Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Windows 8 and the Microsoft Surface

ignorethecode.net

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

111–120 of 162 posts

Re: Windows 8 and the Microsoft Surface

#111

Post by mkr-hn »

eropple wrote: post #82
doorhammer wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The digital pen part is the one that keeps tempting me to check out the surface pro 2. I'm no artist, but having a digital notebook would be really nice. I want something that really comes close to the fidelity and feel of a notebook and a pen. For instance, when I'm sketching out a design or an idea, I like to jot down the ideas, connections, etc, and move them around. I like doodling random notes during meetings, a…

I bought one yesterday on the strength of the pen alone. It was an impulse buy and I may return it (14 day return, no-restock-fee), but it is really, really impressive and I'm digging it. It'll also let me build a touch version of my game on a system I can also build on, which is pretty handy. I wasn't looking forward to deploying to Android ten bajillion times. Also, oh my god is OneNote wonderful with that pen. It…

You're boot-curious. It's normal.

Re: Windows 8 and the Microsoft Surface

#112

Post by satyrnein »

manilafolder wrote: post #54
satyrnein wrote: post #29

I definitely concur about the handwriting recognition being terrific, but the interface being terrible. I wrote a little prototype of how I thought it should work a few months ago: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zhn6EdN3Vvw

Great demo. That's exactly how the handwriting UI should have been designed. I have one small suggestion, if you don't mind: How about making the input box increase in size (maybe double in size) so you don't have to write so small? The resizing wouldn't need to reflow the rest of the page; it could turn into a modal textbox in the same location as the original textbox. It would make it easier for children, the elder…

Actually, my plan was to have the recognition area expand beyond the visual size of the input box as soon as your pen touched the input box, so as not to penalize the user for wandering out of the box a bit, while not having any visually jarring effect, but it's worth experimenting.

And of course, there is still the option of scaling the page overall. It's possible the audiences that would want bigger input boxes would also want the text and images to be bigger as well, but it needs research to confirm.

Re: Windows 8 and the Microsoft Surface

#113

Post by satyrnein »

LukasMathis wrote: post #62
manilafolder wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Great demo. That's exactly how the handwriting UI should have been designed. I have one small suggestion, if you don't mind: How about making the input box increase in size (maybe double in size) so you don't have to write so small? The resizing wouldn't need to reflow the rest of the page; it could turn into a modal textbox in the same location as the original textbox. It would make it easier for children, the elder…

Another option would be to set the text caret inside the text box, but allow people to write anywhere, while the focus is on a text field. This is probably something where you'd have to do a ton of different prototypes, and see which one feels best.

Agreed that there are plenty of ideas that warrant prototyping, but I think there is special value in not having a text cursor to manage at all, similar to how touchscreens obviated mouse cursors for certain tasks.

Re: Windows 8 and the Microsoft Surface

#114

Post by codeulike »

LukasMathis wrote: post #40
AndrewGaspar wrote: post #35

"The way I want handwriting recognition to work is to take notes by jotting them down inside an app like OneNote, and have Windows recognize that automatically, behind the scenes, optionally without replacing my handwritten notes with printed text. Then, I want to be able to search my handwritten notes using full-text search." OneNote actually already does this! Try searching in OneNote for things you've written in p…

I just tried, but it didn't find anything. Not sure if my handwriting is so terrible, or if there's something else going wrong here. [Update: maybe the Metro version of OneNote doesn't support all of the features of the desktop version?]

There's a free version of OneNote and a paid version, presumably this feature is in the paid version

Re: Windows 8 and the Microsoft Surface

#116

Post by eropple »

doorhammer wrote: post #102
eropple wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I bought one yesterday on the strength of the pen alone. It was an impulse buy and I may return it (14 day return, no-restock-fee), but it is really, really impressive and I'm digging it. It'll also let me build a touch version of my game on a system I can also build on, which is pretty handy. I wasn't looking forward to deploying to Android ten bajillion times. Also, oh my god is OneNote wonderful with that pen. It…

I'm going to go take a look at one now and see how I like it. I doubt I'll pick one up today, but who knows. I've impulse bought worse.

I'm convinced they'd have art students lined up around the block if they had ArtRage, Painter, and Photoshop with the WinTab drivers on display. But instead they hock that "Fresh Paint" program, which isn't bad but is no ArtRage or Painter.

Re: Windows 8 and the Microsoft Surface

#117

Post by wluu »

GSimon wrote: post #33

I think this year and the next few years should be promising for Windows in the Tablet/Phone market. They were behind in specs for a while but their products are improving and are getting harder to ignore. I recently ordered Lenovo's ThinkPad 8 and can't wait for it to arrive. I think this is the first good alternative to the Windows Surface (it's lighter, higher res, better battery, smaller bezel, usb 3.0, sd card s…

The ThinkPad 8 looks great (great screen res, micro usb 3.0), just wish it had the Wacom style digitiser of the Surface Pro.

I know that the Asus Vivo Tab Note 8 has the Wacom digitiser though but has a much lower res.

Also wish that these 8" devices had seperate ports for charging and USB.

Re: Windows 8 and the Microsoft Surface

#118

Post by Terretta »

You might want to send your letter to a friend to read. Maybe that friend will send back some suggestions. On an iPad, you can’t see the email with the suggestions and your letter at the same time.

Multitasking gestures on iPad and Macs let you slide back and forth between adjacent full screen apps.

Your CV probably includes a picture. Maybe you went to a photographer who gave you a CD with copies of the pictures she took. You can’t easily copy them to your iPad.

Can't easily copy CD to my current computer either. But I have both a USB adapter and card reader adapter for the iPad.

Once there, you probably want to touch them up a bit, and crop them. It might be inconvenient to move the image file between all of the apps you’ll use to work on it.

You're unlikely to need more than the pretty amazing version of iPhoto on an iPad. If you prefer, there are multiple alternatives from the free SnapSeed to relatively expensive pro options.

Finally, you might want to export your letter and CV as PDFs, maybe combine them into a single PDF, or maybe ZIP them. You want to attach the resulting file to an email. It’s reasonably simple on a Mac or PC, but I’m not sure if some of these things are even possible on an iPad.

Check out Documents 5 from Readdle, along with PDF Expert, and you don't have to leave the apps.

I use iPad for contract work (round trip MS Word with track changes) all the time, and when not doing Word, PowerPoint, or Excel using iWork apps, I'm importing and editing and posting pro-size photos from a Nikon D3.

From your article, I'm guessing you're missing the excellent Logitech ultraslim keyboard case, have multitasking gestures turned off, and aren't that familiar with the productivity applications available.

Re: Windows 8 and the Microsoft Surface

#119

Post by nirnira »

marcosdumay wrote: post #64
LukasMathis wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I thought the article already covered a wide range of topics, so I wanted to focus on comparing the iPad and the Surface. You're right, though, Android solves many of these problems, too.

It's a bit unusual to say "look, this niche system solves a problem that the one used by 1/3 of the people does not solve", while ignoring that the one used by the other 2/3 of the people solves it. It's a honest comparison, it's just completely useless.

Sorry, what? Android isn't a productivity solution yet. Not even close. No manufacturer is trying with Android to build what Microsoft is building with 8.1+ - a coherent, unified, cross-device productivity and computing ecosystem.

Re: Windows 8 and the Microsoft Surface

#120

Post by seanmcdirmid »

Terretta wrote: post #118

You might want to send your letter to a friend to read. Maybe that friend will send back some suggestions. On an iPad, you can’t see the email with the suggestions and your letter at the same time. Multitasking gestures on iPad and Macs let you slide back and forth between adjacent full screen apps. Your CV probably includes a picture. Maybe you went to a photographer who gave you a CD with copies of the pictures she…

> From your article, I'm guessing you're missing the excellent Logitech ultraslim keyboard case, have multitasking gestures turned off, and aren't that familiar with the productivity applications available.

I agree that productivity is possible with an iPad, but perhaps it requires "being familiar" with a lot of stuff before you can be very effective with it.

Post reply on HN