problems with writing text on my computer

[mysuzuki2]

I'm having problems with writing on my computer. Often, while I am writing my cursor will suddenly jump back into the body of the text and continue with my text in the middle of a previous sentence. I don't think I am doing anything to cause this but I'm not sure. It is annoying and time consuming. Has this happened to anyone else?

[tg]

1. Are you using a laptop with a touch pad?

Last edited Sun Jan 22, 2012, 09:41 AM - Edit history (1)

I used to brush the touch pad on my lap top with the base of my thumbs to similar effect. -tg

[ChromeFoundry]

6. +1 for disabling the touchpad in the BIOS!

I absolutely hate those things!

[EvolveOrConvolve]

2. I'll echo what tg asked - do you use a touchpad?

If you use a laptop, it could also be the pointing stick, if you have one of those.

[immoderate]

3. Laptop with touchpad.

Unanimous!


--imm

[mysuzuki2]

4. Thank you all. That may be it. I was not aware I was doing that.

[drm604]

5. It may be you accidentally brushing the touchpad as others have said, or it may be something else.

I use a MacBook Pro at work with an external keyboard and mouse. A couple of weeks ago it started going crazy on me. At random times it would begin acting as if I was holding down the left mouse button. As I moved the cursor around it would open things or grab them and drag them around. It was impossible to work with it.

I finally figured out that the laptop battery was swelling and pressing against the bottom of the touchpad. Removing the battery, and working with the laptop plugged into the adapter, eliminated the problem. I replaced the battery and no longer have the problem.

If you're using a Mac, and your problem continues even when you're careful not to touch the pad, test this by working with the battery removed. This may also happen with non-Macs, I can't say.

[HopeHoops]

7. Keep your thumb off of the touchpad. That happens all the time. Use CTRL-Z to undo it.

I've deleted entire paragraphs that way (unintentionally of course). Hit CTRL-Z to restore the stuff you accidentally deleted. I love touch pads, but that's one of the hazards.

Actually, my favorite "mouse" device is the little nipple in the middle of the keyboard that IBM introduced on the first ThinkPad (which I still have).

[ElboRuum]

8. Yes...

And it's why laptops generally suck (which I am assuming is what you have).

What is happening is that your text cursor (not the caret that moves as you type, but the I-beam shaped mouse cursor) is hovering over a different part of the text than over what you are typing. This is perfectly normal and legitimate and works fine... if you are using a desktop computer with a mouse.

However, laptops generally have a touchpad and/or a pointer nub (and god help you if you have both), and "mouse" buttons in the most inconvenient places. Often you will hit one of these buttons or tap on the touchpad by accident, and this will move the caret to the I-beam's current location. And of course since you are still typing, your text goes smack in the middle of an unrelated piece of text, some swearing occurs, etc.

Sometimes putting pressure of any kind on the case CLOSE to these buttons (say, resting your palms on the laptop to type) can cause the click event to fire.