Multi-touch interfaces have been one of the themes of this blog over the past 18 months or so. In fact, they’re becoming so commonplace it soon won’t be worth my mentioning them any more. However, before that day finally arrives, here’s a quick look at some recent developments.
Within the last couple of weeks Microsoft have shown their Touch Wall. Here’s Bill Gates driving it:
And here it is being demo’d by Microserf Ian Sands, with a good deal more technical detail included towards the end:
Well in theory it’s a great idea, right? (I’d love one to teach with, for example.) But you’d have to ask how viable a system this is at the moment, especially when Sands admits that you can’t even edit a Word document on it! It also looks slow, glitchy, and just plain clunky. Notice how the slides don’t sort properly when Bill Gates gestures them aside—sometimes one doesn’t go at all, and then two jump the next time—and note the problems Sands has in selecting the right mode in the toolbar. “The calibration is a little off,” he says. Yes, quite.
Compare the Microsoft Touch Wall with the fluidity and sophistication of Jeff Han’sPerceptive Pixel products:
Back in July last year—is it that long ago already?—I had a good look at the Microsoft Surface. Here it is, out there and doing a job in the real world:
Are those thick cables security tethers, or are they connecting the phones to the computer (i.e. the PC inside the Surface)?
Back in January I had a good look at the iPhone and Jefferson Han’s work on multi-touch interfaces (here and here). And for those of you looking to gain some kind of contextualization on this fascinating and highly topical area of interface design I’ve recently come across Bill Buxton’s historical overview.
I casually mention these only by way of introduction to Microsoft’s (ahem) “new paradigm in computing”, the Surface computer. Here’s one of Microsoft’s own promotional videos:
For something a little more illuminating, and that briefly includes schematics showing the innards of the Surface:
And for the inner geek, here’s a full 18-minute test-drive of the thing:
Yes, it’s pretty impressive (although the thought of that bog-standard PC running Windows Vista hiding inside is a bit off-putting). Some thoughts:
It’s not clear how the security issues will work. I mean, have you ever transferred data from one device to another without generating security prompts? As these will be public devices it seems inconceivable that security will not be a huge issue, and yet not once do we see anyone even inputting a PIN number in any of the videos. As if!
Will all manufactured objects become ‘tagged’ in the near future to allow interfacing with surface computers?
If so, will there develop a universal tagging language that will be understood by all “surface-compatible” products?
Can we predict a new job description: Surface Designer?
I do think there is a certain inevitability about this type of product.
The ability of the Surface to act as a ‘docking station’ for mobile devices calls to mind one of McLuhan’s Laws of Media: if you push a technology to an extreme it flips over into it’s opposite. In other words, as mobile devices have gotten smaller and yet more powerful, the tendency for miniaturization flips over into single large device that many of them can simultaneously attach to like a Mother Ship.
Doesn’t the Microsoft Surface remind you of those black glass-topped gaming tables you used to find in pubs? Space Invaders, anyone?
Of course there are those who quite rightly question Microsoft’s presumptuous and overblown claims for their product: British multi-touch interface designer Andrew Fentem has a reasonable and well-argued critique of both Microsoft and Jefferson Han here. Fentem’s own Spaceman Technologies website is well worth checking out by multi-touch aficionados.
Finally, irresistibly, if only to puncture the corporate pomposity of Microsoft:
