Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!swrinde!ucsd!ucbvax!decwrl!limbo!taylor
From: madd@world.std.com (jim frost)
Newsgroups: comp.society
Subject: Re: Looking Backwards
Message-ID: <301@limbo.Intuitive.Com>
Date: 8 Jan 90 17:58:29 GMT
Sender: taylor@limbo.Intuitive.Com
Organization: Software Tool & Die
Lines: 63
Approved: taylor@Limbo.Intuitive.Com

J Storrs Hall earlier wrote:

> Cellular wristphones will hinge on battery technology, which I'm not
> up to predicting;

I will be surprised if we don't see an improvement of more than 1000
times in the next ten years.  Current consumer battery technology is
terrible (what's the efficiency of a Duracell?  EEEEK!).  I also
expect that costs for this technology will be extravagant for awhile
(much as computer technology was until just recently), probably until
after the end of the century but not much beyond.

> The keyboard will go the way of the card reader.  Voice-and-pointer
> will be standard; the pointer may be a dataglove or merely a camera
> pointed at your hand.

This is an interesting idea, but it's not one of those things I expect
to happen to the degree that you might think.

First, several technologies have to come together (as you said).
Second, machine speeds and -- more importantly -- core memories have
to increase many times over.  I agree with Barry Shein's predictions
of about 100mips and 128mb being pretty standard, but 100mips isn't
really all that much faster than what you're dealing with today, and
128mb isn't much more than many of the machines I use daily have.
That kind of processing power is great for displays, not good enough
for voice manipulation without substantial dedicated hardware support.
If someone comes out with a nifty voice-processor on card, I will
happily eat my words (if printed on biodegradable paper with a
generous side order of beers :-).

There are other reasons besides technological ones that lead me to
believe that voice processing won't doom keyboards even if it becomes
that commonplace.  How many of you have ever tried doing formatted
dictation?  What I mean is, try to dictate verbally the layout of a
printed document.  I've done it, a lot, and it's a LOT harder to do
verbally than on a keyboard or piece of paper.

Regardless of my pessimism, I can imaging coding with a verbal
interface, and I can imagine that I'd like it.  Maybe I'll get to see
in the next ten years.

> You have to have something to do with that 100 mips, after all.

"User Interface."  Expect something similar to NeWS to show up and
become very commonplace in the next ten years.  It will be three
dimensional and it will be fully extensible.  My bet is it'll based on
LISP or something very similar (we can now afford the cost of LISP in
terms of CPU).  It will not be NeWS or Display Postscript as these are
very limited in their support for three-dimensional displays.  I
believe NeWS is an interesting precursor of things to come, though.

> By the end of the decade, some major strides will have been made in
> life extension

Hah!  This is a sure bet.  Geriatrics is improving so fast that I
seriously expect to live a long, long time.  Barrying cataclysm, of
course.  You quote a 50% improvement, but I expect better than that.

To long life and a better work environment,

jim frost
jimf@saber.com