PointerEventProps

Most of today's web content assumes the user's pointing device will be a mouse. However, since many devices support other types of pointing input devices, such as pen/stylus and touch surfaces, extensions to the existing pointing device event models are needed and pointer events address that need.

Pointer events are DOM events that are fired for a pointing device. They are designed to create a single DOM event model to handle pointing input devices such as a mouse, pen/stylus or touch (such as one or more fingers). The pointer is a hardware-agnostic device that can target a specific set of screen coordinates. Having a single event model for pointers can simplify creating Web sites and applications and provide a good user experience regardless of the user's hardware. However, for scenarios when device-specific handling is desired, pointer events defines a property to inspect the device type which produced the event.

The events needed to handle generic pointer input are analogous to mouse events (mousedown/pointerdown, mousemove/pointermove, etc.). Consequently, pointer event types are intentionally similar to mouse event types. Additionally, a pointer event contains the usual properties present in mouse events (client coordinates, target element, button states, etc.) in addition to new properties for other forms of input: pressure, contact geometry, tilt, etc. In fact, the PointerEvent interface inherits all of the MouseEvent's properties thus facilitating migrating content from mouse events to pointer events.

MDN