Head-mouse: A simple cursor controller based on optical measurement of head tilt

Abstract

This paper describes a wearable wireless mouse-cursor controller that optically tracks the degree of tilt of the user's head to move the mouse relative distances and therefore the degrees of tilt. The raw data can be processed locally on the wearable device before wirelessly transmitting the mouse-movement reports over Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) protocol to the host computer; but for exploration of algorithms, the raw data can also be processed on the host. The use of standard Human-Interface Device (HID) profile enables plug-and-play of the proposed mouse device on modern computers without requiring separate driver installation. It can be used in two different modes to move the cursor, the joystick mode and the direct mapped mode. Experimental results show that this head-controlled mouse to be intuitive and effective in operating the mouse cursor with fine-grained control of the cursor even by untrained users.