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From: mason3@husc9.harvard.edu (Richard Mason)
Newsgroups: comp.society.futures
Subject: Re: the interface for the rest of us?
Message-ID: <1991May4.222932.846@husc3.harvard.edu>
Date: 5 May 91 02:29:31 GMT
References: <1991May4.172440.1851@casbah.acns.nwu.edu> <9105042144.AA22495@horse.ee.lbl.gov>
Organization: Harvard University Science Center
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Two reasons for using pen technology have already been repeatedly cited:
(1) It's a better input device for many-letter alphabets (not necessarily
    just Japanese -- consider that a mathematician can use a pen to write
    Greek letters, mathematical symbols, etc. without hitting
    <shift>-<option>-<control>-<widget>-<Q>-LETTER 
    or switching to a special font.)

(2) It's more portable than a keyboard and can be used to take notes
    while standing up.

I'd like to add a third reason:
(3) Holding a pen in your hand makes it easy to switch instantly between
    text and graphics, and combine both in the same file/document.
    You can easily scribble a sketch in the margin of your computerized
    notes.  On a keyboard system, you'd have to leave the keyboard and
    reach for your mouse or sketch tablet (and I think the pen is a much
    superior graphics tool to the mouse).

    Also, to return to mathematics again, consider how much easier it
    would be if one could enter equations into a computer in the same
    way one writes them on paper, i.e. with numerators and denominators,
    limit symbols, summation symbols, integration symbols, etc. etc.
    A pen-based system could remove the need for TeX.

So I think there is a case to be made for a pen interface.  Mind you,
for the "interface of the future", my money is still on voice recognition.
;-)

-- 
"These things are pure science fiction! And yet they are all true."
                                              -M.O. Rabin
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Richard Mason | mason3@husc9.harvard.edu | All opinions are my own.