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A Look Beneath the 'Surface'
Hajsky writes "Ars Technica takes a closer look at Microsoft's new "Surface" tabletop device. Turns out that Surface isn't actually a touchscreen at all, but uses five cameras located in the table's base to record movement and touch. 'The five cameras are near-infrared devices, but that's not because they are trying to read heat signatures from fingertips (or other body parts) on the table. Instead, it's because the entire surface of Surface is bathed in light; by illuminating the top of the table, the cameras can easily see when things are placed on it. Shining colored light across the surface of the table would spoil the effect that Microsoft wants, so near-infrared light is used for invisible illumination.' The whole setup runs on a Core 2 Duo and off-the-shelf hardware, and can handle 52 simultaneous touches." jfanning wrote with a link to an overview of similar technology used in the Helsinki 'CityWall'. The article she provides discusses the unique public display, and has an in-depth video on the way these kinds of setups work.
Or you could install an electrical outlet into the floor... just a thought.
and i doubt much would happen if you spilled something, unless it seeped in through cracks...
It seems like it could be frustrating, but more likely it'll just be imprecise. Parallax will only throw the thing off by so much, so the smart thing to do would be to design all the controls to be big enough that an approximation would be sufficient. After all, you're supposed to control this thing with your fingers, and not with an ultra-precise stylus.
I use Illustrator all day at work. I'd hate to have to use my fingers, instead of the precision of a mouse pointer. Even zoomed in, with more complex artwork, the miniscule mouse point is too large and cludgy to be as precise as I'd like. I can't imagine using a mouse pointer that's 1/2 inch wide.