Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!mcsun!ukc!mucs!logitek!grep!frank
From: frank@grep.co.uk (Frank Wales)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.handhelds
Subject: Re: Crazy dreams of HP48's with touchscreens
Message-ID: <1991Jan18.164959.1313@grep.co.uk>
Date: 18 Jan 91 16:49:59 GMT
References: <38125@cup.portal.com>
Reply-To: frank@grep.co.uk (Frank Wales)
Organization: Grep Limited, LEEDS, UK
Lines: 32

In article <38125@cup.portal.com> Jake-S@cup.portal.com (Jake G Schwartz) 
 writes:
>Over top of the HP48 LCD, it would open
>up all kinds of options that perhaps the Corvallis folks are only day-
>dreaming about at the moment. Imagine being able to simply touch one of
>those six bottom-line soft key menu labels and getting the function to
>execute. The sky's the limit. Do we have any takers? 

I think it would be cute to make it work.  However, I have to say that I
dislike the idea of a touch-sensitive LCD for several reasons:  poor
tactile feedback, the temporary obscuring of the display necessary to
operate it, the low resolution of the interface due to finger dimensions,
and the need to clean the display often due to build-up of finger grease
(or worse, dependent on where you put your fingers :-) ), necessitating
disabling of the touch-sensitivity while you do it.  I'm assuming that
mechanical problems, like people hitting the display like they hit keys,
or poking at it with the end of a pen, would be dealt with in a production
machine, as would problems like fast typing and roll-over.

Touch-screens tend to be of most use in running the interface to a
well-defined system with relatively few allowed combinations of the components
of the system, and where the number of choices at each stage in the interaction
are small (i.e., fit on the screen).  They also turn up where having a
normal keyboard is not desired, for whatever reasons.

Consequently, I'm unconvinced that a touch-screen would buy you anything
when the User has more than a slight familiarity in using the equipment.

[But I still think it would be a neat hack!]
--
Frank Wales, Grep Limited,             [frank@grep.co.uk<->uunet!grep!frank]
Kirkfields Business Centre, Kirk Lane, LEEDS, UK, LS19 7LX. (+44) 532 500303