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The I-Tech Virtual Laser Keyboard
avtchillsboro writes, "The NY Times has a rather fluffy article (registration required) about stuff you can buy to 'accessorize' your smart phone & or cell phone (so passé!). What caught my eye was the I-Tech Virtual Laser Keyboard. From the vendor's website: 'The Virtual Laser Keyboard (VKB) uses both infrared and laser technology to generate an invisible field and project a full-size virtual QWERTY keyboard on any surface... The I-Tech VKB reacts exactly like a real keyboard. Direction technology based on optical recognition enables the user to tap the images of the keys, complete with realistic tapping sounds(!), which feeds into the compatible PDA, Smartphone, laptop, or PC. Note: The VKB is both PC and Macintosh compatible!'"
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=02/03/18/131420 7&tid=126
The guy who got one of these in 2003 was arrested whilst using one on a plane to submit the article.
His computer went into standby at a critical moment and upon his release from gitmo powered up his laptop and allowed the submission to go through.
Please note that the poster or his dell laptop cannot be located, however there is a strong burning smell coming from his apartment.
liqbase
There was a dupe back in 2003 too!
...from here.
Laser keyboards have a high rate of false key presses, because your fingers have to pass over other keys, and you can't feel the keys.
"Sony anounced today a recall of their ultra high power laser keyboards. After several unfortunate power surges resulted in lost fingers they felt a recall was wise."
"The I-Tech VKB reacts exactly like a real keyboard."
One of the reasons I type so much faster than I can talk is that I get so much tactile feedback from the physical keys on the keyboard. My hands know when I've mistyped usually before I can even see the difference on the display. A little lingering feeling in my hands that they've missed the pattern they were expected to type. Despite the simulated clicking sounds to my ear, I expect that I'll make a lot more mistakes on a keyboard which doesn't offer tactile feedback that I've hit a key, complete with a little "throw" through its unique 3D spatial path.
That kind of feedback is extremely important to using any device. It's why eliminating any grasped tool for purely gestural expression seems doomed inferior to actually touching something. Maybe just a dumb pad that gives just tactile feedback, without needing to deliver any sensory info back to the processor, is plenty to complete the loop. But just tapping my fingers on an unresponsive surface, or one different in shape/texture/response every time, will be much worse than typing on even a tiny crowded keyboard, or maybe even A9 keypad entry.
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make install -not war
I got one of these a few months ago, figuring i'd be able to use it to type faster than I would with the hand writing recognition/on screen keyboard of my lifedrive. Turns out I make enough mistakes, and need to go slow enough with it that the handwriting recognition is faster on it. The On Screne Keyboard is probably the fastest method of inputting (provided you don't have to use symbols and such). I've been meaning to put mine on ebay for the last months, but i'm a lazy bastard.