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FAA Gets a Big-Screen Touch Table

Posted by kdawson on from the every-situation-room-needs-one dept.

Matt writes "Northrop Grumman, best known for missile systems and other military gear, has for years been selling the TouchTable as part of what it calls an ' integrated collaboration environment.' They delivered their TouchTable to the US Federal Aviation Administration last month and will showcase their technologies next week at a defense conference in London. There are two versions of the TouchTable; one with an 84-inch screen (1600x1200 resolution), the other with a 45-inch screen (1920x1080 resolution). Moving a hand across the surface pans the display' two fingers moving apart zooms it out; and two fingers moving together zooms it in. This simple interface allows users easily to change a view from miles above the Earth to a detailed layout of a single city block."

6 of 130 comments (clear)

  1. Interface Design by Dun+Malg · · Score: 4, Insightful

    two fingers moving apart zooms it out; and two fingers moving together zooms it in This strikes me as counterintuitive. Perhaps actual testing proved this was the best way, but it seems to me that it's exactly backwards. If you wanted to zoom out, would it not be more logical to place two fingers on two points on the map (say) six inches apart, then have the map zoom out as you "dragged" the two points closer together, and vice-versa?
    --
    If a job's not worth doing, it's not worth doing right.
    1. Re:Interface Design by Dun+Malg · · Score: 3, Informative

      Moving the fingers apart to zoom out makes sense to me, you are enlarging the piece of the world/map to be displayed on the display. Enlarging a small piece of the visible map to take up more screen space is usually considered zooming in.
      --
      If a job's not worth doing, it's not worth doing right.
    2. Re:Interface Design by streak · · Score: 4, Informative

      Being a developer of the touchtable, I can tell you that the article is backwards.
      You spread your fingers to zoom in, and move them together to zoom out.

  2. Resolution by russlar · · Score: 5, Funny

    one with an 84-inch screen (1600x1200 resolution) those are some big-assed pixels.
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  3. Re:Counter-intuitive zoom? by Hennell · · Score: 3, Informative

    Video on their website seems to show it better.

  4. Microsoft Surface by westlake · · Score: 3, Informative
    It will be interesting to see if which came first - the FAA touch table or Microsoft's desktop computer. God I hope it was the FAA touch table. It would be too funny to see MS get blown out of the water after their big splash with that thing.

    Reading the fine article:

    Pressure sensitive surface allows multiple methods of information

    Microsoft's Surface uses cameras to track input. The actual tabletop is nothing more than an ordinary acrylic panel used as a rear projection screen.

    It should be easy to clean and difficult to break, scratch or stain.

    The technology allows non-digital objects to be used as input devices. In one example, a normal paint brush was used to create a digital painting in the software. [In] using cameras for input, the system does not rely on [the] properties required of conventional touchscreen or touchpad devices such as the capacitance, electrical resistance, or temperature of the tool [being] used. Microsoft Surface

    Surface can sense and interact with "domino" tagged objects, like a digital camera. What lurks below Micosoft's Surface

    The Grumman maxes out at 1600x1200 for an 84" display. To my mind, that seems a little disappointing for a military-grade tactical display.

    Surface at 1280x960 for a 30" display.