Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!sdd.hp.com!wuarchive!uunet!mcsun!ukc!slxsys!ibmpcug!mantis!mathew From: mathew@mantis.co.uk (CNEWS MUST DIE!) Newsgroups: comp.society.futures Subject: Re: the interface for the rest of us? Message-ID: Date: 8 May 91 13:37:14 GMT References: <1991May7.204509.27452@beaver.cs.washington.edu> Organization: Mantis Consultants, Cambridge. UK. Lines: 66 chou@steelhead.cs.washington.edu (Pai Hsiang Chou) writes: > In article mathew@mantis.co.uk (CNEWS MUST DIE!) w > >chou@steelhead.cs.washington.edu (Pai Hsiang Chou) writes: > >> A keyboard is something that really can't be miniaturized > >> too much. A tiny, calculator-sized keyboard is simply unusable. > >> A standard sized keyboard takes up a significant amount of space. > > > >Only if you assume one character per key. > > no, the keys on today's keyboards are already overloaded. > Shift/Option/Command/Control/... If you want to go to > the extreme, anything can be input 1 key -- using Morse code! I have a keyboard with five keys and two shifts. It allows me to type all the characters I need. Remember, you have 32 combinations of 5 keys; combine that with two shifts and you have enough for the full ASCII character set. Add a graphics mode / text mode switch and you can do extended ASCII. > >> To input graphics, you need either a mouse or a pen. > > > >Or a finger or a trackball or a joystick. > > OK, maybe I should have changed my line to "I would use". > My fingertip isn't sharp enough to give me satisfactory > precision I want. Besides, I wouldn't want to smear the > display with my fingerprints or scratch it in case I > forget to clip my fingernails. Who said anything about using your finger on the *display*? Look at the Psion MC machines. They have a fingertip touch-pad. > >What on earth do you want several notebook computers for? I want everything > >in the *one* computer, so I can copy a dictionary definition into a piece of > >mail, stick a diagram into a diary entry, and so on. [...] > The reason I think several notebooks will be more usable than one > notebook with windows is simple: you can never have enough screen space > (or I should say, "I can always use more screen space"). > But there is a limit to how big a screen size can be before it gets too > big to carry. So the solution is to carry several screens. ...and attach them to the same computer. You still don't need several computers. > If you want to cut and paste from one computer to another with a pen, > you might be able to do it with a smart pen which effectively sucks > the data from one screen, stores it in its own memory buffer, and > inject the data into the target screen. > (Who says a pen can't be some sort of computer?) I'd rather cut and paste on the same computer -- that way I can have proper transclusion rather than static inclusion (i.e. when I change the spreadsheet, the copy in another document can be updated automatically). > At the same time, your notebooks may communicate with each other by > wireless means, by fiberoptics, or whatever. Yes; however, the chances of all the computer manufacturers settling on a single standard for data interchange, and that standard being a good one, seem remote. mathew