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

A Motion-Sensing Keyboard

research.microsoft.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

61–70 of 140 posts

Re: A Motion-Sensing Keyboard

#61

Post by FajitaNachos »

zenbowman wrote: post #31
FajitaNachos wrote: post #18

I've been messing around with a Leap Motion device lately, and while I was initially skeptical, there are some actions which are genuinely more pleasant than using a keyboard alone. Sure, it may not be ideal for everyday computing, but it can be great for specific scenarios. Think a presentation, or something that has less frequent interactions than surfing the web.

I think Leap Motion is great, but I think that same kind of sensing can be achieved through lower tech ways, like a multi-color glove plus a webcam. It is a cool idea and I hope they succeed, but I'm working on the low-tech LEAP idea and I'd like to see how far that can stack up to their more complex system.

I would be interested to hear more about the low tech ways, but I don't find Leap to be overly complex. There is a lot of math if you're on the developer side, but I think you need that level of complexity to be able to customize it for whatever your needs are.

Re: A Motion-Sensing Keyboard

#62

Post by [deleted] »

lvs wrote: post #44
btbuildem wrote: post #33

Hm, I wonder how quickly the sensors would be covered in random kbd crud.. Cool idea, but why not leverage a Leap Motion device somehow?

Actually, I wonder if the troubled Leap Motion device is a good argument against this whole approach.

[deleted]

Re: A Motion-Sensing Keyboard

#64

Post by amatheus »

guelo wrote: post #26

The idea of turning the surface of the keyboard into a trackpad is very cool, you could almost get rid of the mouse. Except for, how do you click the mouse pointer? Accidental clicks of keyboard keys is probably what makes it impractical.

you could click the buttons with your thumb behind the space bar. In fact, I guess for typing it would be better if you kept the fingers on the keyboard, so why not make the keyboard keys touch sensitive?

Re: A Motion-Sensing Keyboard

#65

Post by joshschreuder »

dnlserrano wrote: post #12

It reminded me a lot of Apple's Magic Mouse: https://www.apple.com/magicmouse/ I did not enjoy working with it, one of the few times I had to use a Mac to do something. However, I think these new forms of interaction will definitely play an important role in the way we will use (mechanical) interfaces in the future. A bit off-topic, but have you seen this? https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/mimu/mimu-glove-for-mus.…

HN discussion on the Mi.Mu: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7570361

Re: A Motion-Sensing Keyboard

#66

Post by interpol_p »

dchichkov wrote: post #43

Brilliant! Not sure I like that particular implementation (with IR), but the idea of having the whole desktop keyboard work like a giant track pad is an enticing one. Can a track pad surface be integrated into every keyboard key?

The problem with the implementation demonstrated in the video is that the gesture is recognised, and then the action happens.

There is no one-to-one mapping between the gesture in progress and action on screen, so I suspect it will not feel anywhere near as nice as a trackpad or touchscreen.

Re: A Motion-Sensing Keyboard

#68

Post by prawn »

rjd wrote: post #29
pbnjay wrote: post #2

I find it amusing that they used an Apple keyboard... Then again the chiclet style keys seem to be a big factor in the build.

... umm.. because its white? and every thats white is Apple? If you actually look at it you'll see its a not printed anything like an Apple keyboard, the letters are offset for one, they are centered on Apple keyboards, and has Windows keys.

Looks like it has a Command key to me.

Re: A Motion-Sensing Keyboard

#69

Post by melling »

m_mueller wrote: post #47
melling wrote: post #22

When is someone going to start replacing parts of the keyboard? Remove the function keys and replace them with quick gestures? Is there a copy/paste gesture on the way?

Rather than removing functionality of already crammed laptop keyboards, I rather think this will be used to get rid of the touchpad and allow smaller laptop form factors that still have full sized keyboards, e.g. new kinds of surface devices.

The ESC key, and all the function keys, on my Mac laptop are half height keys. Personally, I'd rather just have an ESC gesture, for example.
Post reply on HN