A mouse jiggler is a software used to simulate the movement of a computer mouse. [1] [2] It can also be a mechanical device moving the physical computer mouse. In all cases, it prevents sleep mode, standby mode or the screensaver from activating. Mouse jigglers are also known as mouse movers. [3]
Mechanical mouse jigglers are small devices onto which a user places their computer mouse. They work by using a full rotating platform or rotating disc underneath the mouse. The movement is subtle but enough to move the user's cursor on their screen.
Software driven mouse movers install a program on the user's machine that also moves the mouse cursor across the screen. [4]
The demand for mouse jigglers is being driven by employers or line managers indirectly monitoring their employees who are remote workers. [5] Communication applications such as Microsoft Outlook, Teams, Skype, as well as Slack show the working status for everyone within a group. The online status displays work in a traffic light system to show others within the team if someone is available, away, offline, or busy. If these applications are used through a desktop computer (instead of a mobile device), and the user doesn't interact with their mouse for a said period of time, the status will display as inactive. In terms of the traffic light system, the available status will change to inactive. This is the mechanism that provides indirect monitoring of employees. Should someone appear to be inactive or away for a lengthy period of time, it could indicate that the individual is not working. This online monitoring of remote employees is causing a trust issue [6] and employees are searching for ways to overcome the monitoring. Mouse jigglers enable users to keep their screen active while undertaking other tasks. This keeps the status set to available instead of showing a user to be inactive or away.
A computer mouse is a hand-held pointing device that detects two-dimensional motion relative to a surface. This motion is typically translated into the motion of the pointer on a display, which allows a smooth control of the graphical user interface of a computer.
The graphical user interface, or GUI, is a form of user interface that allows users to interact with electronic devices through graphical icons and audio indicators such as primary notation, instead of text-based UIs, typed command labels or text navigation. GUIs were introduced in reaction to the perceived steep learning curve of command-line interfaces (CLIs), which require commands to be typed on a computer keyboard.
A pointing device is a human interface device that allows a user to input spatial data to a computer. CAD systems and graphical user interfaces (GUI) allow the user to control and provide data to the computer using physical gestures by moving a hand-held mouse or similar device across the surface of the physical desktop and activating switches on the mouse. Movements of the pointing device are echoed on the screen by movements of the pointer and other visual changes. Common gestures are point and click and drag and drop.
A refreshable braille display or braille terminal is an electro-mechanical device for displaying braille characters, usually by means of round-tipped pins raised through holes in a flat surface. Visually impaired computer users who cannot use a standard computer monitor can use it to read text output. Deafblind computer users may also use refreshable braille displays.
Scroll Lock is a lock key on most IBM-compatible computer keyboards.
A screensaver is a computer program that blanks the display screen or fills it with moving images or patterns when the computer has been idle for a designated time. The original purpose of screensavers was to prevent phosphor burn-in on CRT or plasma computer monitors. Though most modern monitors are not susceptible to this issue, screensaver programs are still used for other purposes. Screensavers are often set up to offer a basic layer of security by requiring a password to re-access the device. Some screensaver programs also use otherwise-idle computer resources to do useful work, such as processing for volunteer computing projects.
A touchpad or trackpad is a type of pointing device. Its largest component is a tactile sensor: an electronic device with a flat surface, that detects the motion and position of a user's fingers, and translates them to a position on a screen, to control a pointer in a graphical user interface. Touchpads are common on laptop computers, contrasted with desktop computers, where mice are more prevalent. Trackpads are sometimes used on desktops, where desk space is scarce. Because trackpads can be made small, they can be found on personal digital assistants (PDAs) and some portable media players. Wireless touchpads are also available, as detached accessories.
A screen magnifier is software that interfaces with a computer's graphical output to present enlarged screen content. By enlarging part of a screen, people with visual impairments can better see words and images. This type of assistive technology is useful for people with some functional vision; people with visual impairments and little or no functional vision usually use a screen reader.
In computing, text-based user interfaces (TUI), is a retronym describing a type of user interface (UI) common as an early form of human–computer interaction, before the advent of bitmapped displays and modern conventional graphical user interfaces (GUIs). Like modern GUIs, they can use the entire screen area and may accept mouse and other inputs. They may also use color and often structure the display using box-drawing characters such as ┌ and ╣. The modern context of use is usually a terminal emulator.
A KVM switch is a hardware device that allows a user to control multiple computers from one or more sets of keyboards, video monitors, and mice.
In human–computer interaction, a cursor is an indicator used to show the current position on a computer monitor or other display device that will respond to input.
Employee monitoring software is a means of employee monitoring, and allows company administrators to monitor and supervise all their employee computers from a central location. It is normally deployed over a business network and allows for easy centralized log viewing via one central networked PC. Sometimes, companies opt to monitor their employees using remote desktop software instead.
Microsoft PowerToys is a set of freeware system utilities designed for power users developed by Microsoft for use on the Windows operating system. These programs add or change features to maximize productivity or add more customization. PowerToys are available for Windows 95, Windows XP, Windows 10 and Windows 11. The PowerToys for Windows 10 and Windows 11 are free and open-source software licensed under the MIT License and hosted on GitHub.
In computing, the term remote desktop refers to a software- or operating system feature that allows a personal computer's desktop environment to be run remotely off of one system, while being displayed on a separate client device. Remote desktop applications have varying features. Some allow attaching to an existing user's session and "remote controlling", either displaying the remote control session or blanking the screen. Taking over a desktop remotely is a form of remote administration.
Remote Desktop Services (RDS), known as Terminal Services in Windows Server 2008 and earlier, is one of the components of Microsoft Windows that allow a user to initiate and control an interactive session on a remote computer or virtual machine over a network connection. RDS was first released in 1998 as Terminal Server in Windows NT 4.0 Terminal Server Edition, a stand-alone edition of Windows NT 4.0 Server that allowed users to log in remotely. Starting with Windows 2000, it was integrated under the name of Terminal Services as an optional component in the server editions of the Windows NT family of operating systems, receiving updates and improvements with each version of Windows. Terminal Services were then renamed to Remote Desktop Services with Windows Server 2008 R2 in 2009.
In computing, an input device is a piece of equipment used to provide data and control signals to an information processing system, such as a computer or information appliance. Examples of input devices include keyboards, mouse, scanners, cameras, joysticks, and microphones.
Computer surveillance in the workplace is the use of computers to monitor activity in a workplace. Computer monitoring is a method of collecting performance data which employers obtain through digitalised employee monitoring. Computer surveillance may nowadays be used alongside traditional security applications, such as closed-circuit television.
The transition from Windows 7 to Windows 8 introduced a number of new features across various aspects of the operating system. These include a greater focus on optimizing the operating system for touchscreen-based devices and cloud computing.
Chrome Remote Desktop is a remote desktop software tool, developed by Google, that allows a user to remotely control another computer's desktop through a proprietary protocol also developed by Google, internally called Chromoting. The protocol transmits the keyboard and mouse events from the client to the server, relaying the graphical screen updates back in the other direction over a computer network. This feature, therefore, consists of a server component for the host computer, and a client component on the computer accessing the remote server. Chrome Remote Desktop uses a unique protocol, as opposed to using the common Remote Desktop Protocol.
Zorin OS is a Linux distribution based on Ubuntu. It uses a GNOME 3 and XFCE 4 desktop environment by default, although the desktop is heavily customized in order to help users transition from Windows and macOS easily. Wine and PlayOnLinux are supported, allowing users to run compatible Windows software, like Microsoft Office. Its creators maintain three free editions of the operating system, and sell a professional edition.