Posted by
michael
on from the up-up-down-down-left-right-left-right dept.
_iris writes: "As reported on the Dot, gesture control (apparently all the rage with the kids after the latest Opera release) is coming to KDE. You can find a _very_ early release of KGesture here." Sounds like a recipe for carpal tunnel to me.
Actually, I would LOVE to see this in a game like Diablo II. You learn spells, and then you cast them by making gestures with your mouse over your enemies. Being a magic user might actually take some talent then.
oh, to hell w/ voice recognition. as i don't work in the US i am missing out on the cubicle culture and i'm sitting in my office w/ 2 other people. i think all hell will break loose if we all start mumbling "close window", "open xterm" all day. heck, I imagine a support call coming in, someone here says "Close Window" and the guy on the other end of the phone actually does this... "Uh, no, not you, that was just someone wanting to CLOSE a WINDOW"... hm, chain reaction anyone?:)
on the other hand imagine all the pranks you could play on your co-workers computer if you can teach them to react to everyday words in a real weird way:)
The multi platform 3D modeling program
blender (full featured and fits on a floppy!) has had this for a few years now. It's really pretty easy to get used to.
Congrats to KDE
-pos
The truth is more important than the facts.
-- The truth is more important than the facts. -Frank Lloyd Wright
Before you dismiss this out of 'hand' . . .
by
brickbat
·
· Score: 5
Sorry, had to get that horrible pun out of my system.
Seriously: while gesture controls may not be ready for prime time just yet, consider that the technology may prove useful for those who communicate best using only their hands. A 17-year-old from Colorado recently won the grand prize at the International Science and Engineering Fair for designing a glove that can interpret the movements of someone "speaking" in American Sign Language (ASL) and then output the communication as text.
So, the hard of hearing could control their computer with ASL commands, or dictate letters the same way the rest of us can with a voice-powered word processor, using beefed-up gesture control technology and, of course, hardware that can reliably interpret their hand movements. It's somewhat tangential to the story, but an intriguing concept nonetheless.
new life for porn browsing
by
Dark+Paladin
·
· Score: 3
You know, I could comment from there - but I'm not:). John "Dark Paladin" Hummel
How to use this effectively
by
benploni
·
· Score: 5
After spending some time playing with this, I have learned a few things:
1) Don't bother with fancy gestures yet. Only simple ones, like L will work with any reliability.
2) You *must* pause before and after the gesture. This is CRUCIAL. A slight pause, gesture, pause.
3) Scale doesnt matter. Small l, big L, it doesn't matter. It would be nice if I could filter smaller motions.
4) Understand dcop. dcop will allow you to do gestures for all sorts of KDE apps. For example, you could have gesture that makes the konquror web browser "go back", or "reload". Or it could have kmail cheack your mail. Try running kcdop, a graphical dcop browser, to get an idea of what's possible.
DCOP is one of the most wicked things about KDE. And you know what? Each and every KDE application is linked against DCOP so potentially -- all of them support it. Konqueror definitely supports DCOP, and has a nice interface for simpler methods like "open a new window" but for more complicated things like "back" or "reload" it gets a little tricky but you CAN do it... fully control your Konqueror for the command line.
DCOP and the DCOP interfaces will only get better and better, KDE should push and promote this stuff. It's something GNOME really can't compete in, yet, not even with Bonobo.
-- (Please browse at -1 to read this comment.)
Not new, not revolutionary...
by
joto
·
· Score: 3
No, it's not new, and it is not revolutionary. But it is a good idea that has taken surprisingly long time to catch on in the mainstream. While I can probably see better uses for it than in a web-browser (e.g. a CAD-program, or some other mainly graphical app, such as computer games or graphics applications), it is interesting to see if the time is ripe for such a good idea to finally reach the mainstream...
In case you don't like to take my word for it, gesture recognition has existed in at least one free GPL'd C++ library for quite a few years (long before Gtk came to life, and AFAIK also before Qt, at least before it became popular). The library is called Amulet and has several other interesting features, such as a constraint solver for geometry layout. Another interesting aspect of Amulet is that it does not use class-based inheritance, but uses a prototype-based approach (in the form of a C++ library) instead.
But the history goes even further back. Basically, Amulet is just a reimplementation in C++ of an even older Common Lisp library called Garnet. Sadly Garnet seems to be relatively unmaintained these days, but it provides many of the same features in a much better suited language (yes, Common Lisp is better suited for this kind of programming, although I must admit that modern C++ is a surprisingly flexible language, given it's static nature).
They could advance the technology even further
by
Rosco+P.+Coltrane
·
· Score: 3
When the "gesture control" program will be able to recognize more than 26 "gestures", they'll be able
to create a very nifty "letter gesturing" control.
This will be groundbreaking ! I suggest that we call this new feature "handwriting recognition". My friend next to me, always very creative, suggests that we call is "grafiti", but somehow I can't imagine that a company would be so misguided as to use such a silly name.
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
-- "A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
Am I the only one who quickly abandoned B&W, due to frequent misinterpretation of gestures?
There are limitations to gesture controls, but B&W is built for it. It's part of the game, because you're a god, so waving your hand around should produce miracles, not some function key being pressed. It's part of the mystique and aura of the game, and involves you in the story more. So while gesture based commands may be slightly gimmicky for everyday workstation use, it works well in a game where you're supposed to be a 'god', producing magical effects with the wave of a hand. I have temporarily given up the game cause it never really saves my games, but I really like the gestures for this game only. I'll stick to keyboard commands for everything else I think.
I'm sure at least some of you have done over the phone tech-support (even a litle).
Ever have trouble getting someone to right-click and drag? Try this:
"OK, now close your current window by holding down the right and middle mouse button, while making a square, clockwise, aterting from the top left corner. Now, open a new konsole by holding down the right mouse button, and then moving right a short distance, then down, then right for a short distance, then up."
DarkWinter, part-time gesture phone support expert, fulltime psychotic.
--
Even if it looks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, you can't be sure until you see the RealDuck
So could I use this to send a relpy to all the Spam I get? I've got a great gesture for them.
-- Americans could not be more self absorbed if they were made of equal parts water and paper towel. -Dennis Miller
Your a wanna-be (feature's already there)
by
Duley
·
· Score: 3
Erm, try right clicking on the toolbar handle and this is what you get:
Text Position->Icons Only, Text Only, Text aside icons, Text under icons.
There are your labels. Been here ever since KDE2.0 development first started. You can also select icon size and got a selection of small, medium, and large.
As for "progressive disclosure", I don't see this problem but if you do almost all of the menus and toolbars are constructed out of XML. Edit them if you think you can do better and post it to the KDE mailing lists (or the application author).
Slashdot Mirror
Netscape: "RAM! We need more RAM!"
oh, to hell w/ voice recognition. as i don't work in the US i am missing out on the cubicle culture and i'm sitting in my office w/ 2 other people. i think all hell will break loose if we all start mumbling "close window", "open xterm" all day. heck, I imagine a support call coming in, someone here says "Close Window" and the guy on the other end of the phone actually does this ... "Uh, no, not you, that was just someone wanting to CLOSE a WINDOW" ... hm, chain reaction anyone? :)
:)
on the other hand imagine all the pranks you could play on your co-workers computer if you can teach them to react to everyday words in a real weird way
By freezing a standard too quickly, bad implementations can be propogated more often than necessary.
--
FYI, ACDSee's scrollwheel support also helps, and is probably better for quickly scrolling past some of the crap that shows up on usenet sometimes.
--
Just so that everyone knows:
The multi platform 3D modeling program
blender (full featured and fits on a floppy!) has had this for a few years now. It's really pretty easy to get used to.
Congrats to KDE
-pos
The truth is more important than the facts.
The truth is more important than the facts.
-Frank Lloyd Wright
Sorry, had to get that horrible pun out of my system.
Seriously: while gesture controls may not be ready for prime time just yet, consider that the technology may prove useful for those who communicate best using only their hands. A 17-year-old from Colorado recently won the grand prize at the International Science and Engineering Fair for designing a glove that can interpret the movements of someone "speaking" in American Sign Language (ASL) and then output the communication as text.
So, the hard of hearing could control their computer with ASL commands, or dictate letters the same way the rest of us can with a voice-powered word processor, using beefed-up gesture control technology and, of course, hardware that can reliably interpret their hand movements. It's somewhat tangential to the story, but an intriguing concept nonetheless.
You know, I could comment from there - but I'm not :).
John "Dark Paladin" Hummel
52 Weeks, 52 Religions with John Hummel
After spending some time playing with this, I have learned a few things:
1) Don't bother with fancy gestures yet. Only simple ones, like L will work with any reliability.
2) You *must* pause before and after the gesture. This is CRUCIAL. A slight pause, gesture, pause.
3) Scale doesnt matter. Small l, big L, it doesn't matter. It would be nice if I could filter smaller motions.
4) Understand dcop. dcop will allow you to do gestures for all sorts of KDE apps. For example, you could have gesture that makes the konquror web browser "go back", or "reload". Or it could have kmail cheack your mail. Try running kcdop, a graphical dcop browser, to get an idea of what's possible.
KDE Rules, Good luck!
DCOP is one of the most wicked things about KDE. And you know what? Each and every KDE application is linked against DCOP so potentially -- all of them support it. Konqueror definitely supports DCOP, and has a nice interface for simpler methods like "open a new window" but for more complicated things like "back" or "reload" it gets a little tricky but you CAN do it... fully control your Konqueror for the command line. DCOP and the DCOP interfaces will only get better and better, KDE should push and promote this stuff. It's something GNOME really can't compete in, yet, not even with Bonobo.
(Please browse at -1 to read this comment.)
In case you don't like to take my word for it, gesture recognition has existed in at least one free GPL'd C++ library for quite a few years (long before Gtk came to life, and AFAIK also before Qt, at least before it became popular). The library is called Amulet and has several other interesting features, such as a constraint solver for geometry layout. Another interesting aspect of Amulet is that it does not use class-based inheritance, but uses a prototype-based approach (in the form of a C++ library) instead.
But the history goes even further back. Basically, Amulet is just a reimplementation in C++ of an even older Common Lisp library called Garnet. Sadly Garnet seems to be relatively unmaintained these days, but it provides many of the same features in a much better suited language (yes, Common Lisp is better suited for this kind of programming, although I must admit that modern C++ is a surprisingly flexible language, given it's static nature).
This will be groundbreaking ! I suggest that we call this new feature "handwriting recognition". My friend next to me, always very creative, suggests that we call is "grafiti", but somehow I can't imagine that a company would be so misguided as to use such a silly name.
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
There are limitations to gesture controls, but B&W is built for it. It's part of the game, because you're a god, so waving your hand around should produce miracles, not some function key being pressed. It's part of the mystique and aura of the game, and involves you in the story more. So while gesture based commands may be slightly gimmicky for everyday workstation use, it works well in a game where you're supposed to be a 'god', producing magical effects with the wave of a hand. I have temporarily given up the game cause it never really saves my games, but I really like the gestures for this game only. I'll stick to keyboard commands for everything else I think.
Ever have trouble getting someone to right-click and drag? Try this:
"OK, now close your current window by holding down the right and middle mouse button, while making a square, clockwise, aterting from the top left corner. Now, open a new konsole by holding down the right mouse button, and then moving right a short distance, then down, then right for a short distance, then up."
DarkWinter, part-time gesture phone support expert, fulltime psychotic.
Even if it looks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, you can't be sure until you see the RealDuck
So could I use this to send a relpy to all the Spam I get? I've got a great gesture for them.
Americans could not be more self absorbed if they were made of equal parts water and paper towel. -Dennis Miller
Text Position->Icons Only, Text Only, Text aside icons, Text under icons.
There are your labels. Been here ever since KDE2.0 development first started. You can also select icon size and got a selection of small, medium, and large.
As for "progressive disclosure", I don't see this problem but if you do almost all of the menus and toolbars are constructed out of XML. Edit them if you think you can do better and post it to the KDE mailing lists (or the application author).