What would you use a multiple touch Tablet for?
Although I’m not in a position to comment, the recent Tablet PC buzz is around the potential multiple touch capabilities of the upcoming Dell Tablet PC. If indeed that functionality comes to market, nobody can deny it’s something that no other Tablet PC offers today. Note that I’m calling it “multiple touch”; that’s for a reason of clarification. Most folks hear “multi-touch” thinking it means that the PC can sense and use multiple touch points, but that’s not the case. When I hear “multi-touch”, I think of a device that has both passive and active capabilities, i.e.: you can touch it with your finger or you an use an RF pen. That’s just the way I think about it; doesn’t mean it’s right. ;)
In any case, I was having lunch with John Hill from ALLTP just yesterday and something came up in conversation regarding ink-friendly apps. John and I were pretty much in agreement that there are far too few applications written and designed for inking. There’s a few standouts that are (OneNote, TEO and such come to mind), but by and large, most apps aren’t designed for effective use with a pen. What about touch? There’s even fewer of those.So that gets me thinking about the anticipated multiple-touch capabilities of the Dell Tablet. It’s an innovation to be sure and I’m not bashing it in any way. But what’s the value of a function if it doesn’t solve a problem? How will it enhance the user experience? In what way will you use it and how often? Is it “gimmicky” or does it really provide a better way to do things than currently available solutions?Believe me, I love to see innovation, especially in the Tablet PC space. And I’m not trying to be critical of Dell here at all. I’m simply trying to foster some conversation and thought. Put another way: I believe that Tablet PCs are a niche market partially because there aren’t enough apps that use ink in a way that provides extra value over apps that don’t. There are other reasons of course, but let’s face it: if people don’t see enough value in a solution, it’s likely not a solution they’ll buy or use. I’d hate to see that happen on the touch side too.Another viewpoint: your thoughts, wants, needs and requirements here could be read by developers that bring your idea to life. So have at, put some thought into it and share your thoughts! Do you want to see two fingered zooming in your browser on a Tablet PC? Is stretching out photos going to keep you happy? Or can you think of even better applications of multiple touch that we haven’t even thought of yet?
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Kevin,
Call it multi-touch or multiple touch as you like (and your distinction makes sense) but Apple has defined multi-touch as multiple input on the screen, and that horse has left the barn.
True, but that’s not the central point here. ;)
I want a great active digitizer for inking with the stylus and touch so I can get by if I lose the stylus. Plus, for some things, like lauching the web browser to see my default home page, seems to me that touch should be good enough and there should not be a reason to pull the stylus out of the garage. Maybe I should change the name of this post to “call my lazy.”
I love using the touch on my FUJI P1510D but I want active digitizer too….
I would use it as a keyboard…
Like a musical keyboard.
Or more specifically I guess – XY midi controller with multiple points of input… Run it through reason and it would sound quite positively sexual.
A continuum (by Haken I think?) does a similar thing – but it’s like $8000 for a full length one. And it supports only one point of contact. Sounds amazing though.
THIS is a potentially cool point to start for a similar device, but that would allow some chords etc.
Would be nicer if Dell didn’t limit it to 5 points – or maybe i’ve got that wrong and the guy only randomly demonstrated 5. I’m not sure.
I also think multiple touch has good potential for web browsing by means of finger gestures. Like on apple pads for laptops – the two fingers down or across do random things (I don’t know what though :) I don’t use an apple)…
Like two points of contact moving left parallel to each other (think – flick two fingers across the screen to the left) takes you back a page, and the opposite direction does forwards… One point dragged to select a bunch of text, tap another point to bring up a right click contextual menu which lets you copy or whatever.
Maybe many points simultaneously could do a polygon select? But I dunno something like that actually does sound kind of ganky and stupid to me even.
I think to some extent – some of those functions double up on how a wacom style tablet works (where the pen can do right click etc) but I don’t think it’s entirely superfluous. Maybe even I can circle something with one hand to snip it out – while my finger is still on the page draw a C to copy it. Or maybe a string of characters to copy then save to a particular file/location or something. This is still a little difficult, and I think the most seamless integration of it will come from combinations of consecutive points just from the one hand, while the example just suggested really lends itself to the human use of two. Which is a little silly because unless the item is placed on a table – you need your other hand to hold it.
But I do completely agree that it needs some *very* clever applications to make it sell. Apple will probably work out a few. I’ve got my doubts about many of the others.
I think one of the problems is that an interface which leverages something like this starts to become increasingly different from what is normal and what is expected. And as such, I think it’s unlikely that many “button” type interfaces would fully utilise the potential of a multitouch device because they would need to support
We are seeing the collision of two worlds here, I think: the traditional (and not just about ancient!) stay-in-one-place desktop mouse-based GUI and take-along compurers that simply need a brand new interface that is suited to their screen size and to the needs of mobility.
I think, of course, Apple will get it right first.
Surprisingly, it might be Intel’s MIDs that do it next (or at least come close).
MS still has to show it is SERIOUS about what it began with UMPC.
As for Linuxes such as Ubuntu, et al, I have no idea. But Asus might have quite a few!
Damn typo! “not just” = “NOW just”
Kevin is no doubt ROTFLHAO after I pointed out some of his. Fiend.
Dell needs to take a page from Apple and stop outsourcing it’s operating system.
DellOS and DellOS Tablet Edition only needs ONE killer app.
Like someone said, I also would use it as a keyboard!
In something like this:
http://www.gottabemobile.com/MeetTheCanovoDualTouchScreenTabletNotebook.aspx
For me, this is the perfect Tablet PC. A real digital notebook.
Well, I know that it’s blasphemy around these parts, but I’ll say it.
The TabletPC/Origami touch screen setup SUCKS. It sucks less with an active digitizer, but in the end, it still sucks.
Why?
1) Right-clicking. You either need a button (not available on every stylus,) or a time-delay action.
2) Middle-clicking. Umm… not without a second button.
3) Erasing. Okay, this one’s clever, but impossible to replicate with a passive digitizer.
Multitouch can fix a lot of these problems, just based on finger-counts and the like.
Tap with one finger, and it’s a click. Hold with that finger, and tap with a second, it’s a middle-click. Hold and tap with TWO, and that’s a right-click. (Swap those around at will.) Detect a wide enough contact patch, like a swipe of the thumb? That’s an erase action.
Also, single-touch passive digitizers are notoriously inaccurate, even when they’re calibrated properly. This isn’t perfectly solved by multitouch, but the hardware to process multitouch usually has enough input to determine pressure trends from single-finger input. That alone could be used to provide a lot more error correction, and as a result, improved overall accuracy.
Of course, pinch-zoom, finger-scaled sliders, and kinetic scrolling aren’t bad ideas, either, nor is a Dock-like onscreen keyboard. (I say “Dock-like” because the keys raise and enlarge as you pass over them on the iPhone, much like how icons grab additional attention in the OS X Dock.)
Overall, the TabletPC interface needs to be a major UI overhaul, while capable of still running Windows apps.
It also needs to get rid of the menus. I would love to see a return of the TC1x00 series from Compaq with multitouch all the way past the edge of the screen, so that I could summon the Start Menu, app menus, and so on as needed. Imagine OneNote without all the typical Windows UI crap. Just a page with tabs on two edges, and nothing else until you truly need it. Need a menu? Touch the menu button off the edge. Start Menu? Task Manager? Separate edge buttons. You don’t need multitouch for this, but since different people grip a tablet differently, you’d want the added security of a truly deliberate button press. Multitouch, plus an out-of-the-way UI, would make for a killer TabletPC.
Chris K.: not blasphemy at all. In fact, I agree with your general premise on the UI. We have two great tools (ink and touch) that are under-developed, under-appreciated and therefore, under-used. Appreciate the honest thoughts!
I want the medical profession to have portable ultra-high-rez image viewers so that bedside consultations at least have a chance of using the right x-rays etc for treatment assessment. They would have patient codes linked to the files and distributed from the hospital network. My dad’s leg was nearly amputated, when in fact he only had a dislocation, because the wrong x-rays were viewed several times from a diabetic patient.
No endless fetching and filing and misplacing of records etc.
I believe Apple were approached to build such a thing about 10 years ago but Jobs reply was ‘we would love to do it, but the technology isn’t there yet’
Well the time is just about right imo
Well, for starters, on-screen keyboards become a lot more useful when you can hold down a shift key while pressing a letter key. Just try to type Ctrl-C on an on-screen keyboard and you’ll see why multiple touch is useful.
The there are all sorts of applications that could be developed that could benefit. Expanding and resizing on-screen objects can be easier if you can drag two opposite corners at the same time.
How about a settings type application where there is a plus and a minus key and a function selector list. Hold down the function while pressing + or -. Example: the function list can contain “Volume” “Brightness” “Bass” “Treble” etc. Hold one of those down and then plus or minus – this would be quicker and allow bigger buttons then what we typically do now: select the volume control sider and drag up or down.
On-screen guitar applications with tremelo, wah wah, string bending, etc.
Zoom and move maps at the same time.
Have an on-screen Shift Ctrl and Alt keys. Tremendously useful in Excel when I want to select multiple non-contiguos ranges.
Finger painting apps are obvious but what about being able to draw with one finger while changing color or line thickness or shading with another?
All sorts of 3d applications would benefit from simultaneous multiaxis controls.
What everyone is saying, without saying it, is we want what Tom Cruise had in Minority Report.
‘Nuff said!
;-)
Woadan
I’m sitting here — probably like most people — in front of a vertically-oriented flatscreen.
This is simply wrong.
It should be flat on the desktop at a tilt/incline. I should scroll with my fingers. I should move back/fwd between pages/links with my fingers tips.
I should be able to zoom in/out of the screen image (the TOTAL IMAGE) with pinch-squeeze-out/in (not the Firefox CTL-+/-).
NO MOUSE. (Most of the time.)
I shouldn’t have to touch the keyboard except to type this (in some instances, it could be an on-screen keyboard — but I Will Hurt You if you make it DialKeys!).
It’s not just mobile computing that needs a change. So does the whole idea of the desktop PC and how we interact with it.
MS Surface? I don’t want a fekkin coffee table. Make it even a 17″ Multi-Touch (or, as MS would probably now steal my trademark idea: TouchActive) display. There’s what a desktop computer should be.
OK. Now pay me. (Hahahah.)
Oh, and I will also Hurt You if you bring up MS’s failed Smart Display.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smart_display
FAIL!
Kevin, you say that “no other tablet PC” offers this – but I was under the impression that Sahara does offer this, they have announced it quite a while ago!
Here it is:
http://www.tabletkiosk.com/products/sahara/i400s_pp.asp
“Dual Mode Active Digitizer and Touch Screen “
Bruno, TabletKiosk, as well as Gateway and Lenovo do indeed offer both pen and passive touch on Tablets. When I said no other Tablet PC offers this, I was referring to the Dell offering of multiple touch points. You’re actually proving my point about the confusing definition of “multi-touch” ;)
Kevin, you are absolutely correct – serves me right for being a selective reader :-)
Actually, in contrast to what an earlier poster said that Apple coined the term “multi-touch”, Lenovo was first and uses the term to describe their dual digitizer X61 and not a screen that registers multiple points at once like this Dell.
I personally see no use for a larger screen device like the Dell that registers multiple fingers at once. What possible usage could that play for the consumer? None that I can think of. It also probably means that there is no type of palm rejection possible, meaning that it better be very good deciding if you want to ink or are just touching the screen.
Large companies knew about the multi-touch and other features for over a month.
James, I’m afraid I have to disagree with you on this one. I think there are a LOT of potential usage scenarios that would benefit from this kind of technology (some of the previous commenters have listed off some good ones already).
Truth be told, my dream device would be a 12.1″ convertible tablet with a 1280×1024 multi-mode, multi-touch screen (multiple-point touch passive digitizer paired with an active digitizer in a manner that automatically deactivates the passive touch when the pen is near, similar to the x61 or Motion’s original plan for their n-Trig LE1700). I tend to shy away from passive touch-only devices because I just love the ink experience on my Tecra M4 so much, but if I had both I would put both technologies to good use.
(As an aside, I think 1280×1024 would be perfect because XGA just isn’t enough resolution and SXGA+ makes everything too small for my taste, so it’d be a nice hybrid.)
I also think a multi-mode/multi-touch combination technology would be absolutely perfect for a device like the OQO. Imagine being able to zoom in on documents and web-pages on that tiny screen with your fingers, but also still being able to have a real “ink” experience when you want to use the pen!
One last thing, does it strike anyone else as somewhat hypocritical when so many blogs question the usefulness of multiple-touch screens on something like this Dell tablet, but talk with such eagerness about how great the same thing would be on the oft-rumored Apple tablet?
Saw this posting this morning and am only now getting a chance to post on it… ugghhh.
For me, I completely lost interest in this Dell Tablet the moment I heard that multitouch was not a dual mode active/passive digitizer.
I’m sure there are some kids out there that will have fun moving some pictures around with their fingers. But I’m not one of them. I’ll leave it to the fingerpainting crowd.
The only thing I can say in the positive is this…. this whole multiple touch digitizer strikes me as so unremarkable that I can’t help but wonder if the whole story on this device is not yet known. In my experience, Dell has never struck me as a brand that truly innovates. Sony does, Apple does, heck, even Lenovo does. But Dell?? They find the sweet spot in a market segment and go after it with a vengence. I love them for that. They help bring prices down. But this does not seem like a sweet spot to anything. In fact, it doesn’t seem to make much sense at all.
Wishing thinking perhaps….
What is nice about the current keyboard mouse setup is that your hands don’t block the screen and the keyboard provides tactile clues about the edges of keyboard keys. Also moving the mouse is easier on the arms than reaching to touch a screen therefore the new screen will need its top edge to be in easy reach to avoid repetitive starain injuries.
I think I’d like a multitouch display with a screen that sweeps up from the desk surface in a shallow arc and makes a virtual keyboard near the bottom with some sort of forced feedback to mimic physical keys. That’s for the desktop.
I think multi-touch is ideal for point of sale and portable applications usch as restraints, retail, doctors and nurses charting, traffic cops, as the front end to targeting detection packages of all kinds.
A tablet-sized one to replace the newspaper and magazine with the internet would assume pervasive omni-present networking availability and a thin flexible possibly folding screen to maintain portability.
Also a virtual keyboard of this size would encourage two handed typing, so some means of suspension would be need so both hands were free to type. Try walking and typing with a laptop and you’ll see waht I mean. (I picture some lighter weight variant of a steadicam mount.)
I’ve been thinking more.
I want a desktop I can control completely by hand gestures.
I want it to have radial kind of menus that run out in a circle/arc from the initial finger touch, with the most common options adapting to move to places where my other fingers naturally lie (assuming that i’ll touch the screen initially with my index finger).
It would be a little like Launchy or Quicksilver if you’re familiar with either of those – except ideally with less typing.
If they’d sell this Dell in Australia – I’ll buy one straight away.
Mainly because i’m a little afraid from a lot of these comments that I won’t be able to buy something else like it for a VERY long time.
qwerty keyboards are not efficient.
Neither is a mouse.
Tools which force me to input things in a sequence where I know location/destination item slow things down.
Back to launchy and why it’s great – I want to hear some obscure mp3 on my computer… I open up launchy (with alt + spacebar) and start typing the first letters of the file name. Then just hit enter and it plays. No clicking through 20 folders to get where I want with the mouse. And no crap arbitrary library system like itunes applies either. Because it sucks.
The ideal solution to me, is a touch interface with good voice recognition. If I can tell my computer “Hey can you just launch foobar and load up Themata by Karnivool – the live version from my Roxy bootleg” and get the computer to sort out the useless semantics of my request – that would be amazing a lot of the time…
For the times it isn’t – maybe I can help it out. When i’m flipping through my 300GB of mp3′s maybe I can tell it to open cubase and reason in the background so that I can start pulling things apart as soon as i’m inspired to do so.
That double screen notebook someone else linked to looks awesome though – I’m half tempted to gut a regular notebook and try and cobble one together myself. If the dell multitouch *really* comes from software i’ll even give rolling my own interface a go.