pen cursor in OneNote can be hard to see when using tablet peripheral

Solution 1:

Ran across PenAttention by Kenrick Mock in the same search results as this question:

Blog with description/screenshot: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/descapa/archive/2010/04/28/pen-attention-highlights-your-pen-cursor-for-giving-presentations.aspx?Redirected=true

Download page (includes source): http://math.uaa.alaska.edu/~afkjm/PenAttention/download.html

Solution 2:

One partial solution is an accessibility setting which comes with Windows. If you enable it in Control Panel -> Mouse Properties -> Pointer Options -> Show location of pointer when I press the Ctrl key. Pressing Ctrl will animate a shrinking circle (an inverse of the ripple when you drop a rock in water) at the location of the cursor.

Solution 3:

When using a tablet pen, the idea is that it would mimic the utility of a paper and pencil. The small dot that indicates the location of the pen cursor is there for the purpose of fine-tuning your accuracy. Because tablets can be recalibrated (or calibrated poorly) such that the location of the pen cursor doesn't correspond to the exact location of the pen tip, it can make writing difficult. This allows you to see where exactly you will be writing once you apply pressure.

However, the cursor will disappear when you lift the pen. This is on purpose, because if you are holding the stylus away from the tablet, you aren't writing, and so knowing where the cursor was last serves no purpose. Readability is important, and having an obstructive cursor can make reading the text you just read obnoxious.

Once you move the mouse, you can easily see the location of the pen cursor. Even if you draw with the pen, using the mouse you will (by default) be using the "select and type" tool, which appears as a form of the "I-beam" cursor. You can use the inking tool with the mouse by selecting it in the toolbar, which will cause you to retain the dot cursor when moving the mouse, but this is not necessary when using a digitizer pen/tablet.