Microsoft Garage releases Mouse Without Borders

http://www.neowin.net/news/microsoft-garage-releases-mouse-without-borders

by alexsb92 • 15 years ago

117 79 15 years ago

cleverjake• 15 years ago

I have been doing this for years...http://synergy-foss.org/

rplnt• 15 years ago

Same here. And I probably stay with synergy as it is multiplatform that microsoft thing has some extra functionality. See this comment: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2983052

drivebyacct210• 15 years ago

Revolutionary! Despite competing open source projects that have been around for years with more features and no arbitrary limitations of four computers.

rbanffy5• 15 years ago

When all your progress comes from a single source, you tend to consider anything that comes from there revolutionary.

drivebyacct210• 15 years ago

I've been accused of writing a troll-bait post, so I thought I'd elaborate on my thoughts. There seems to be this cheering of the notion of "Microsoft Garage" despite the fact that Microsoft still gets to say if it's released at all, and how.

I'm more sad to see that this was it's own project instead of a modification/fork/extension of Synergy. If the focus and energy used to develop this were instead spent on cleaning up the Synergy UI and adding drag-and-drop... it would have been a net-less amount of energy spent and a better, more widely usable product.

drivebyacct210• 15 years ago

Thanks for the downvote and no reply! It's totally awesome that Microsoft is taking control of their developer's community projects and totally awesome that they incorporate these projects and relegate them to internal use only instead of encouraging the betterment of existing tools.

How dare I suggest otherwise. I totally deserve to be downvoted. THANKS.

avolcano• 15 years ago

Before you pass this off as a Synergy clone, check this out:

> As Microsoft's Steve Clayton explains, "I have two PC’s on my desk at work connected to 3 LCD screens and using Mouse Without Borders I can move my mouse between the 3 screens, even though one of them is attached to a different PC from the other two. What’s more, I can move files between the 2 computers simply by dragging them from one desktop to another."

> In addition to the file movement features, Mouse Without Borders also allows the user to log onto all the PCs linked together by the program via just one PC.

So yes, more than just a limited Synergy.

mamp2• 15 years ago

So the question is do you need a whole separate unit within a company to create this "innovation"? Sometimes in microsoft land "innovation" == "not reading widely enough".

robert_nsu• 15 years ago

You don't, however, I think the article is playing up the word "innovation" a bit too much. All I see is some guy (who works for Microsoft) writing a program to make his life a little easier.

xpaulbettsx6• 15 years ago

The Garage is a community, not a paid group (sometimes this isn't clear to folks outside of MS).

The point you should take from this news though, is that Microsoft is now helping its developers release their projects they hack on in their spare time as Microsoft, if they meet the quality bars as well as being popular / useful enough inside Microsoft.

Jacob4u2• 15 years ago

I don't think the "Garage" is necessarily a separate unit.

> “The Garage is open to anyone, which means we have people from all over the company working together. The Garage provides support through Garage Weeks, Science Fairs, free hosting, and a worldwide community to help you build things you wouldn’t be able to accomplish on your own,” Hawkins said." - http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/Features/2011/aug11/08-19...

I'll leave the troll bait "'Innovation == not reading widely enough'" statement alone even though I'm severely tempted to waste my time on that.

buff-a• 15 years ago

The ability to drag files or log in once hardly makes up for the fact that I have three computers and only one of them runs Windows.

What’s more, I can move files between the 2 computers simply by dragging them from one desktop to another

I can drag files from my PC to my Mac (or other PCs) using two folders on the PCs desktop without any extra software.

EDIT: Removed sarcasm.

snow_mac2• 15 years ago

Yes. But Garage probably stole the idea.

http://synergy-foss.org/pm/issues/47

Synergy isn't very developed but they do have an extensive roadmap, which Microsoft seems to have copied and implemented. This doesn't make them innovative, just coping a good idea.

Maybe if this run on OS X I'd use it, but I'll stick to my separate Mouse/Keyboards for now. Btw, back in the day, I did love Synergy.

xpaulbettsx6• 15 years ago

Synergy's been around for years and is still difficult to use. Ideas that don't have good execution aren't worth anything to users.

snow_mac2• 15 years ago

Why a down vote on this? It's not spammy!

leif• 15 years ago

teleport for mac has file and clipboard synchronization

logging in though, no

nhebb2• 15 years ago

> In addition to the file movement features, Mouse Without Borders also allows the user to log onto all the PCs linked together by the program via just one PC.

That's the big one. I use a commercial tool (MaxiVista) right now, and I've used Synergy in the past (buggy). The drawback of both is that you need a separate keyboard for each system to log in, and then you can use the software as a KVM. If Mouse Without Borders allows you to log into a separate computer, then it adds real value above the others.

StavrosK3• 15 years ago

No you don't. I have a separate PC next to my desktop, and it doesn't have anything connected to it but the screen. I run synergy as a service so it's ready to connect as soon as it boots up.

It's not single sign on, but it's very handy.

dmn0012• 15 years ago

I have a computer that does not have either a mouse keyboard or monitor attached to it, to use it I switch it on and wait for it to boot, then use windows RDP to login. I can view the screen, move the mouse across monitors seamlessly, use the clipboard. The only thing extra here is the file sharing - I can just hook up an external drive or sync using dropbox.

sambe• 15 years ago

Running both PCs practically without reboot, Synergy needs restarting about once a month. I do not need more than one keyboard and mouse. I can't log in to both at once, but then a) one is not Windows, as is this case for most people in my office; b) I type my login enough times per day that once or twice for each system makes no difference.

Urgo• 15 years ago

Will give this a shot since maybe since its by microsoft it will integrate a bit better but yeah its nothing new. Many of you already brought up synergy as doing this same function which is true, I used to use that, but for the past 3 or so years I've been using Input Director (http://www.inputdirector.com/) which also does the file transfer thing. I don't really see this being any different then Input Director..

jtreminio• 15 years ago

Input Directory is a top-notch program, and I suggest it to all my friends over Synergy.

meatmanek• 15 years ago

To save some folks a click: Input Director seems to be Windows-only.

cincinnatus• 15 years ago

The most annoying thing about this is not the existing similar products. It is that Microsoft was demonstrating this capability in their business showcase on the MS campus almost 10 years ago! Drag from desktop to laptop, shared mouse and drag and drop to copy. Lots of great ideas never seem to get past prototype.

ck2• 15 years ago

Input Director - used it with my netbook for years now.

It also does shared copy/paste which is really handy.

http://www.inputdirector.com/

And it can encrypt the communications, I wonder if MS bothers?

evanlong• 15 years ago

When I was at MSFT there was an internal tool call Magic Mouse that did what Mouse without Borders does. Magic Mouse had encryption so I would venture a guess that Mouse without Borders does as well.

vtbassmatt• 15 years ago

MWB = Magic Mouse v.next

tallanvor• 15 years ago

Mouse Without Borders is Magic Mouse - they just renamed it a few months ago is all.

artursapek• 15 years ago

I like that this blurs the line between individual computers. To what extent does this combine their processing power though? Right now it just sounds like an easier way to transfer files. I wonder how much further this will be taken. Perhaps one day it will be easy to temporarily bunch together a few computers into one super-performing machine.

hamidpalo2• 15 years ago

This is an internal tool that has been apparently been made public. All employees at MSFT get more than one machine connected to many screens. Mouse Without Borders was developed by a group of employees in their free time to make it easier to deal with multiple Windows desktops. IMHO it is much nicer and more secure than Synergy for managing Windows machines. It's not a clone of anything. The Garage is MSFTs version of 20% time where you can work on whatever projects you want. There are some extremely interesting and useful projects that are part of the Garage beyond this one that haven't been made public yet.

Disclosure: I'm a dev at MSFT.

Michiel• 15 years ago

From the video it doesn't sound like 20% time ("nights and weekends")

fabjan• 15 years ago

Isn't it the same at Google? But there they do their regular work in nights and weekends instead.

That's just what I've gathered from reading articles about Google workers. Maybe I'm wrong and they really do work no more than 40 hours per week, including the 20%. But that is not the impression I've gotten from reading.

PyErr_SetString3• 15 years ago

"All employees at MSFT get more than one machine connected to many screens"

Just out of curiosity, why does everyone need more than one machine?

techsupporter• 15 years ago

They don't. Perhaps all devs get more than one machine, but not every employee ("blue badge") gets a 2nd or more system. My sole company-issued computer is a ThinkPad.

Note: I'm in Ops at MSFT.

rbanffy5• 15 years ago

When I worked in a big Windows-centric company developing hardware and software for Windows CE (mid-2002), I had two desktops, one associated with the corporate domain, where I could print and read e-mails off their Exchange server, and another, where I had administrative privileges (VS required them to attach debuggers to processes) that didn't connect to the corporate network at all.

If you develop pieces of the OS, I would assume they would give you a machine to rebuild occasionally (because you'll probably destroy it a couple times) and one to be a well-adjusted corporate citizen, reading your e-mail and filling out your paperwork.

hamidpalo2• 15 years ago

At minimum people get a laptop and a desktop, and quite a bit of time you see more than one desktop in offices. I haven't seen anyone in the engineering disciplines with fewer than two.

Having more than one machine is very handy for when you need to run VMs to test different versions, and not risk getting your own main machine into a bad state. If you work on services, the VM runs a local copy of the service.

trollLikeABoss• 15 years ago

Two things - MS needs to learn how to make fun tech videos, and its just so uncool not sharing the code in the age of social coding. The music in the background is extremely loud, enough to drown the engineer's voice at times - and no demo? Just compare it with videos that come out of google (labs) ... The CEO(one and only) said it best long time back "The problem with Microsoft is that they have absolutely no taste ..."

sakura_k• 15 years ago

Perhaps if the article were more accurate - "Microsoft developer releases side project into the wild" - this would be better received?

The Garage is a loose collective of people building things in their spare time. It's not a formal organization and people who work on Garage projects come from all over the world. Those who are drawn to ambitious side projects would probably fit in pretty well here. Kudos to this project for maturing as far as it has!

mellifluousmind3• 15 years ago

I agree. For those that never worked for MSFT will have a hard time to know that Garage is an internal MSFT lingo for MSFT version of 20% free time. But yes, essentially, it is a MSFT Dev who wrote the code as side project and released to the wild.

It is a great for PR, but they really need to make a better video. I couldn't understand what he was saying, because the volume was so low.

spiralganglion• 15 years ago

An observation.

There's a bizarre inconsistency in the videos coming out of Microsoft. The video for this (pretty bleeding cool) evening-and-weekend side-project couldn't sell anything, but that's not the point. The Mango video[1] looks and sounds pretty good, like it was made by professionals. But their Windows 8 videos[2][3] are unbelievably slipshod. This is so counterintuitive.

Obviously, the Mango video is intended to give some dearly-needed promotion to a fledgling product in a fiercely competitive market. But Windows is their flagship product! The [3] Win8 video was watched by 10x as many people as the [1] Mango video, so obviously these early Win8 previews are getting a lot of buzz. But the more recent [2] Win8 video shows only subtle, insignificant improvements over the earlier [3] video (the sound is better-recorded).

I would love to know why such little care is given to the public unveiling of a product that's tremendously important to their customers, and their bottom line, while absolute TLC is showered on something that doesn't even have a foothold in the market. They obviously have the tools and talent to do better, so someone decided not to exert the effort. This fascinates me.

[1] Mango: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OP30F3ZxTmw

[2] Win8 boot time: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ia3zBs42cc

[3] Win8 metro preview: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p92QfWOw88I

rkwz• 15 years ago

Different audience.

rbanffy5• 15 years ago

Which is really interesting. Who are they trying to sell each product to?

xtracto• 15 years ago

>"Microsoft Garage projects are projects that Microsoft employees perform in their nights and weekends"

This does not sound right... does Microsoft own what their workers do on their nights and Weekends? I understand Google owning what its employees do on the 20% free time, but on weekends?

simonbrown• 15 years ago

See: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/9705/what-can-i-do-about-...

radarsat1• 15 years ago

It has to be said though, a major advantage of Synergy is that you can use it to switch between Windows, Linux, and OS X. For some, this is the main reason for having multiple machines.

wvenable• 15 years ago

A noticed a lot of people mentioning Synergy, but if you're running nothing but Windows PC's then I highly recommend Input Director ( http://www.inputdirector.com/ ). It's much easier to configure than Synergy and is a lot smoother.

Microsoft Garage releases Mouse Without Borders

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