouse button twice in rapid succession,
   right-click (to press and release the right mouse button},
   and drag (to hold down the mouse button while moving the
   mouse).

   Most modern computers include a mouse as standard equipment.
   However, some systems, especially portable laptop and
   notebook models, may have a trackball, touchpad or
   Trackpoint on or next to the keyboard.  These input
   devices work like the mouse, but take less space and don't
   need a desk.

   Many other alternatives to the conventional roller-ball mouse
   exist.  A tailless mouse, or hamster, transmits its
   information with infrared impulses.  A foot-controlled
   mouse is one used on the floor
   underneath the desk.  An optical mouse uses a
   light-emitting diode and photocells instead of a rolling
   ball to track its position.  Some optical designs may require
   a special mouse mat marked with a grid, others, like the
   Microsoft IntelliMouse Explorer, work on nearly any surface.

   Yahoo!.

   http://peripherals.about.com/library/weekly/aa041498.htm.

   PC Guide's "Troubleshooting Mice".

   (1999-07-21)

MOUSE, n.  An animal which strews its path with fainting women.  As in
Rome Christians were thrown to the lions, so centuries earlier in
Otumwee, the most ancient and famous city of the world, female
heretics were thrown to the mice.  Jakak-Zotp, the historian, the only
Otumwump whose writings have descended to us, says that these martyrs
met their death with little dignity and much exertion.  He even
attempts to exculpate the mice (such is the malice of bigotry) by
declaring that the unfortunate women perished, some from exhaustion,
some of broken necks from falling over their own feet, and some from
lack of restoratives.  The mice, he avers, enjoyed the pleasures of
the chase with composure.  But if "Roman history is nine-tenths
lying," we can hardly expect a smaller proportion of that rhetorical
figure in the annals of a people capable of so incredible cruelty to a
lovely women; for a hard heart has a false tongue.

Source: Easton's 1897 Bible Dictionary

Mouse
   Heb. 'akhbar, "swift digger"), properly the dormouse, the
   field-mouse (1 Sam. 6:4). In Lev. 11:29, Isa. 66:17 this word is
   used generically, and includes the jerboa (Mus jaculus), rat,
   hamster (Cricetus), which, though declared to be unclean
   animals, were eaten by the Arabs, and are still eaten by the
   Bedouins. It is said that no fewer than twenty-three species of
   this group ('akhbar=Arab. ferah) of animals inhabit Palestine.
   God "laid waste" the people of Ashdod by the terrible visitation
   of field-mice, which are like locusts in their destructive
   effects (1 Sam. 6:4, 11, 18). Herodotus, the Greek historian,
   accounts for the destruction of the army of Sennacherib (2 Kings
   19:35) by saying that in the night thousands of mice invaded the
   camp and gnawed through the bow-strings, quivers, and shields,
   and thus left the Assyrians helpless. (See SENNACHERIB.)