MIT Smartboard video — MUST-SEE

[zridling]

Pretty freakin' cool how intelligent this board is. For some reason, it reminds me of what Michael Rainey does with software:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NZNTgglPbUA&eurl=

[f0dder]

Damn, that's cool!

Combine that with the multi-input display stuff from apple(?)...

[JavaJones]

Pretty cool. I wonder how flexible and powerful it is though. That was all pretty simple stuff and unless you're designing the next child's marble toy I'm not sure it's genuinely useful. It's frankly not surprising to me that they could make a computer figure out interactions of simple shapes, especially in 2D. It'd be something a bit more interesting if they could actually show a genuinely practical design example, even if it was also simple.

Still, kudos to the design team of course!

- Oshyan

[mrainey]

it reminds me of what Michael Rainey does with software:

You mean the way the little cart kept crashing?   

[zridling]

I would like to see a biology teacher get ahold of that board — draw vampire; draw innocent simp with juicy brain; watch vampire perform a good brain suck.

[NeilS]

Combine that with the multi-input display stuff from apple(?)...

You mean this? http://www.cs.nyu.edu/~jhan/ftirtouch/

Possibly the most awesome thing ever. I'm already saving up for one.

The only thing that could make it better is some kind of force feedback system so that you can feel controls and other elements in some useful way. Immersion used to have a force feedback mouse which did that kind of thing (e.g. becoming a bit "heavier" when you went over buttons), which was pretty cool, although also pretty limited in a lot of ways. No idea how they would achieve feedback on a screen though - maybe some sort of nanotech is in order?

[f0dder]

Yeah, that's the one NeilS. For some reason I thought it was Apple.

[jgpaiva]

Yeah, that's the one NeilS. For some reason I thought it was Apple.

Here's the reason why you thought it was apple's (it is ).
Check http://www.donationcoder.com/forum/index.php?topic=2730.0

[NeilS]

Here's the reason why you thought it was apple's (it is ).

I know Apple have done some work on multi-touch displays, but I didn't think that particular technology was anything to do with them. Mind you, they have patented a nice wall all round that area now, so it might as well be theirs.