Computer Interaction in Science Fiction Movies

MidVicious writes "From futuristic 'Punch Cards' to Voice Recognition HoloDeck Interfaces, human/computer interactions have always mirrored the base concepts of our emerging technologies. An article from a Saarland University CS Seminar highlights Hollywood history with UI, ranging from the moderately feasible (Total Recall's television/scenery display wall) to the often ridiculous (Swordfish's 6-flat screen monitor setup complete with 3-D virus-hacking environment). An interesting read, especially considering some of the technology is on its way to becoming a reality."

Comments

Video game as firewall

[starfishsystems]

My favorite are scenes where figuring out how to hack through some kind of super hardened security amounts to playing a big old video game.

It's like, yeah, that's really how I configure iptables or add a server cert to Apache.

Re:Video game as firewall

[Anonymous Coward]

You mean YOU don't compile the kernel by using tetris bricks?

Re:Video game as firewall

[Mr. Flibble]

You don't? Hell I use psDooM on all my production systems. I like to let my processes sort out their own issues, who needs nice anyways? And boy, with this kind of user interface, I deal with hackers by "iddqd" "idkfa" and then pull out the BFG. Problem solved.

(Screenshots for those who don't remember psDooM: http://psdoom.sourceforge.net/screenshots.html

Re:Video game as firewall

[shmlco]

That's no good unless you have to quickly catch them as they fall AND orient and place them correctly. I mean, we need to maintain some level of skill. Can't make building Linux kernels so easy that ANYONE can do it... (grin)

Re:Video game as firewall

[Clazzy]

What they don't realise is that firewall configuration goes something like this:

You are now entering port 80.
It is pitch black.
You are likely to be eaten by a grue.
The batteries have gone on your flashlight.
> CHANGE BATTERIES
You have no new batteries.
You were eaten by a grue, port 80 is now open.

Re:Video game as firewall

[stefanlasiewski]

And somehow, I can never survive the explosion when I kill the big Boss named '1:init'...

Lex says...

[the_tsi]

This is a Unix system! I know this!

Re:Lex says...

[lottameez]

Jurassic park? I laughed when I heard that line. "Run like hell" I said, "you'll never figure out what the csh call is in time!"

Re:Lex says...

[harp2812]

Sad thing is, I actually went and installed it after seeing the movie...

http://www.sgi.com/fun/freeware/3d_navigator.html

Slow as hell, and not nearly as cool as I thought it'd be though. :(

Alien

[chebucto]

The computer in Alien (the first in the series) was unrealistic - not because of the artificial intelligence or natural-language processing, but because of the cumbersome way commands were entered and the unnecessary tekno-futurism of the computer room. Still, it was really good at helping the conspiratorial mood of the movie, and it is still one of my favorites in terms of fictional computers. I think the Star Trek TNG computers were probably the best depiction of how computers should be.

Re:Alien

[spaceyhackerlady]

I think the Star Trek TNG computers were probably the best depiction of how computers should be.

The TNG computers were pretty good. I remember seeing an interview with Michael Okuda talking about the challenges of creating something that people would accept as 23rd century technology, but having to use 20th century technology to do it. I also remember, when TNG was just about to debut, remarking in another forum that the TOS computers looked clunky by then, and that the flight deck of a Shuttle or 767 looked far more futuristic.

While it never made it in to film, the interface in the later Foundation novels wins for me.

...laura

Re:Alien

[Original Replica]

Star Trek has predicted other aspects of communication/information well enough, I don't see why predicting useful GUIs would be out of character for the series. Aside from the obvious cell phone = communicator, we also saw Uhura's bluetooth earbud, and between MRIs, spectrometers, and NASA's NUGGET (Neutron/Gamma Ray Geologic Tomography) we are working our way to a proper tricorder.

Re:Alien

[Oktober Sunset]

I think the TNG computer was a sack of crap, you ask it where someone is and its says they aren't on board, if the computer knows where people are on he ship, why doesn't it tell you something usefull like, they went crazy and flew off in a shuttle or they mysteriously vanished from some coridor due to weird alien crap. And why didn't it tell someone when they went missing, rather than sit there like a fucktard for 5 hours untill someone notices they are gone before telling anyone they were mysteriously abducted by wierd energy monsters or whatever. The interface was good, with the touch screens and the voice, but the AI of the thing was dumb as fuck.

Re:Alien

[vux984]

Maybe the crew liked having the freedom of not having their every move recorded. IE the computer only tracked someone down when it was asked to (by command staff even maybe?), rather than maintaining continual tabs on everybody all the time.

Not saying that's the rationale for TNG... but I wouldn't mind a future where it was.

Re:Alien

[Anonymous Coward]

While it never made it in to film, the interface in the later Foundation novels wins for me. Do the UI components still explode with a sea of sparks every time the ship has any problem like in the TV shows? Or have they finally figured out how to get input from consoles without needing 100,000 V and a couple of pieces of random explosives strapped inside?

Re:Alien

[kv9]

The TNG computers were pretty good.

I never quite got how the turbolifts worked. the crew doesn't seem to prepend commands with "computer...", they just usually say "deck x", "bridge", "pause", "resume". how does it know when it's a command and when it's just crew chatter? or are these keywords reserved for computer communication and their usage in casual chatter is verboten?

Re:Swordfish

[dbhankins]

It wasn't the six panels that was ridiculous, it was the additional peripheral the hacker had to deal with during his job interview.

Mouse?

[Anonymous Coward]

Am i the only one who notices punching keys is all they do in movies? even tho they have a graphical UI

Re:Mouse?

[fyngyrz]

See, the thing about menu driven interfaces is they are serious compromises. They trade cost (many buttons and the space they take up) for layers on a single interface (a screen.) When operating critical machinery, you can't be navigating menus. For instance, if cap'n starboy says "shields up", you can't say, "sorry, I didn't get them up in time because I was in the turbolift interface." You need to press a button that puts the shields up, and *right now.* Likewise for any number of critical functions.

I can give you a practical modern example. I own a Denon 7.1 channel surround system. It's really pretty decent quality, and it is the main system for our theater. If you want to do anything besides change sources or volume, you'll be navigating menus. Sometimes... lots of menus. It's a pain in the butt, and it is slow. This thing cost me about two grand.

In my library, I have a Marantz 2325, circa 1975 or so. This has every control and status display on a button, knob, or dial. There are only two multi-purpose things on it. Consequently, it is a lot easier to run - everything is always in the same place, and the things you use often you learn where are almost immediately - and it is a whole lot faster to operate. Want to turn up the bass? Reach for the bass control. Want just bass on the left speaker? Inner concentric ring of the bass control. And so on, for almost every function on the unit. It's not perfect - FM muting level is on the rear, and the Dolby levels take over the FM signal strength meter when you want to look at them, but man is it a lot easier and more comfortable to operate than the Denon. But accounting for inflation, the retail on this was about five grand. Those buttons and knobs are very costly. It isn't just advances in electronics that make that relative price drop!

The Denon actually has a lot more functionality. But getting at it is tough. Practically speaking, that actually means that mostly, I don't get at it at all.

Coming back to a computer interface for a spacecraft or a watercraft or any war machine, I can see them going back to buttons regardless of the ability to fold functionality into a graphic interface, because with a button, a well trained person goes right to the function and time may be of the essence in any one of a number of situations, including some that may not have been foreseen by the system designers. Buttons cost more in terms of real estate, but then again, they can give you more in terms of outright survival.

Buttons are faster than speech, too, even if there is no latency. Takes about 40 ms to hit a button. You can't talk that fast. It's just that simple. Now, if they ever manage to make a mind to machine interface, we'll be on new ground, but until then... buttons ftw. :-)

My favorite

[Bongo Bill]

I want a monitor that will project the text I'm typing onto my face.

I wonder how far away form GPP interfaces we are?

[edwardpickman]

After the attempt at Bob and then Clippy I wonder if Douglas Adams predicted where Microsoft will be 200 years from now? Are they the real Sirius Cybernetics? If so how long do I have to wait for my very own Marvin? ...........Now that I think about it hopefully a very very long time.

Star Trek comm badge logic

[47Ronin]

Somehow the way comm badges work in Star Trek doesn't make any sense. Take the scenario which is frequently done on the show:

(1) Enterprise bridge crew is watching an away team's planet survey on the main viewscreen. Captain Piccard decides to ask Commander Riker (who is on the away team) a question.

(2) Scene cuts to the planet. You see Riker with his away team. Suddenly you hear Piccard's voice on Riker's comm badge "Piccard to Riker: Report!"

Now tell me this... In this scenario, Piccard supposedly hails Riker and even though there is no "routing" done with the message beforehand, Piccard's entire vocal request automatically goes to Riker and ONLY Riker, though everyone on the away team has a comm badge. In fact, you hear the initial request for Riker on his own badge. Did the comm badge psychically know to message Riker solely at the instant Piccard clicked his comm badge to transmit?

Re:Star Trek comm badge logic

[rklemaster]

You need to get laid.

Re:Star Trek comm badge logic

[PhreakOfTime]

As sad as this is... Ive actually thought about that too. What follows is my attempt to justify the technology and what must be going on, with what you would see on the screen.

Lets say that Picard(on the bridge) taps his badge to ask for Riker(not on the bridge). This is how that might work;

1)Picard taps the badge to initiate the comm link.
2)Picard begins the link by stating who he is, and who he is attempting to contact.
3)With just a few second delay, the computer could derive from the audio who the intended recipient is.
4)Having cached the entire audio to determine who is the recipient, the ships comm system then forward this cached audi(mith a few second delay) to the recipient.
5)When the recipient hears the request come through on their badge, the link is already established, and there is no more need for a delay.
6)conversation proceeds as normal.

And no fair to the guy who said "you need to get laid". To that I say... "You need to stop getting laid, we have enough friggin people here!"

Re:Star Trek comm badge logic

[SPQR_Julian]

Come on, this is Slashdot. Anyone who utters that statement here should explode from the sheer redundancy of that statement.

Re:3-D interface in X-Men

[Original Replica]

I don't think the X-Men display features any color, so this is probably doable today.

I would almost feel sorry for anyone who went through the trouble of building one, without running fiber optics up each pin. The color part should be easy compared to the hydraulics part.

Where do they get Compatible Cables?

[krbvroc1]

In all these movies, they are a joke.

I mean, I cannot find a proper cable and even then I need to dig out 3 gender changers and a break-out box. These guys can I/F with some computer port from a different civilization using the same RS-232 port and a TTL voltage. Amazing! If only we the same interoperability here on planet Earth.

Uplink Hackers Elite

[zaibazu]

This game takes it the other way round. It takes a movie style interface and give the the impression you are "hacking" into corporate computers. Pretty entertaining (And it has a Linux Version yay)
Main Site:
http://www.introversion.co.uk/uplink/
Review at Home of the Underdogs:
http://www.the-underdogs.info/game.php?id=3044

Metropolis 'interface'

[Oktober Sunset]

Something tells me that they didn't quite grasp the concepts at work in some of these films, like criticising the metropolis interface for making the 'user' work. The workers in metropolis weren't users, and they didn't interface with the machines, they were slaves to the machines and just carried out the machines instructions, they didn't have any input, they just performed physical labour acording to the machines instructions. The clock thing was like a relay, but with a person doing the physical labour. They seemed to miss the whole point of that scene.

So tempting...

[Anonymous Coward]

I know, I know... I am as comfortable in front of csh and piping through awk and sed as most folks are with playing video games. Today, as part of the normal day-to-day crap, I wrote a 15 line perl script without referring to a manual, that formatted a bunch of data and made it all pretty for a browser. My co-workers can all do this.

I'm also big into making films. Much as I want to join the chorus and laugh at the totally unrealistic interfaces, I do realize something: most people don't know and don't care. To them, this is how they see computers. When I type up some bizarre iptables ruleset it's about as clear to them as Swahili is to a goat in Uganda. For the director it's a matter of balancing the telling of the story with realism. This is *tough* to do.

BTW, someone once said that it's better to blame stupidity/laziness/ignorance than malice. I realized this all too clearly when I had to shoot 4 actors. One was *extremely* difficult to light because of his skin tones to the point that I ended up cutting him out of the shot entirely. My ignorance probably contributes to the idea that directors/producers don't highlight certain actors. It's not malice, just that I'm not experienced enough to do it properly. Certainly not an excuse for professionals though... The same thing with computers.. Film guys are not necessarily computer guys (though there's a lot of overlap).

Scotty

[jac89]

Hello Computer?? ***maybe you should use the keyboard*** ... Ah yes, how quaint.

Re:Minority Report

[technococcus]

(NOTE: Not an Apple shill; owns no Apple products)

Apple's working on it. One of their latest iMac concepts included a screen that was completely clear when off and semi-translucent when in use. There was a Slashdot post about it, IIRC.

Right, here we go: http://ibloggedthis.com/2006/08/09/a-concept-of-a- future-imac-pictures-transparent-screen-and-keyboa rd/

Enjoy.

Re:Swordfish

[Scarletdown]

I'm dropping out of society if this ever becomes a standard interface for any system.