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Perry Mowbray:
UI aside: I love the input device. Currently I use a Contour Roller Mouse, that pretty much has similar input dynamics: I love it and even talked my employer into buying one for me at work  :-* :-* So I think the basic concept would work well.

What's also funny is that just the other day I was looking at LCD Tablets thinking that something like that may be my next major purchase; but what occurred to me (and what was demonstrated in the video) is that having the tablet and keyboard is a problem: either the tablet/monitor or the keyboard is too far away. Wouldn't it be better to have the keyboard as part of the display?

All through the video I was wondering how the typing was happening, not until the end did they show that the device sat just below the keyboard. But I was wondering about a screen keyboard, and how that would work (I've never used a LCD tablet and have no idea what it would be like to type on one: unforgiving I'd think -- no key movement)... but it did make me wonder about an integrated keyboard that was part of the windowing system? Sort of select the window, click the button on the window and a screen keyboard displays and sends keypresses to that window.

And I agree with Oshyan and others: I'm happy with multiple monitors and found it a little restrictive in the display.

mouser:
So for me this concept video is trying to solve a problem I don't have
--- End quote ---

i think that mostly sums up my feeling as well.

JavaJones:
I'm still waiting for them to get innovative with response in touch surfaces. There are cell phones that sort of buzz or vibrate when you click something, but that's really not what I mean. Something more like the sensation of physical resistance. Or hell, what about a flexible OLED over the top of a raisable clicky key set? The reason I'm talking about this is I don't think I could ever grow to love any keyboard without decent tactile feedback. But imagine if the keyboard keys were touch/pressure sensitive and could just recess themselves when not in use. You could use it like a regular touch keyboard for quick typing if you wanted, and the fully raise it with normal key response for "real typing". This would of course be very complicated and expensive without some significant innovation in materials, maybe "memory materials" or something, but it's the best I can think of as far as an "ideal" concept. Everything else is a compromise of where to put this or that piece - do I have this nifty big touch surface right in front of me and have to reach for the keyboard when I need it, or do I have the keyboard close and use a smaller touch surface off the right thus negating left-handed multi-touch, etc.

- Oshyan

Paul Keith:
Well, I think Mouser has already expressed some of my concerns. I like the idea of a better multi-touch interface close to hand, rather than the silly idea of trying to actually use your monitor which is A: too far away 90% of the time and B: you don't want fingerprints all over.
-JavaJones (October 13, 2009, 11:03 PM)
--- End quote ---

Well, it was just a suggestion but I think you miss the part where I talked about covers for the sides and both situations are weird complaints.

One: any multi-touch interface is always going to be farther than any monitor because you're increasing utilities + you're increasing the base size of your desk area.

Don't believe me? Remove your mouse now and press the buttons on any of your monitors. Did the space really increase without the mouse?

Which is why as much as I don't mean to offend (although I was offended by your use of the adjective silly here), the idea that you want no fingerprints on your monitor sounds absurd.

It's ridiculous! You're already smudging a monitor with your fingerprints when you carry it. You already smudge it when you press the power button. You already smudge it when you use the other buttons to change the brightness/contrast and position of the screen.

Unless you have a humongous monitor that is as far away as your TV (which I remind you is only available to a select few), your monitor is never so far that your arm cannot reach it.

Even in that situation, it is ridiculous to even add the 2nd bit about fingerprints as if you were a thief in fear of fingerprints or even use the 90% analogy as if 90% of the time a regular monitor is so far out of reach that the common monitor today involves buying a remote just to click the power button.

Sort of select the window, click the button on the window and a screen keyboard displays and sends keypresses to that window.-Perry Mowbray
--- End quote ---

Windows does have an on-screen keyboard as part of it's accessibility tools.

I know it may seem like pointing out the obvious but you make it seem like there's no built-in (well as much as built-in) on-screen keyboard in the accessibility tools.

It's clunky true but a pop-up on-screen keyboard really solves very little. As you said, no keypresses but you must also follow the keyboard lay-out that is in front of you.

Everything else is a compromise of where to put this or that piece - do I have this nifty big touch surface right in front of me and have to reach for the keyboard when I need it, or do I have the keyboard close and use a smaller touch surface off the right thus negating left-handed multi-touch, etc.
--- End quote ---

That is no compromise. That is sacrifice. It would be no different than having a tablet PC and a mouse.

Even if they are both at arm's length, you have to factor in the additional usb slot and additional wires and additional room ergonomics as you're now not dealing with a mouse but a mouse/keyboard hybrid.

At most, it could be a luxury gadget to many but it will not be a standard item nor will it solve anything because it will add new problems to the stuff it claims to solve. (Again, compare this to motion sensors on a monitor where not having/utilizing the motion sensors adds very additional space to the PC desk area.)

At best, it is a more juiced up tablet PC but who is to say that the tablet PC industry is dead and wouldn't evolve here eventually?

Yet no matter how much a tablet PC evolves, it will not change the mouse market because the mouse is still cheaper, of more standard shape, easier to figure out and is all in all, lighter and a standard in many homes.

JavaJones:
Hmm, I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree then. The idea of having to wave my hands around in the air to control anything in a precision way seems both inaccurate and tiring, and fingerprints are a real concern if you're actually touching the display surface (obviously not if you're talking about the edges, where you'd use the power button or carry it - I'm not objecting because I'm a clean freak). There is no precedent for such a UI being used for any precision purpose or as the general interface for a normal computer system, whereas the device I suggest is merely a potentially novel combination of existing and proven technologies.

- Oshyan

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