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Is Microsoft Right About Touchscreen Computers?

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Re: Is Microsoft Right About Touchscreen Computers?

#11

Post by wluu »

mgkimsal wrote: post #4

I played with 3 Win8 touchscreen computers at a store the other day. The big 'all in one' one - from HP I think - was just not good. You might get used to it, but I didn't like it. The dragging - which you end up having to do a lot of - was pretty slow, and no amount of poking around in the system settings showed a way to change the responsiveness. Secondly, it doesn't seem that there's any sort of speed sensitivity…

I tried an Acer all in one with a touch screen, then a Sony Vaio 11 Duo and then to a bunch of non-touch laptops running Windows 8 in a store over the weekend.

I think in terms of Windows 8, the new touch screen is easier to navigate and interact with using touch than it is with keyboard and mouse. And feels more natural.

I think the keyboard & mouse experience could be improved.

An example, my brother installed Windows 8 on his Lenovo Thinkpad the other day and took a good few minutes trying to find the shutdown button until I showed him where it is now. (Hover right to bring up the charms, select power. Or press ctrl+alt+delete. Or if all else fails, pressing the power button should shutdown the device).

Re: Is Microsoft Right About Touchscreen Computers?

#12

Post by GuiA »

adriand wrote: post #3

On the rare occasions when my five-year-old son gets his hands on my Macbook, he frequently tries to interact with it by tapping and swiping the screen. Growing up with tablets around, this is natural to him. I know that's just one anecdote, but it's enough to make me think that the OP is right that regular, non-tablet computers will commonly have touch screens.

>regular, non-tablet computers will commonly have touch screens.

I think the conclusion is rather that soon enough, regular computers will be tablets (or tabletops).

Re: Is Microsoft Right About Touchscreen Computers?

#13

Post by eupharis »

pm90 wrote: post #7
adriand wrote: post #3

On the rare occasions when my five-year-old son gets his hands on my Macbook, he frequently tries to interact with it by tapping and swiping the screen. Growing up with tablets around, this is natural to him. I know that's just one anecdote, but it's enough to make me think that the OP is right that regular, non-tablet computers will commonly have touch screens.

I think a lot of the people saying that Windows 8 is the most terrible mistake are forgetting precisely this. Dell has just released a series of laptop/tablet hybrids running win8, and also has Desktops with touchscreen. I think Microsoft has done a great job by facilitating this transition(to "all computers with touchscreen") with win8. Now that a major Software has a touch-based paradigm, hardware vendors will have…

Wow. This is mindblowing. I just went through the thought/body experiment:

On your desktop/laptop, assume you already have a touchscreen and everything works perfectly. Assume every swipe interaction you have ever used works perfectly.

Interact with the computer. Navigate around the computer. Drag and drop files. Surf around the internet. Click tabs and hyperlinks and whatever with the mouse, with touch, even with tab+space, whatever feels natural.

Do it. Seriously, literally do it. Go through the motions.

Re: Is Microsoft Right About Touchscreen Computers?

#14

Post by damian2000 »

chrismorgan wrote: post #2

The article's title is "Microsoft Is Right About Touchscreen Computers", not the interrogative form as this post's title currently is. It should be corrected.

The submitter probably disagreed with the article's conclusion. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betteridge%27s_law_of_headlines

Re: Is Microsoft Right About Touchscreen Computers?

#15

Post by TimGebhardt »

Well don't forget that they were doing tablets all the way back in 2002. They just didn't have the foresight or guts to revamp the ecosystem around it. So the tablets didn't work because they needed to take advantage of the existing mouse-based Windows ecosystem of software, most of which was just too cumbersome to use on a tablet with a stylus.

It took the internet about 10 years to really take off too and there were a lot of visionaries in the early 90s that just couldn't survive until the hockey stick growth really started to take off and validate their assessments.

Re: Is Microsoft Right About Touchscreen Computers?

#16

Post by Mythbusters »

potatolicious wrote: post #9

I think Microsoft is, at least in concept, on to something. Whether or not they're right is a matter of execution - not only on their part, but on the part of the OEMs who have a nasty habit of doing the most short-sighted things possible. A general purpose tablet computer, with the right feature set, with the right price point, and most importantly, with the right user experience, can be huge . But of all the Win8 d…

Right is subjective. Care to explain? Maybe there is no single device that gets everything right? But are there separate devices that each got one aspect right? Care to give examples?

My pint is that Windows ecosystem is all about diversity. If there exist separate devices, some manufacturer will bring the together.

Re: Is Microsoft Right About Touchscreen Computers?

#17

Post by snowfarthing »

adriand wrote: post #3

On the rare occasions when my five-year-old son gets his hands on my Macbook, he frequently tries to interact with it by tapping and swiping the screen. Growing up with tablets around, this is natural to him. I know that's just one anecdote, but it's enough to make me think that the OP is right that regular, non-tablet computers will commonly have touch screens.

Several years ago I bought a used Sharp Zaurus. I got so used to using the touch screen that, even now, I reach for a stylus when I try to use my TI-89.

I now have an Asus Transformer, and I find that I now reach for the screen on laptops as well. However, when I plug my mouse into my Transformer, it annoys my that I cannot use the mouse as I've comes to expect it to be used; instead, the OS interprets everything the mouse does as gestures.

I hope to someday install Linux on my tablet, and then try to create an interface that treats touch as touch, and mouse as mouse. I also have ideas for touch I'd like to experiment with.

Re: Is Microsoft Right About Touchscreen Computers?

#18

Post by pm90 »

eupharis wrote: post #13
pm90 wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think a lot of the people saying that Windows 8 is the most terrible mistake are forgetting precisely this. Dell has just released a series of laptop/tablet hybrids running win8, and also has Desktops with touchscreen. I think Microsoft has done a great job by facilitating this transition(to "all computers with touchscreen") with win8. Now that a major Software has a touch-based paradigm, hardware vendors will have…

Wow. This is mindblowing. I just went through the thought/body experiment: On your desktop/laptop, assume you already have a touchscreen and everything works perfectly. Assume every swipe interaction you have ever used works perfectly. Interact with the computer. Navigate around the computer. Drag and drop files. Surf around the internet. Click tabs and hyperlinks and whatever with the mouse, with touch, even with ta…

I see what you're getting at, and I agree that it feels quite clunky....now. But I wouldn't be so dismissive quite yet. What if in the future you could detach your screen and keep it on the table? Now, you have an actual "surface" (just like a tablet). You can play games with others on this surface . Maybe, divide the screens and then have everyone use part of their screen for their own work. (I'm just listing what I could think of doing with a really large tablet)

My point is simply that once we have touchscreens on every desktop, it might enable ways to interact with your computer that we might not even have thought of yet.

edit: added "similarity to tablet" part

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