Prediction: Apple buys the company and the proceeds to get every patent they can on this tech.
Absolutely. And then reveal the innovation through some iPhone 6s or something in between?
At least that's what they did with Siri.
Buttons that morph out of the surface of the device.
41–50 of 95 posts
Re: Buttons that morph out of the surface of the device.
#42This will be huge for automotive touchscreen applications: I have no doubt it will save lives. With current touchscreen interfaces, you rely almost solely on visual cues and feedback to make correct inputs. Not a good situation while driving, when you need as much visual attention as possible focused on the road. The best interfaces for operating complex or dangerous machines have fixed, haptically identifiable refer…
Well, self driving cars will make the safety application moot.
Re: Buttons that morph out of the surface of the device.
#43Earlier quoted context omitted.
We definitely were NOT browsing Google maps on our smartphones a decade ago.
The earliest I had Google (or any) maps on my phone was 6 years ago.
I had a phone with a terrible web browser, a tiny screen, and ridiculous charges for bandwidth before that. MapQuest likely had a terrible mobile site for it to talk to. I think it's likely that I theoretically had maps on my phone 8, 9, or even 10 years ago.
In practice though, I didn't have them until June 2007.
Re: Buttons that morph out of the surface of the device.
#44This will be huge for automotive touchscreen applications: I have no doubt it will save lives. With current touchscreen interfaces, you rely almost solely on visual cues and feedback to make correct inputs. Not a good situation while driving, when you need as much visual attention as possible focused on the road. The best interfaces for operating complex or dangerous machines have fixed, haptically identifiable refer…
Well, self driving cars will make the safety application moot.
I'm a big fan of the nascent self driving technology, but vehicles in the first several waves of that revolution will still need a proper human interface.
And realistically, I think "dual interface" cars will own the general market (non-taxi, etc) for a long time to come. Anyone who enjoys driving once in a while on a nice piece of road (E.G. the 280 between Daly City and Cupertino) is going to want a car that also features a manual mode.
Eventually we'll have cars where a hidden steering wheel unfolds from the dashboard and pedals rise from the floor. And parental controls to prohibit your teen from accessing them ;)
Re: Buttons that morph out of the surface of the device.
#45This will be huge for automotive touchscreen applications: I have no doubt it will save lives. With current touchscreen interfaces, you rely almost solely on visual cues and feedback to make correct inputs. Not a good situation while driving, when you need as much visual attention as possible focused on the road. The best interfaces for operating complex or dangerous machines have fixed, haptically identifiable refer…
Similar to kiba's comment below, but perhaps a step in between, it would make sense for car designers to look at other similarly complex machines that require the operator's constant attention to the outside world before innovating blindly.
HOTAS (Hands on Throttle and Stick) as a concept has been adopted almost exclusively in fighter aircraft - and extended into Formula 1 and Indy cars as well - for this exact purpose.
The modern car dashboard design is beyond stupid, almost criminally so when you start to see 12 inch video screens placed underneath the windscreen in such a way that the driver has to take his attention off the road to use pretty much anything in the car.
Tactile feedback isn't going to help much if you are fumbling with controls floating an arms length away between you and the passenger.
There is plenty of room on the steering wheel for all of the car's functional controls, especially if you make use of a HUD/windscreen visual menu and multifunction controls. I almost exclusively use my 5 button steering wheel control to manage my entire audio experience while driving right now.
I'm not sure how many people will need to be killed before something like that becomes the norm. Of course, seatbelts and airbags both required their fair share of human sacrifice before the car gods decided lowly operators warranted them, so maybe kiba is onto something. :-)
Re: Buttons that morph out of the surface of the device.
#46This is cool, but is there really a demand for this? Didn't we almost universally switch from textured, real buttons to glass interfaces over the last 5 years?
Maybe it's just me, but I'm not exactly pining for my old blackberry's keyboard. My display/interface iPhone isn't perfect, but this just isn't a real enough problem for me. Is it for you?
Re: Buttons that morph out of the surface of the device.
#47Very interesting and a bit scary. Think about it, a screen that can reach out and change its shape. That almost guarantees some (software) application misuse if they are given access to screen control. But on the other hand, gaming would be more interesting with something more to interact with than just what is displayed on screen. It will be interesting to see what becomes of this.
I'll bet one of the first apps to take advantage of this will be a back massager app.
That will probably be the second. The first will undoubtedly involve a penis of some sort/shape.
Re: Buttons that morph out of the surface of the device.
#48This is cool, but is there really a demand for this? Didn't we almost universally switch from textured, real buttons to glass interfaces over the last 5 years? Maybe it's just me, but I'm not exactly pining for my old blackberry's keyboard. My display/interface iPhone isn't perfect, but this just isn't a real enough problem for me. Is it for you?
Glass is preferable because it can be reconfigured by software to fit the application, allowing dead-simple, focused interfaces rather than bloated, inflexible catch-all input devices.
The tradeoff was the loss of tactile feedback, meaning good luck dialing a number, choosing a song, etc. while driving. Tactile glass would be the best of both worlds.
Re: Buttons that morph out of the surface of the device.
#49This is cool, but is there really a demand for this? Didn't we almost universally switch from textured, real buttons to glass interfaces over the last 5 years? Maybe it's just me, but I'm not exactly pining for my old blackberry's keyboard. My display/interface iPhone isn't perfect, but this just isn't a real enough problem for me. Is it for you?
Glass is preferable because it can be reconfigured by software to fit the application, allowing dead-simple, focused interfaces rather than bloated, inflexible catch-all input devices. The tradeoff was the loss of tactile feedback, meaning good luck dialing a number, choosing a song, etc. while driving. Tactile glass would be the best of both worlds.
And not just driving. Take the iPad, for instance - it's fun and kind of magical, but a lot of us dismiss it because you can't really do "serious" input on it. Even though I really like it, I have to confess that I can't really type that fast, nor is typing comfortable enough to do for very long. But if typing on my iPad were as easy as it is on a chiclet-type keyboard - just a step or two down from my laptop keyboard - then suddenly things would equalize a bit. And what is for many people the major barrier to using a touch device exclusively would disappear.
Re: Buttons that morph out of the surface of the device.
#50why is everybody ranting on this nice technology and ignores the fact that the sites image and css ressources aren't loading?!