3D desktop

tim Rowledge tim at rowledge.org
Tue Feb 13 00:19:02 UTC 2007


On 12-Feb-07, at 10:28 AM, Brad Fuller wrote:

> stéphane ducasse wrote:
>> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M0ODskdEPnQ
>> Could be cool to use Genie for that....

I actually dislike this - the movie has been a round for a while and  
it hasn't grown on me. 'messy desk' might have been a reasonable  
metaphor years ago in order to get people used to the idea of  
windowing computer interfaces but it isn't actually a *good* idea.  
This particular version is nothing more than making a video game out  
of moving stuff on your screen.

>>
> another interface:
>
> http://link.brightcove.com/services/link/bcpid271543545/bctid422563006

This on the other hand is actually an improvement in the UI. We tried  
to do a little of this multi-input stuff years ago on the ActiveBook  
- at Bill Atkinson's urging I believe - but had to do it via two  
quite separate input devices so it was never really very convincing.  
It will of course require non-trivial changes in how we arrange our  
hardware to be useful . Nobody is going to spend a day at work having  
to hold fingers up to typical displays and typical portables would  
need noticeable changes.

The shared aspect may turn out to be a major win as well. Imagine  
traffic control systems working like the demo, where a group of  
controllers can handle the traffic by moving objects around to block  
or permit access to airspace, direct to holding patterns, see the  
progress of all the traffic, etc etc.  Or perhaps group reviewing  
code, making scribble notes, passing blocks of code/notes around. Of  
course as always the real technology driver is likely to be making it  
easy and convenient to sort your porn collection.

tim
--
tim Rowledge; tim at rowledge.org; http://www.rowledge.org/tim
Oxymorons: Clearly misunderstood





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