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Touch-based Handhelds Turned Inside Out
holy_calamity writes "Mitsubishi and Microsoft have made a prototype PSP-like handheld operated using a touch interface on the back — the idea is to give a firmer hold, prevent obscuring the screen and allow greater accuracy than the iPhone and others. The users fingers are shown as shadows on the screen so they can see what they're doing, making the device look transparent. As a video shows, it's far from market ready, but the design principle seems sound."
Shadowy fingers behind the back of screen images should be a big advance for Porn Digital Assistants. I predict a win for this one.
One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
Only con I can think of is being able to instantly touch a certain point. It'd seem like with the "touching" on the back that you'd need to touch somewhere first to get your orientation, then touch where you want to go.
Beyond that, I think this would be very practical.
If the front and back of the unit take input from touches.. how do you hold it when you aren't actively using it?
While this looks like a great idea and all, I can't help but wonder how this will translate into smaller mobile devices. Something thie size of the iPhone (just to pick a random example ;) doesn't really have space for two hands. If you pick up your own mobile phone and drag your fingers around the back of it, you'll find it a bit more cumbersome than holding your phone in the palm of your hand and touching the front of the device.
That said, this could be an important development for tablet PC's. From my perspective, it seems tablets suffer from a lack of keyboard input. Sure you can plug in a keyboard, but that kinda defeats the purpose. This looks like it could be the solution to that problem.
Go these guys!
this post is now diamonds!
Have i seen a goatse ? (0'43")
(Sorry my bad French) Je fais parler les Guignols de l'Info. Le pied, quoi.
OK, I was thinking, "yeah, so what" until they got to the part where they type on the keyboard. You could seriously type on that thing as fast as on a regular keyboard, because of the way they laid it out. Hold it and type at the same time.
But the webcam on the back is great. I love it. It's like headgear for handhelds. Want to be the master of geekiness? Look no further my friend: the handheld that neither fits in your hand NOR your pocket! Useless you say? Yes, but it's cool!!
Qxe4
Apple filed a patent on that several months ago. Microsoft's implementation seems cumbersome, using a camera on the back (cleverly kept out of the frame). Apple can at least implement this with multi-touch.
In any case, I don't see this going anywhere; it's too weird.
I text msgs pretty fast, but many of my friends complain how their own hand obscures what to type. Somewhat like the keyboard, a new user has to look and type, which calls for a learning curve How to type. If there is a workaround, people would prefer it, just as many non it people work with the mouse. I'm guessing this to be a similar product(and a similar success (like a mouse)), although I'm not sure how good the product would be. But one thing we could be sure of is that there is a market for an alternative.
http://monkeynesianeconomics.blogspot.com/
Wow! An original idea. It might even be a good idea. Microsoft et al, please note: this is what the patent system is all about.
just not waiting as long
http://www.macrumors.com/2007/05/10/patent-multisided-and-touch-screen-ipod/
and the actual patent
http://appft1.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sect2=HITOFF&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsearch-bool.html&r=1&f=G&l=50&co1=AND&d=PG01&s1=20070103454&OS=20070103454&RS=20070103454
Your'e all thinking it, I just said it for you
typical microsoft product development strategy. 1. Look at what software / gadget's hot in the market. ... muwahaha
2. Rip the idea and turn it around in any shape or form.
3. Tell the market this is what they need.
4. Profit
i live on an alternate planet
It corrently works by having a camera sitting behind it and viewing the fingers as they move. If they build the camera into the device it would have to have a very wide angle and be able to distinguish between the fingers and the background.
) Human Kind Vs Human Creation
) It'd be interesting to see how many humans would survive to serve us.
They are about 1/2 the length of your hand and useless for tapping data (aside from maybe squeeze). I find myself holding just about anything two handed and I drum my fingers or generally move them around idly. This would let you grip the device while interacting comfortably. But it used a front and rear touch system, so if it did become troubling you could use your thumbs on the front or just one hand it when appropriate and problem solved. I think this a good thing and it should be very intuitive and very flexible. Apple's certainly started the ball rolling.
Quack, quack.
Without the camera-on-a-stick it would probably have to be touch AND pressure sensitive. I'd doubt most alternative sensors could detect "hovering" fingers otherwise. With touch-and-pressure, you could hold it and not "click" until you pressed firmly enough.
Any sect, cult, or religion will legislate its creed into law if it acquires the political power to do so.
That sorta looks like goatse with the shadows of hands positioned like that... am I the only one thinking that?!
Pens also obscure the paper that you're writing on. I'm used to that. I like that. I'd rather look at my obscuring hands than some pseudo-transparent shadow of them. This seems like another case of "we developed something neat, now lets make up reasons to use it."
It is dangerous to be right when the government is wrong.
I wonder if they can use something else... Like heat sensors placed inside the back cover. It would be hard to get the kind of resolution they showed in the video though.
You don't need camera optics for this application, since you are not interested in objects that are far away anyhow. Just sprinkle the backside of the device with a hundred or so individual photodiodes, and you get a (low res, but good enough) idea of where the fingers are (the resolution may seem low, but it will be enough if you make use of anatomical properties such as there are 4 fingers on each side, and their shadows extend more or less in a straight line from the boundaries).
0 to godwin's law in .5 sec. I do so wish that was a record but sadly, no.
Accordion Hero anyone?
Sorry, but I like real, tactile buttons.
They make it something physical you can actually interact with. (And something that doesn't take extra compute power, time, and battery power to guess where blobs of finger data are located.)
And we've all had bad experiences with touch-screen ATMs where parts of the screen go bad over time. At least when that happens with a button you can open up the device and actually repair it! (like cleaning the gunk out of a dirty old NES controller)
And you know it's hard enough for visually impaired people to use handheld devices as it is, but you want to make it worse by taking away the easily-found input device, too?
And yes I hate the iPhone for the same reasons.
History lesson:
Name a major flaw of the Super Famicom that was fixed when it was redesigned for America as the Super NES. The A, B, X, Y buttons were only color coded!
Lance Barr, the designer of the SNES, realized how stupid it was to make people rely on vision alone to figure out what buttons they were pushing. No one is concentrating on that shit. It has to happen BY TOUCH. So the American controller buttons have X and Y shaped differently from A and B. (convex versus concave) Major improvement.
It's an interesting idea there is no doubt about that. I really liked the map browsing right up to the point where I noticed the zooming in action looked a lot like he was trying to reproduce goatse with the map. The device will never been the same for me.
I used to have a better sig but it broke.
Yeah way to back up your arguments. What's being religious got to do with being a bigot anyway? Or are you saying that people aren't allowed to consider certain practices wrong if their religion forbids it (not eating certain types of meat, not conducting in certain kinds of activity etc).
which is totally what she said
The pda equivalent of anal sex. We slashdotters positively love it, of course.
All that to get accuracy of what you are pointing at. A redesign of the Graphical User Interface would have sufficed. What would have been great is if the interface was really translucent, like the headsup displays they have been playing around in car windshields for years.
The only things I want from a mobile device's physical interface are: Clamshell format, a full QWERTY (or preferably Dvorak) matrix/block keyboard (with the keys exactly under one another), and a pointing trackball-style device. A touchscreen with a stylus is an optional advantage, as well as an interface for easy scrolling (and if the device is x86, in which case I will surely change the OS, it should have three mouse buttons as well, left, middle, and right, as the middle button is useful in GNU/Linux). My HTC Universal PDA offers a clamshell design, has a QWERTY matrix/block keyboard, and a touchscreen, but no pointing device and no scrolling interface, but I still prefer it over any kind of touch-only interface. No real buttons, no buy for me.
taking /. trolls to new levels.....no thanks
Really, touch screens are cool and all that, but also have some disadvantages, as this page will tell you.
Nyhetsankaret.com -- det bÃsta av Sveriges Nyhetssido
Aren't ALL aspects of net.culture merely annoying?
You're worse than Pol Pot.
...this thing is far from an iPhone killer. For one, it is still vapourware and would be at least a year or two before it could get to market. They still have A LOT of work to do. For example, the product needs a much faster CPU and/or image processor - the demo shadow fingers look extremely laggy, to a point that it would not be usable because I would have no idea where my fingers actually where when doing something quick like typing.
Or does that demo video seem rather goatse-esque?
Haha, Sceintology.
-The world would be a better place if everyone had a hoverboard
Yeah, and apparently I'm well-known and a leader now! I did not receive that memo yet. The raise will be nice once the Marcabs finally get caught up on my back-pay.
One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
When you move your finger to the left, I mean stage left, your virtual finger will move to the right... that is, virtual right... so if you're right-handed, it will be wrong. I suppose it will work OK for left-handed people, though. Could you turn it upside-down? But then when you move your finger upwards, the virtual finger will move downwards!
:-) -----
Wait, wait, that's wrong. If you turn it upside down you'll be touching the front of the screen instead of the back. The orientation will be correct, but you won't be able to see the screen, unless they can make the electronics transparent. To select objects, instead of pushing down, you'll have to push up, I mean lift down, I mean pull your finger away from the screen.
And what happens if you rotate it ninety degrees? Clockwise?
Or counterclockwise, if you're in the southern hemisphere?
Note, smiley below
----->
"How to Do Nothing," kids activities, back in print!
You had me at transparent rear touch interface ..
Take it easy? I'll take it anyway I can get it . . .
"It's TEH MIKKKR0$$$L0TH!!! TEH EVIL!!!!"
Oh, and...
"Duuuuhhhh, I'll bet it blue screens! Dun-huh duh-huh duh-huh!"
Finally a way to reliably control my hand held device with no pants on ;)
Gee I thought the idea was to moderate the post not the author of the post.
-- QED
You forgot to tell us to get off your lawn...
Nice. Imagine one of these combined with one of those new roll-up virtual paper screens we've been promised for years.
/. get prior art now when someone tries to patent it?
You'd have two cylinders clipped together and connected only by the roll-up screen, like a scroll. One cylinder has the the screen rolled up in a protective housing, the other holds batteries and logic. They'd come in different screen heights, from pocket-sized (mobile-phone height) to great big newspaper-sized ones for serious work/ posers.
Take one cylinder in each hand, unclip, and pull them apart to reveal the screen, much like a rollerblind. There would be a clip of some kind (like on tape measures) that allows the screen to hold itself open, instead of rolling itself back up with a snap the second you let go of it. Then you could put it on a table/ hang it on a wall to look at it/ watch it/ type on it/ use a stylus/ let your cat sit on it and scan its underside for amusing lolcat pictures/ whatever.
Control the thing (the screen, not the cat, you can't control a cat) with your fingers on the back and/or thumbs on the front, as in TFA. You can physically adjust the width of the screen dynamically by simply pulling the two ends apart/ bringing them closer. According to some control or other (under the thumbs, probably) the screen image will either resize itself automatically to fit the new width, or the screen image could stay of fixed size, so that the edges of the screen will disappear into the cylinders as you roll it up, allowing you to bring objects in the centre of the screen to within reach of your digits.
An alternative for reaching central objects in large screens would be for the software to amplify the X and Y movement of your fingers, making them appear much much longer than they really are (but sacrificing some detailled control) to reach every part of the screen. Mice do this already: With the right settings a small movement of my mouse can translate to a big movement of the mouse pointer. Once the system knows the actual length of the user's fingers, the level of amplification could be adjusted automatically to fit the screen width.
Now, would someone hurry up and build me one of these please? Does
Handhelds are typically too small to accomodate all fingers. To use all fingers without dropping it, you'd need to slip your wrists through some awkward accordion belts. Also having to move fingers to specific spots (keys) slows down typing a lot. So why not use chords? I can comfortably hold my smartphone with thumbs and pinkies, which would allow for 6-bit input without having to move the fingers sideways. 63 characters is fine for text input.
I always wondered how we'd get to the UI William Gibson described in _Neuromancer_, where Case had goggles and his hands buried inside some touch interface he couldn't directly see.
Now we're finally stepping off the old "see your fingers" path, and into a future where the eye/hand feedback is mediated by the machine.
When this new device ships with a 3D network dogfight game, we'll have arrived.
--
make install -not war
This could be the perfect platform for implementing touch feedback. Like a memory plastic which deforms from flat into small bumps and ridges under small voltage changes. UI can feedback directly to the fingertips, much like a keyboard, better than a touchpad, much better than a mouse, and entirely better than just a cursor on a screen.
;). The front of the device could include something similar, but which "bumps up" only when covered by a finger actually touching the surface, which would occlude the view anyway.
;).
The problem with those bumps is that they are hard to make optically transparent, or to mount on a graphic display at all without being counterproductively distracting. But if they're on the back of the device, the optical problems disappear (pun intended
What this device is actually pulling off is also making the display act like a small volume that can be interactively manipulated from front and back. Just as our 3D vision is mostly constrained to fairly close objects in a relatively narrow field and an extremely short height, this device could bring real 3D manipulation into our reach (pun intended
--
make install -not war
Not into touch screen? Enjoy your new job in the underclass, boiling corpses.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
I'm quite excited to read this article, as Daniel Wigdor was one of my instructors in first-year Engineering Science at the University of Toronto about 4 years ago. He taught me CSC181, which was the advanced option of the first-year computer-science course. Back then he was working with developing a system for cell-phones where you could type text by wobbling the cell-phone aroud in your hand instead of pressing keys.
I'm really glad to see his research going well, it seems he's doing very well for himself =)
Aikon-
hehehe now u can draw and write on the back whit the stylus too.
ill start training on paper rigth now
Imagination is more important than knowledge @ Albert albert Einstein
They (Palms) are about 1/2 the length of your hand and useless for tapping data (aside from maybe squeeze). I find myself holding just about anything two handed and I drum my fingers or generally move them around idly.
Have you tried holding a device the size of a PDA or iPhone between two palms?
For the size of device the researchers are using, it's fine. Both the thickness and the separation due to the large screen allow for comfortable holding with the palms of either hand.
But try holding an iPhone or PDA between both hands using only your palms. The device slips all over because the edge is not wide enough to preset a good grip. You could possibly solve this with better coatings or flared edges, but the remaining problem is much harder to overcome - your fingers are simply too close to touch the back of the device comfortably.
The idea as presented is really cool and unique, but I think is locked into a form factor of the size presented in terms of screen space just for that reason (need to be able to keep fingers from both hands from crossing). That size (UMPC/small tablet) has typically not done well in the market...
For the niche uses of tablets that remain, this is probably a much better input mechanism.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
That would be utterly retarded. I'm sure the eventual plan is to just use heat/proximity sensors on the back. The prototype in the video hardly even counts as "innovation" hardware-wise. It's just something they slapped together to use as a test platform for the software. And Apple may have a patent on it, but I don't see them actually producing anything. So I think Microsoft wins here, in regards to exposure to the public.
I guess this is just the kind of thing we WON'T be seeing more of, coming as it did from MERL (Mitsubishi Electric Research Labs). There was a story a few months ago about how MERL is packing its bags and getting out of the biz. Having been a researcher at MERL, I have to say its a darn shame.
Oh, so you'd mod Hitler up if he posted here?
Hear that everyone? ukemike would mod Hitler up even though he killed 6 million people following the Jewish faith.
Your parents would be proud, I'm sure. By all means, continue to positively moderate destructive leaders of hate groups. Let logic rule you like a robot and ignore all emotion. Being human is overrated in your opinion, apparently.
We've secretly replaced Slashdot with new Folgers Crystals - let's see if it notices.
I thought Slashdot had a tradition of welcoming evil overlords.
Regardless of anything else, you've failed to make your point for one specific reason - you never explained HOW AndroidCat is a religious bigot and/or hate group leader, for those to whom it isn't so "well-known" - a link to some evidence would have gone far. As it is, for those who don't already know how horrible he is (ASSuming, and that's a big ASSumption, that you're sincere in your ASSessment), you come off as a troll.
...Oh.
*clicks AndroidCat's homepage link to try to get some idea of what you're on about*
Scientology.
nevermind. Let me know when your "religion" stops charging huge piles of cash for enlightenment, why don't you?
We've secretly replaced Slashdot with new Folgers Crystals - let's see if it notices.
As for the claims that the religion's beliefs are fake or insincere - well, Scientology certainly is not alone in having hard-to-swallow beliefs. Actually, some of them are quite a bit more plausible than some mainstream religions. But, when the religion was founded by someone whose day job was "Science Fiction author", and the secret meaning of life just so happens to involve wars between extraterrestrial aliens (nevermind that religions keeping their beliefs a secret at all is, you know, just a tad passé), and it just HAPPENS to require handing wads of cash to a centralized organization - well, can you really blame people for rolling their eyes at it?
But as far as most people are concerned... It's not the religious beliefs themselves that are a problem (it's no worse than most), it's the organization.
We've secretly replaced Slashdot with new Folgers Crystals - let's see if it notices.
Oh, so you'd mod Hitler up if he posted here?
Hear that everyone? ukemike would mod Hitler up even though he killed 6 million people following the Jewish faith.
Your parents would be proud, I'm sure. By all means, continue to positively moderate destructive leaders of hate groups. Let logic rule you like a robot and ignore all emotion. Being human is overrated in your opinion, apparently. I think pretty much anyone who comes back from the dead to post on Slashdot deserves a +1 for effort. Or would that be a -1 for being pathetic enough to care about Slashdot after death? The undead, and John Titor, they should get some recognition...
warning: This post is likely to contain gobs of dripping sarcasm. Consume at your own risk.
You're probably right about the size. Maybe PSP sized, but I wouldn't be surprised to see this in devices smaller. Assuming it's as intuitive as it looks it might even still add usability to smaller devices. Overall I like the idea a lot and look forward to seeing how it works out.
Quack, quack.
In deference to our own little Cotton Mather here, it is possible he or she is merely doing their job.
The organization in question here has previously been accused of assigning members to hound those it considers to be unfriendly to itself, both legally and, as in this case, socially. I'd also heard they more or less stopped doing it years ago, but oh well.
I personally suggest android cat make a copy of this thread to use in any legal matters they may need to take (such as a restraining order) at a later date.
How many scientologists has AndroidCat killed?
We've secretly replaced Slashdot with new Folgers Crystals - let's see if it notices.
well, split the device and embed it into the hand. have each half be used to generate a display field. on this field use the fingers to manipulate the display, and the eyes' focal point to direct the manipulated depth.
:)
you hear me jeff han?
How many Jews had Hitler killed in 1932?
Getting it yet?
Actions derive from ideas, and horrific abominations occur when apathy and excuse-fueled disinterest -- such as was the position of European nations, the Vatican, and the United States during World War II -- overwhelm human protective and preventative instincts.
But go on, keep minimizing the potential and apologizing for those who target minority religions for total destruction. I'm sure many people agree with you, just like during WWII, and that makes it okay... right?
Two Cameras... or Four. Stereoscopic vision can easily distinguish fingers from the background. Four cameras would help it even better, which would allow for more random placement of the fingers (or hands.)
The field of view for the cameras can easily be widened with a simple fish eye lens.
Bill
It's my Sig and you can't have it. Mine! All Mine!
I use a trackpad all day long on my laptop, and I *never* look down to see where my finger is touching it. Why couldn't they just slap a standard trackpad on the back of a phone? Sounds like a cheaper solution.
Sounds like a seller.
Tags: retarded, bassackwards
/. ...
...of course having finger shadows on the game screen could be annoying, but it could be tweaked down to a single cursor or dynamic number of cursors. Bravo! No more nasty hand cramps from holding tablets weirdly in one hand while writing with the other for hours on end!
Thanks for telling me how to think as always,
Clearly this isn't "ready for prime time" yet, but I like the idea. Just think - if the PSP did this, you could blow through menus without even repositioning your hands or even interrupting button presses. On the DS it's so annoying when a game is made for "press a few buttons, dig out the stylus, tap something, put it away, press more buttons, take out the stylus..." etc. I also had a problem with occlusion playing Ouendan / Elite Beat Agents on DS - you get a fraction of a second to hit a marker that shows up anywhere on screen, but if you're not holding the pen at the top, your fingers will block the screen and you'll miss unless you've memorized the level beforehand.
Why not just put a giant trackpad on the back side of the unit?
Have it divided into 'key-like' segments that conduct uniformly, but have a unique 'keyboard' mode?
HP put out a PDA for a short time that had a super high-res, mini trackpad on it. There were little nubs to define "buttons" for Home, Calendar, etc. Move these nubs to the back of the device, define a home row, and implement a 'soft keyboard' button?
You'd effectively be holding a mini-Optimus keyboard with one giant LCD vs. lots of mini OLEDs, and with a re-configurable layout?
Why? Why?
Toshiba even had a Synaptics trackpad in some of their high-end laptop models that had a mini monochrome LCD under the translucent surface of the trackpad.
Make the back out of ePaper with a synaptics-type conductive layer behind it.. Put a color LCD on the front, and do it now!
Also, why mess with a camera? Because of Apple's patent on a video/display device? Hooey. That idea died when Engelbart still had brown hair.
Controls on the back aren't new, touch interfaces aren't new, etc.
When I read the blurb, I immediately thought of this:
http://www.commodore-gravel.com/gravel/Homepage.aspx
http://www.commodore-gravel.com/gravel/Products/Gravel+in+Pocket.aspx -- Commodore media player, controls on back.
I don't know how novel it would be to just put a 3" trackpad behind a 3" LCD and use it as a pointing device. You might even be able to do this as a 'garage project' with off the shelf stuff for cheap.
Anyhow, touch interfaces "on both sides" are probably on the way to ubiquity.
Read Heinlein's 1953 Revolt in 2100, now more than ever.
A restraining order against an anonymous coward on Slashdot? Heh. Almost always, the people assigned to these sorts of duties are doing an "ammends project" to be allowed back "onlines" with the Cthurch of Scientology. They seem to get picked for the nasty jobs because (a) they're deniable as working for Scientology, (b) they're frequently judgment-proof because they have no assets or they're so dubious in sanity that no one would believe any liable and no damages could be proven. (There's also the danger that Scientology would help out in the legal fight in order to make it as time-consuming and expensive for a critic as possible. "The purpose of a lawsuit is to harass", in the words of L. Ron Hubbard.)
It's not worth my time because I can do more to help expose the organization in an hour of working on my media references page than wasting months in court.
It's no accident that he Godwin'ed himself immediately. When Scientology starts flinging poo at anyone who dares criticize the "most ethical organization on the planet" (their words), they always reach for Hitler and the Nazis first: Germany (which is why Cruise had recent troubles there), psychologists and psychiatrists, newspapers, journalists, Germany again (Bringing your kids along to a Nazi uniformed protest is weird by anyone's standard yes?), and probably a lot more. It's no wonder that some people occasionally fling it back, where it seems to sit better (and when the poo sits...):
One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
It's not my fault you're the cowardly leader of a hate group designed to rid the world of an entire religion. Unlike many unjust comparisons to Adolf Hitler, in your case it's perfectly apt.
You hate a minority religion; you characterize its adherents as evil; you stalk and harass them using your website; you spread negative propaganda about them; you want the religion gone.
Make fallacious, hero-worshipping appeals to the memes of USENET legends all you like. It doesn't change the actual facts, which any objective observer can see: you're no different from 1932 Hitler, save that you hate a different religion.
Do something positive with your life, man. Stop oppressing other people because of their voluntarily chosen religious beliefs. You aren't helping anyone with your stalking, propaganda, or harassment, and it's crazy that you might think you are.
You're a sad loser.
Groups that hate other religions often like to characterize themselves as rational, dispassionate, fact-seekers -- this is a common theme in KKK and neo-Nazi literature.
Another common tactic for these hate groups that allows them to deflect attention away from their own vile bigotry is "straw-grasping" -- focusing solely on negative aspects of the religion they want to destroy, whether those aspects are real or invented.
The Jewish faith has been attacked repeatedly over the centuries by bigots following this model, and all manner of atrocities have been attributed to Judaism in attempts by hateful bigots to destroy this minority religion.
"Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it." - Santayana
Reject religious bigotry. Don't support obsessed, hateful, ignorant, lying posters who'd say anything in desperate efforts to eradicate a religion.
Support religious freedom.