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A GUI For Books
NASA's Goddard Flight Center has just issued a contract to use Touch User Interface technology from a company called Somatic Digital. Their "TouchBooks" let printed material connect to digital devices via sensors in the covers. (C'mon, don't tell me you've never pressed on a URL on a printed page and expected something to happen.) This page on the vendor's site has videos of a 7-year-old using a TouchBook. Works with XP and OS X.
(C'mon, don't tell me you've never pressed on a URL on a printed page and expected something to happen.)
Ok, I won't tell you that I've never done it.
There is no mod option "-1: Disagree" for a reason. "Overrated" is not an acceptable substitute. Post something instead.
Back slowly away from the psychoactive drugs, these nice men want to have a little talk with you.
... and then they built the supercollider.
How sad do you have to be click on a link in a book? And people tell _me_ that I'm addicted to computers. When I read a book (volunteerily) I do it so as preference to reading from a screen.
"Thanks for all the money you paid to us. We've used it to buy off ISO among other things" -Microsoft
I read tfa but for the life of me I can't come up with a useful application of
this technology. Are there any samples of use out there ? Anybody used this ?
MP3 Search Engine
This page on the vendor's site has videos of a 7-year-old using a TouchBook.
OK, but little kids pick up on things pretty well. Like grandma asking little Timmy to open her child-proof medecine bottle for her.
Show me a video of my grandma using this thing and I'll be impressed.
C'mon, don't tell me you've never pressed on a URL on a printed page and expected something to happen
What kind of dumbass approved that message?
If you imagine this as a tablet pc, or electronic book, kids can get pronunciation and other learning information about the words they are reading, or even the content. Imagine HTML being used to its full potential. You get the quarterly report in summary form, and links take you to the additiona information that you wish to see by selecting from the menu presented when you click on a word or link...
Oh wait...
Never mind
Support NYCountryLawyer RIAA vs People
tried clicking a link in a book...
one time in college after several days of no sleep and too much coding, I tried to click on a post-it note that was stuck to the top corner of my monitor.
And another time at work -- again after too little sleep -- I ctrl-c'd something on one computer, then walked into another room and tried to paste it onto that computer. Twice. Then I actually stopped to think about what I was doing.
I can tell you I've never tried "pressing" a URL on anywhere other than an electronic screen (not even physical hyperlinks (Semacodes).
What I miss more in hard copies of books though, is an easy search/grep functionality. Yeah, Indexes and Table of Contents try to achieve this to a certain extent, but that's nothing compared to the search capability in Electronic documents.
On countless occasions, after a long day of poring over text in vi, and searching for text as easily as "/[search-pattern]", I miss the same capability when I sit down to read a printed book.
And no, I don't want to go to http://books.google.com/ when I want to find the last page I read that I read a Character's name on in my mystery novel.
An Indian-American Hindu committed to non-violent thought/speech/action alarmed by the global explosion of radical Islam
C'mon, don't tell me you've never pressed on a URL on a printed page and expected something to happen.
No, but I do lick my fingertips before I click the "Next" button.
No folly is more costly than the folly of intolerant idealism. - Winston Churchill
Their "TouchBooks" let printed material connect to digital devices via sensors in the covers.
Oh great. Just wait until the "Catcher in the Rye" crowd gets wind of this.
The theory of relativity doesn't work right in Arkansas.
Recently, I did glance up at the top-right corner of a book to see what time it was. And was disappointed to see a page number instead.
I think you're a little out of touch with modern kids. My son would was perfectly comfortable using a mouse, keyboard, and joystick to launch and play his favorite games. At 3. My wife does simple spreadsheets with her grade 1 class.
No, but I have looked for an "UNDO" button when filling out paper forms...
Grammar -- F
Design -- D
Technical understanding -- F
Orthography -- D-
Yeah, that's gonna be a huge success.
I've been trying for the last hour to use the demo, but everytime they ask me to touch the star, but I'm always just too late because I always get another shot at it. Appearantly I'm not fast enough, next time... perhaps...
Will you get electrocuted?
I have never pressed on a URL on a printed page and expected something to happen.
Slashdot Classic
...does anyone else has the taskbar at the bottom of their dreams from time to time?
Does this sig remind you of Agatha Christie?
Isn't this pretty much the same thing as the Leapfrog products? Leapfrog uses a magnetic stylist to monitor where the child is pressing on the page but this is certainly nothing new. And definitely nothing exciting or well done.
Wow, I have never seen anything like it before!
There are 01 kinds of cars in the world. The General Lee, and everything else.
... first I need to buy books that have a special sensor implanted in the spine. Then I need to be sitting in front of a computer to use it. As I click links in the book, my eyes move back and forth from the book to the screen. Sounds like another worst-of-both-worlds technology to me. Why not just give the kids an eBook and combine all this nonsense into a single, functional unit?
Never ever under any circumstances ever take a laptop into the bathroom as "something to read".
If you do have to, make sure you have enough loo roll.
Computers do not make good replacements they are sharp and don't flush very well.
liqbase
...How long it'll be until somebody hacks one of these things so they only display goatse, or screamers, no matter what you push?
"We are Samurai, the Keyboard...Cowboys"
What it the purpose of the book here? Watching the video demo, the interface is mechanically awkward, and you need the computer hooked up to the book anyway.
Compared to a touch screen you have:
1. Two fundamentally different displays: paper and screen
2. Two fundamentally different navigation tools: press on paper and use mouse on screen
My 4 year old uses a touch screen just fine. It appears you have to be older to use this contraption.
don't cut it off www.mgmbill.org
Didn't I see this technology in Toys R Us about 10 years ago sold as a leap pad? http://www.leapfrog.com/do/findproduct?key=leappad plus&ageGroupKey=grade
I haven't clicked any printed links yet, but when I read a boring printed text I sometimes attempt to highlight paragraphs and words.
... oh wait!
Engineering is the art of compromise.
(C'mon, don't tell me you've never pressed on a URL on a printed page and expected something to happen.)
No, I haven't. But then, I've been outside in the last five years, so I may not be the intended audience for that remark.
Proud member of the Weirdo-American community.
(C'mon, don't tell me you've never pressed on a URL on a printed page and expected something to happen.)
Back in high school my chemistry teacher once started wiping the white board before everyone had finished taking notes. A girl in class said "No, wait", the teacher stopped halfway through and said "Oh, sorry". Then he drew an undo button (like the one in, for example, MS Word) on the board and pushed it with his hand and said "Well it didn't work, maybe you could just copy someone elses notes".
and it made this cool crunching sound. I still can't figure out where they hid the speaker but that guy sure writes slick Javascript!
Engineering is the art of compromise.
Some random tips:
1) Try lifting the page rather than pressing on it.
2) Try placing the mouse flat on the desk rather than on the screen.
Yes, because NASA researchers are researchers, not armor installers.
on the screen and expect a url to showup somewhere like it does in the browser status bar.
Almost as big as :CueCat, I'll bet. And almost as useful.
Insightful and funny are really the same thing, except one has a punch line.
and a clever looking barcode scanner which can read the barcode and bring you to some predetermined content! or using ultra-high-powered computers, digitize the book, eliminating the need for printed materials and sensors altogether! the future never looked better. im so happy to be alive!
- blues brothers
The MAFIAA is a bunch of mindless jerks who will be the first up against the wall when the revolution comes
Jeez, the least they could do is just launch the audio from Braiile - at least spare the sight-impaired from the chorus of "Duuuude, did you see that?!" from the other kids.
One of the schools I work with has braille directory signs. They're 25 ft deep into the foyer, past several other hallways. Nice work.
"Win treats sysadmins better than users. Mac treats users better than sysadmins. Linux treats everyone like sysadmins."
C'mon, don't tell me you've never pressed on a URL on a printed page and expected something to happen.
Hell, I can't remember the last time I looked at a printed page.
Property is theft.
Absolutely. Worked OK back in the old days: DigitalDesk.
It's your choice Mods. Just do it now.
Clicking on nothing isnt that bad, yet when your trying to find the USB drive in your book is when you need to see a psychoanalyst.
*thinking of decent signature*
(C'mon, don't tell me you've never pressed on a URL on a printed page and expected something to happen.)
There was this time when I wasn't smokin something, I jokingly poked a URL in a book to demonstrate how people in the future might react when they come across one of those antique artifacts of history made of ink and dead trees sandwiched between two flat, hard, rectangular plates
Give me my freedom, and I'll take care of my own security, thank you.
...computer reads book about you!
FairTax baby!
While the "ooooh aaaaaah" factor is there, I don't see this technology as being particularly promising. It wouldn't be useful in schools because with the amount of wear and tear that school textbooks go through kids would constantly be going up to the teacher complaining that their textbook is broken. Also, having to carry a power brick around (did you see the size of that thing in the video??) for any textbook would seem to be contraindicated. And finally, if you look at the website you will see this paragraph: Tracking the usage of a book makes it a cash register to sell additional services, advertising, and products. Your book becomes a continuing point of sales to all the money-making possibilities of the digital world. Now every page can generate continuing after sales revenue. Great. Just what the world needs, another medium for spam.
People are dying in Iraq because there's not enough people. Solution: Robots. Robot musicians to Iraq.
Ninjas and pirates. How piquant.
Why wasn't there an icon for the DRM? A big frowning face or a picture of a crying baby would be a perfect fit!
Although I have never touched a link in a book/magazine to get something to happen ... I do, however, want to grep for keywords in a book/magazine all the time.
The most important differences from LeapFrog include:
So the TouchBook has the potential to far exceed the LeapFrog both in terms of lower cost to use, but in terms of more interesting functionality for the reader.
I personally am greatly looking forward to using TouchBooks with my special needs students, who would benefit from the richer reading experience it can provide at a cost much lower than the specialized products for the disabled ($845) that are sold today.
What it the purpose of the book here?
Touch screen: $300
TouchBook: $40
You are a parent with limitted income who has a child who could benefit from this rich reading environment. You are a school administrator with the same student needs whose school is running a $4 million deficit. Which one would you choose?