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Microsoft Shows Off Its Vision For Gesture-Controlled PCs
An anonymous reader writes "Microsoft has demoed a prototype gesture-controlled PC using an augmented version of its Kinect motion sensing system. The rig detects 16 gestures and can be used to navigate Windows 8. Microsoft said it wants gestures to complement what is possible using mouse and keyboard, rather than replacing them, and the system favors simple gestures made just above the keyboard, rather than more elaborate Minority Report-style gestures. '[A] window is maximized by clenching a fist to "grab" it and then opening the hand while moving towards the top of the keyboard. Performing the same series of gestures in reverse minimize the window. Repeating the gesture while moving the hand to the left or right edge of the keyboard docks the window with the left or right edge of the screen. The same series of gestures while moving the hand to the top left and right corners of the keyboard will throw the window to the left or right of screen, but not dock it with the edge. Bringing hands together in the middle of the keyboard and then moving them to the keyboard's left and right edge with palms down and fingers splayed will show the desktop. Repeating the gesture restores the original view.'"
When you raise your middle finger?
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
Touchscreens are a big enough step down from mouse and keyboard for getting utility out of computers. Can we just skip all the steps until AI conversation/mind reading? Thanks.
Cars should have this! There is no good reason to lean forward and touch a screen to adjust the volume and skip a track. If we had gestures in cars that would be a real breakthrough.
So no I have to lift my hands from the keyboard to control stuff?
Just how many of the normal motions I make with my hands will trigger random window events?
Sorry guys, but this sounds like a terrible idea, and not one I'd be interested in.
So does having a camera/motion tracker in front of me all day long, especially since Microsoft has already tipped their hand at being able to gather all sorts of extra data with it.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
So much technology and processing, just because keyboard shortcuts are uncool.
I sort of doubt this will directly result in saleable products though. You'd want these gestures to control something besides the WIMP desktop interface - let's say, large appliances.
I guess this is one of the knocks on Microsoft Research (which is stocked with researchers with impressive backgrounds) and its relationship with the product groups at MS.
Kinect has a camera and an internet connection and a company that sides with General Alexander of the NSA. A man I think should be in prison right now.
What gesture does a loosely clenched fist doing an up-dowbn-up-down motion suggest? That's you that is.
After mainly using Windows 8 at home "...Microsoft said it wants gestures to complement what is possible using mouse and keyboard, rather than replacing them..." seems like a complete 180. Using a keyboard in Windows 8 feels like im using some new beta device with sketchy drivers.
...Microsoft said it wants gestures to complement what is possible using mouse and keyboard, rather than replacing them...
Didn't Microsoft say a similar thing about the new interface in Windows 8 and the Start Menu? Yet Microsoft tried burying the Start Menu, only to be chastised by its customers for doing Yet Another Stupid Thing.
And this is better than keyboard shortcuts how? Gestures are useless if you have to remove your hands from what you are doing. They rent't any easier to learn since you still have to learn the gestures. What is the benefit of gestures for a desktop computer?
Come on, static shots on some setup which no one wants in their livingroom with douche practising Tai Chi hardly counts as "showing off".
Microsoft is now attempting to drive the norm in PC interaction to something requiring their hardware and the use of patents they hold.
people would be singing its praises and talking about how totally amazing it is, but since it's MS... well, we can't do that now, can we :)
'The unexamined life is not worth living' - Socrates
It sounds to me like bringing up the desktop requires a variation on a praying gesture. :)
I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
Do you know why touch is ultimately bad for desktops? Because it isn't very precise. And now they want to add a system that is even less precise.
This looks cool, but once the wow factor wears off, will anyone want to use this interface for any length of time?
http://blindscribblings.com - Tasty pop-culture in conceptual fashion.
... I'd like to smugly suggest Microsoft look into a tabbed window manager. It'll help you avoid waving your arms around like an idiot when you just want to do something simple with your computer.
I might be surprised, but I don't expect to use gestures much when I'm using the keyboard and mouse. I don't want more—I want better replacements. I have never used the idiotic "Windows" key, nor do I ever click the mouse's scroll wheel. I use the function keys more than my colleagues, and that's not much, because the things I use them for I learned before Windows and mice. Though I like the idea of a Dvorak keyboard, I'm not going to bother with it because it only offers an incremental improvement. So... save the gestures for the car and the holodeck. That way it'll be obvious to the cops when people are texting while driving. My suggestion for desk work? It would have been chorded keyboards or gloves, but now I think we're going to get brain-direct control pretty soon. So I'll wait for it. But given the thoughts people have, they'll want to check their emails very carefully before sending!
I'm glad they qualified it with augment, not replace, keyboard and mouse. Big, arm-waving gestures are cute for a sci-fi movie or a novelty, but stupid for reality. When they do finger gestures as my hands rest at the keyboard and mouse, let me know.
Even "mouse gestures" where you waggle the cursor in spirals and vague rectangles went nowhere.
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
Not something I'd want for daily usage, but there are realistic scenarios where you might want to reduce/eliminate physical contact with the keyboard, and perhaps something like this might be useful: avoiding contamination, letting you still hold onto something else, lessening chance of mechanical failure, and simplifying interaction modes (such as with public info terminals).
"Benvenuto a Micarosofta Supporta. Owa can I a helpa you?"
"All a my filesa are disparata! Whassa go on? Anche I sold my casa on eBai for a packa di cigarettas. And I donta even smoka!"
"Awhat a you toucha?"
"Nieddu, no toucheda niente. I was a justa askinga mi colleghi if they wanta coffee..."
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
Just how in the world do they expect us to automate our tests, now? Will we have to program little hand-waving robots to make gestures? And we'll, of course, need different-sized hands and fingers, too.
Just imagine a room full of computers with hand waving robots whirring around running unit, functional, and system tests of a new app.
Then imagine filing a bug report with explicit steps to reproduce.
Oh, this will be fun.
I really don't get. Why is it so hugely popular on /. to jump on MS so hard? People go on and on and how BSOD jokes and so on, but I just don't get it. Windows, IMO has been very stable since XP. and W8 is very stable, regardless whether you like the new UI or not. Heck, windows has been amazingly secure when you consider the amount of users /hackers concentrating their efforts on the platform.
I would say, at the present time, Microsoft is much more inventive than Apple. And yet Apple gets the most innovative company award each year. For what? For fucks sake, the iphone 5s is EXACTLY the same as iphone 2G! Oh wait...it's bigger. And they have a tablet version of the same fucking thing! Surely that is innovative, right?
Also, people bitch like hell over how much W8 sucks because of the new UI, except these are the very same asshats who claim MS suxs and never innovates. If you hate MS so much, why are you so upset when they change the product?.
People can say and think what they want of course, but at this point, I would much rather get behind MS than those D-bags in Cupertino or trust google to look after my privacy.
I want a keyboard, a mouse and Windows 7. Anything GUI wise that belongs on a phone/tablet or involves me talking out loud or waving at my PC, well basically, sod off.
I want a list of atrocities done in your name - Recoil
So does it restart, shut down or turn on the webcam and start up chat roulette? I can think of a few gestures done regularly in front of a PC.
A company called Leap Motion, if I recall, has a working product on the market which does the same thing (and looks WAY better).
Where gesture is the core of the OS. Better remove the Start page for something more gesture centric...
I believe that is the gesture for "ask nVidia for an open API."
Help stamp out iliturcy.
The delays in switching windows, changing users, remoting in at different resolutions.
These make make any gesture addons unreliable.
Where do I signup to have the customer experience feedback program send Microsoft pictures of me acting like a retard in front of my PC?
The film Minority Report is going to single-handedly do more damage to UI design than even the falling cost of touch-screen technology.
...Michael J. Fox sits down in front of one!!!
Hola que tal un interesante nota algunas de veces las actualización de la tecnología trae beneficios en otras no saludos. http://www.oscarherrera.info/blog/como-monitorear-tus-pines-en-pinterest/#more-709
Oscar Herrera | Tu Mentor de Negocios Online
We've reached that awkward stage in technology, where the things you routinely disable on a machine are approaching parity with the things you enable. Gestures are one of the first things I disabled on my laptop. Finger print scanner? Don't use, which is essentially disable. Most scripts on web pages? There are plug-ins to disable them. Windows 8 UI? Third party apps were made to roll it back. And so on and so forth. It's all core wars now.
For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?
It'll never make it to production and all the nerds will mourn what could have been... (Microsoft Surface (the original), the folding book thing, the microsoft house of the future, etc etc)
If you gave me a choice between a printer and a giraffe with explosive diarrhoea, i'll get my ladder and my raincoat
Except you typical American Freeway does not have a speed limit of 70 mph, and four tons is heavier than every single non-commercial vehicle in the world.
"Typical" is a loaded word, as so much depends on one's local geographic context. 70 mph is common in Washington state outside of urban areas, for instance.
Four tons might sound like hyperbole; however, some larger SUVs do come close, or even exceed that mark. For example, the Hummer H2 has a curb weight of 6,400-6,600 pounds, depending on engine configuration -- essentially 3.25 tons US. The gross vehicular weight tips the scales at 8,600 pounds, over 4.25 tons. And it sounds like some Hummer models (probably the almost-milspec H1) could be as heavy as 11,000 pounds, or 5.5 tons.
I see a few Hummers daily on my regular commuting route. The posted speed limit never goes above 60, but it's common when traffic is light for folks to be barreling along at 70+ mph.
Cheers,
"What in the name of Fats Waller is that?"
"A four-foot prune."
Gestures with hands and arms? What is wrong with microgestures with my wrist and fingers using a mouse or a touch pad? Why do I want to involve my whole arms and hands when it is far more efficient to only use my hands/wrists and fingers?
This sounds dirty.
Not sure they'd like it.
https://www.leapmotion.com/
... are going to hate the new gesture-based interface :)
Wrong bodily material. Same number of letters though.
I really REALLY don't want to take my hands off the keyboard to do some stupid-ass gesture. It's a waste of time and breaks my flow of thought. I begrudge even reaching for the mouse. Now they want to add a third set of inputs?
This sounds like an idea that came from marketing, requiring overriding the ergonomic group when they violently objected. It's a "feature" that gives the salescreatures something to play with at trade shows.
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.