481–490 of 697 posts
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If that is actually true, then you do not have a high quality workstation.
See, I always get this response, but no one has yet to prove to me that VS can open and be ready to use in less than a minute. I'd like to see video, until then I'll keep believing VS users are incapable of keeping time.
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Pen+touch+type seems like a great idea. It is something no other manufacturer has tried to do. Apple Newton MessagePad, 1993. It had a stylus, handwriting recognition, you could use it with just your fingertips, and you could connect an external keyboard. http://www.flickr.com/photos/atow/4314242537/ That was almost twenty years a go. Newton was a very expensive experiment for Apple, and they have learned the hard wa…
Yeah, so what? If you read HCI papers from the 90s (it's what I do for a job-- I'm a PhD student in HCI), you'll see that a lot of very respected researchers claimed that speech technology is not useful (their claim is well-founded: it is slow, environmental noise is unavoidable, what to say is often not obvious, and there's the Midas problem). But, here we are, with people praising Siri. It's how technology works--…
1) Making it say silly things about hiding dead bodies in ravines.
2) Trying to make it text things, only to give up and type the message by hand. Usually done while driving, and usually spanning the course of around a minute.
It's not even remotely close to something usable yet, at least not from what I've seen. Just look at how people use it, they don't even understand [or maybe they just don't like?] the interface for it!
Most people I see address it by name, like you would the computer on star trek. They hold down the button, and then say:
"Siri, where can I get a blah blah blah nearby?"
Which usually doesn't return a useful result. In this time I'm usually searching on google maps, and telling them the instructions before they've finished their attempt at an interaction.
You don't invoke the service by addressing it. The service was invoked by pressing the button.
Seriously I have yet to see a person who uses siri for something useful.
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For what it's worth: I'm not entirely convinced that Siri will ever work as advertised. I think the new car smell is gone and lately I've read nothing but complaints. Apple really needs to step it up. I expected more of the iOS 6 announcement, like a Siri API for third party apps and better communication between apps. That is what's needed to even come close to the 80s Knowledge Navigator idea. I mean, the dictation…
I use Siri constantly: - change playlists when when I'm working out or biking - set the alarm when I go to bed - reminders (a lot) - the weather - looking up something on wikipedia and imdb - and sending short sms messages I'd say my use has grown over the last few weeks as I'm biking a lot more. There was an initial trust issue, and I still sometimes have this weird feeling of being on the spot when I'm dictating to…
Shit website, shit marketing, and shit video aside, I'm seriously intrigued. Microsoft has five cards to play here: - REAL Windows (TM) and Massive Microsoft Developer Mindshare - Ports, ports, ports! - REAL Microsoft Office (TM) INCLUDED FREE on the low-end model - PEN AND KEYBOARD! - Billions of dollars in cash to burn making this happen And they have three huge challenges in front of them: - Windows 8 critical rec…
> Shit website, shit marketing, and shit video aside, I'm seriously intrigued Given the last statement, it appears the marketing has done something right. It is a 'coming soon' product. All it is a tab running windows 8 so making someone seriously intrigued is a marketing win. At this point they don't want to give you all the facts to make your purchase decision. They want to build interest and excitement. Personally…
I'm interested because Windows has an avalanche of great software, and I think it might be great having Windows In Glass With A Pen And A Keyboard.
The biggest problem with everything presented today is that it's going to spend its first product cycle competing against iPad 4 running iOS 6. And I'll bet you dollars to doughnuts that Apple has an equivalent Keyboard Cover all ready to go if the winds start blowing that direction.
Yes, it's very similar to the iPad in many ways. But other than some of the marketing, it doesn't seem to fall any closer to Apple than any of the Android tablets we've been seeing for the last year. In fact, the metro UI (extreme minimalism) is pretty drastically different from Apple's style (extreme detail). Apple phased out the bold color designs years ago. (And don't feed me the "Microsoft is just really slow at copying" nonsense - it's clearly as much an original design as any.)
A lot of the arguments against it are the sort of arguments Samsung fought against in its lawsuit with Apple. The result of that was a totally unique product, and an awful one. (http://www.androidpolice.com/2012/05/04/the-samsung-galaxy-s...)
Hello enterprise ready tablets!
From a marketing perspective, the video on the site is terrible compared to Apple's iPad site. If you go here: http://www.apple.com/ipad/ You see someone using an iPad, how big it is, how simple it is to use, what it's capable of doing, and you can immediately think the possibilities. Microsoft's video shows some dark crumbling rocks and dust, and this strange tablet device with different colored keyboards. There is…
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I do wonder a bit, how will this blurring of the laptop/tablet line affect their cash cow, Microsoft Office? The business world is trained to believe: they NEED office, and office == productivity. The iPad, long without these apps, challenged this ideal. How would the tablet world spilling into the laptop world affect Office sales...
Even my boss and my partner, died-in-the-wool Windows fans, are well aware of OpenOffice. The idea that MS Office is necessary for productivity simply does not exist. Anyone in an office still using Windows has at least considered the possibility of seeing Linux or Mac on their desktop. Maybe not seriously, but the thought has crossed their mind.
If you have thousands of pre-existing spreadsheets in your office, many of them running fairly complex VBA macros, the idea that MS Office is necessary certainly does exist. And I've never worked anywhere where that isn't the case.
And at organizations of this type, the licensing cost of Office per desktop is peanuts. Can't remember what the prices were, but I was shocked how little it costs large organizations.
I don't understand the "OMG MICROSOFT MADE A TABLET IT IS CLEARLY COPYING THE IPAD" reaction Microsoft's getting here. They're absolutely ahead of the curve with the blending of mobile and desktop operating systems, something which I am extremely happy they are doing, and this is absolutely the logical design choices someone in that position would make. Yes, it's very similar to the iPad in many ways. But other than…