Apple's multi-touch technology seen spawning "mega-platform" - Page 4

Originally Posted by melgross

As far back as you can go implies all the way to the back of the desk. from a normal seating position, that would give 30" as I stated. Since I've not seen people push their monitors to the back of their 30" desks, it does sound unusual.

But, now you state tyhat it isn't as far back as it can go.

So, fine.

I love those definitive charts, and calculators. The problem with them is that they only tell part of the story. While it;'s true that 20/20 vision enables one to see to one degree, a number I've used myself on these forms more than once, and supplied links to charts as well, it only applies for a black and white pixel array. The closer the grey tones are, the lower the resolution we can see. When the greys (or colors) are close, we can't tell the difference between them, unless the size is great. Try it yourself.

These people aren't using these monitors for detailed viewing, certainly not for any length of time, so the occasional "leaning in" Works.

No, you don't always get it right, but you sure try.

Getting stupid like that seems to be your best shot, though.

Originally Posted by vinea

True, you didn't say MT was better. You said MT (flat, no feedback) keyboards would be no worse than conventional ones. Mkay...the study shows that MT keyboards ARE indeed worse.

You stated: "I find that most keyboards these days have poor enough feedback that typing on a monitor keyboard wouldn't be worse. If the monitor is big enough, that would work for a lot of people. My wife's old Atari 400 had a flat, feedbackless keyboard, and she got used to it. A lot of industrial, factory floor equipment, in critical applications, also use such keyboards, so it's not out of the question."

This study says different. That's ALL I said in the original post. How is that "overstating" my case? You made an assertion that a study says is likely incorrect.

1) Typing on a monitor keyboard IS likely worse based on a study with another kind of zero travel MT keyboard

2) Typing on an Atari 400 feedbackless keyboard was shown to be worse (in as much as its closer to the MT keyboard in question) regardless of whether or not your wife "got used to it".

And yes...they used "proficient" typists because well...using non-proficient typpists in evaluating keyboards would be dumb. 45 WPM is by no means excessive...it's within 1 SD from median in one study (21.3 to 54.7 WPM - median of 38 WPM). "Hunt and Peck" typists can achieve up to 37 WPM.

Yes, 45 WPM is faster than the median but still within "average" and below many WPM minimums for typists.


Gee, amazing how in every case I include exactly the words you write specific to a piece of information that contradicts it. You choose to turn this into some bizzare evasion of what was a very simple post that said:

"A study showed that it IS worse than your Apple keyboard".

I didn't comment on ANYTHING else you wrote in that post. Any amplification was limited to saying "this study is limited in the usual ways...".

I provided info in a neutral format about something you were mis-informed about.

Vinea

Originally Posted by melgross

Well, just to hassle you a bit, that test wasn't anywhere long enough to really tell what would happen over a really extended time.

A better study would have compared people who never used any keyboard, and had two groups, one learn on the standard model, and the other on the MTK.

That would actually be scientific.

Because, what you do is to take what I'm saying out of context, as you often do.

Those of us who were discussing this, before you bumped in, were talking about using this for editing in PS, or other similar tasks.

That was why we were talking about Multi-Touch, and stylus usage together, the idea I brought up. We were talking about limited uses for certain tasks. In THAT context, typing the number, or word, or naming a file, or typing a short description, would work out fine.

And for that, the 400 keyboard mention was appropriate. I NEVER said that this should substitute for a regular keyboard for long typing tasks, or continued use.

You should read my other posts, before jumping on one thing, and ignoring all the rest.

Originally Posted by vinea

Its 2" from the back of the desk. What are you insane? Is the monitor supposed to levitate off the back of my desk so the FRONT of the screen can be 30" from the front of the desk? Fine add 2" to all the calculations and you still come nowhere near the limitations of the human eye.

Or do you have some LCD monitor that is 0" thick?

Your original quote: "What a lot of people don't realise, it that LCD's save no room at all on a standard depth desk."

Now I know why you think that...to "save room" in your book you need to occupy zero space.

Gee...and human can actually see much finer detail than 1 arc minute as has been shown in studies (things like power lines in the distance). Do you wish the breakdown by color spectrum as well? Because humans have different resolving capabilities there as well.

This is stupid. If the resolution was close I'd give it to you. It's HALF.

These people don't use it for detailed viewing of high resolution photos/graphics at ALL (well not strictly true but close enough). The point is not everyone that owns what you deem to be a "high resolution" monitor uses it for photo work or detailed graphics. Neither will users of ANY MT display.

This also has nothing to do with your assertion that LCDs SAVE NO SPACE ON THE DESKTOP.

Which is a pretty stupid assertion to begin with. What space DO they save then? None? because they're still the same width and height.

Rest assured that a 30" CRT would be a hell of a lot deeper than 10" on my desk. IF it even fit without overhanging so far forward to tip over.

Saying LCDs save no space is just bizzare. And to then claim victory because the FRONT of my ACD is 10" from the rear of the desk instead of 8" is even more bizzare. Its not like I can even really get it THAT much further back...the cord cuts into some of that space.

Get it right? Jeez...you aren't even on the same plane of reality on this issue. Stupid is indeed the right word.

Vinea

Originally Posted by vinea

Which is a perfectly reasonable response. As I said, the study has all the usual limitations of that kind of study.

Saying that "most keyboards" are not like the conventional keyboard studied is just a wierd and very defensive response.



So you're saying that a peer reviewed paper, published at a professional conference (one of the more significant human factors ones) from a doctoral candidate from Cornell is "unscientific" in nature?

Yah, okay. How many peer reviewed HCI papers have you written?

Jeez, can we be more condescending?

The previous messages were not limited to "PS or other similar tasks". And Onlooker specifically address keyboards directly if you're going for the "whole thread" context and you yourself "corrected" another poster about the multiple threads of conversations

This is also only one of several MT threads in the forum and given that I don't live here 24/7 like you, I don't follow every thread unless the title or length piques my interest. This one started out more iPhone centric (not so interested) then moved into applications of MT on the desktop (more interested given that's an area that I contend with).

In any case...IF you were only talking about "casual" use then why talk about feedback and error at all? And you SPECIFICALLY state that "If the monitor is big enough, that would work for a lot of people."

How would you take THAT out of context? Especially with the amplification that your wife got used to the 400 keyboard for whatever her tasks were.

Presumably that included normal typing, under continued use and she would be included under the category of "a lot of people".

Would it amaze you if I said that I did? The comment was very limited in scope and applied directly to the paragraph in question. This is the usual run around you give...the thread is still very short. Folks can take a quick gander over the course of the topic.

Do I NEED to comment on EVERY post you make in order to inject a comment in a thread? Oh my...a forum rule that I must have missed...

Vinea

Originally Posted by melgross

that's not what I said at all. You said that your monitor was three inches from the back of the desk, not as far back as it could go as you first said. That may not seem to be much, but unless you sit with your belly pressed against the desk, your head is a good ten inches away, particularly if you use a keyboard drawer.

I just bought my wife a 22" Samsung 225BW monitor. The front of the screen is 7" from the back of the stand. Some monitors are more, some less. So, add 7 to 3, and we get 10. If you sit normally, which I assume you do, we're talking about 30" again, just as I said. If you have to lean in sometimes, as you said you did sometimes, then you need to get closer to see the detail clearly, again, as I said.

Well, most monitors I see on desks are about twelve inches in from the front, just as they were with CRT versions. I sometimes see them even closer, and sometimes further, but not pushed to the rear, as you say. But, I'm not arguing that you do what you do there, just that I've never seen it anywhere.

It's amazing that you can say some things, then admit that you can't always see the detail at even half the distance yourself, so you have to get even closer.

By the way, resolution for humans is measured in line PAIRS. One dark line (or dot) and one light one. You do have to cut the rez in half.

And that is why it doesn't matter to them. They don't care if they aren't resolving every pixel.

Relevance?

When you get stuck on something, you really are a junkyard dog, aren't you?

Originally Posted by melgross

At the beginning of my career I worked at the Musium of Natural History, here In NYC. I wrote grants, and did research as well, so I'm familiar with the process.

...

In an article published for the April 2007 issue of Discover, Seth Lloyd, the MIT engineer, who developed the first quantum computer designs, and who has written for Scientific American, several books, etc said that

"I would bet that 99.8% of ideas put forth by scientists are wrong..."

Estimates are that as much as 30% of all scientific peer reviewed papers are wrong, and the fear is that the number may be higher.

So, yes, I find their work to be poorly thought out, and it's not condescending to say so. If you didn't agree, you would have said so.

Originally Posted by vinea

So add 2 or 3 inches. Are you saying that having the rearmost part of the monitor within a couple inches is NOT pushed to back of the desk? That's bizarre. And I said a couple 3 inches because I didn't measure it. Now its suddenly THREE. No, really, it wasn't.

Fine, I just pushed it all the way back. It makes zero difference except now I have an extra 2 inches in the front. The cords keeps the stand about a quarter to a half inch from the partition so I'm sure you'll find fault with that as well.



No, I don't need to lean in to see detail clearly. I lean in to futz around with 1 pixel offsets on displays because PEOPLE can see when UI elements are off by 1 pixel. Yes, even from 30" away...it looks wrong and sloppy. Its more of a hand/eye thing than to see the difference. It doesn't make me any more accurate with the mouse...it just feels more accurate.

I'm looking at an image now and I can see pixel structure. Ironically its the HFES logo for the 2006 meeting. I can see pixel structure in some photos (mostly in gradients). I can clearly see 1 pixel wide lines. I can even see 1 pixel sized dots.



So, simply because of your limited experience (or lack of awareness) you state that most folks are unaware that LCDs don't actually save desk space?



Except that I CAN see the detail. What? Are you saying that I'm lying that I can see 1 pixel wide lines or 1 pixel dots on my display from 30" away? Or that I have some kind of superior vision when normal 20/20 vision would be able to see lines and dots half the width? At least in spectra that human eyes are more receptive?



By the way, resolution for humans are measured in a variety of means of which the most common is the Snellen number (20/20) followed by arc seconds/minutes/degrees.

Note that human acuity is 1/a where a = x/arc-minute. Folks vary what x is...it can be lines, line pairs, or cycles. It depends on the method used to measure acuity of which line pairs is one. You don't "cut the rez in half" in as much as when you convert to arc minutes the result is for 1 line.



Which has nothing to do with the assertion that LCDs save no desk space.



The relevance is that even if you push the monitor all the way back it isn't 30" from the front of the desk. And the fact that you can FIT a 30" LCD monitor on a desk is an indicator that LCDs save depth.



Riiight...because you aren't arguing about 2-3 inches isn't being "all the way back".

And I'm not the one frantically trying to make the statement "What a lot of people don't realise, it that LCD's save no room at all on a standard depth desk." not sound stupid by engaging in a multi-post defence of that statement...

Vinea

Originally Posted by vinea

Yes, and then you run an experiment to show that your idea was wrong. Or not. This IS the process which you claim some familiarity with.

Please, I could claim to be the chief scientist in some department of a prestigious university but it wouldn't necessarily make it true. And even if true WHO CARES?

Nice putting words in my mouth. I didn't say it was poorly thought out. I said it was subject to the normal limitations of such studies (small sample size, duration, drawing from a student population, etc). Within that context it appears reasonable and SCIENTIFIC.

You have some evidence that contradicts your assertions but you choose to poo-poo them without any data of your own except ancedotal observation. Now that's scientific from someone that used to "write grants and did research".

Vinea

Originally Posted by melgross

But, to make you happy, a large monitor would also be needed for a full size keyboard, if it is laid out the way keyboards are. Measure yours, and include the numeric keypad in that.

Originally Posted by Kolchak

Not that I really want to get into the middle of your little war here, nor do I want to advocate MT keyboards, but that's just not true. An MT keyboard could by its very nature fit in smaller spaces. It's precisely that it's not physical that you could leave out the numeric and cursor keypads until you actually need them, and then it's just a matter of pushing one virtual button to switch from keyboard to keypad layout or back, and not the staggered numeric layouts embedded in laptop keyboards. Of course, it's still virtual with no feedback, which would make it harder to use than a physical keypad, but I'm just saying it need not be as wide as a physical, fixed keyboard. I think it could fit on a 15" LCD if necessary. Of course, that wouldn't leave much room above it for the regular display duties, but that's an unavoidable drawback to on-screen keyboards.

Originally Posted by melgross

You are amazing. You answer statements with an irrelevant comments. The rest of your statements are contradictions You lean forward to see it better, but you see it fine without doing so.

You seem to be stuck in your cubical. Get outside once in a while.

Originally Posted by melgross

That's your problem. You learn the issues as you look them up. Sometimes you only learn part.

But the experiment must be correctly designed, or the results won't reflect what you are looking for, but something else. Yes, I do understand. There is no control here. A control is required. If you know something about the scientific methodology of experimental design, you would see that.

We may dislike each other, but I assume you do understand these matters. I think you simply aren't looking.

Actually I didn't mean what I wrote in that last sentence. Honestly, it was several hours ago, and I don't remember what I meant to say, so ignore it.

I'm not denying the results of the paper. I didn't do that. It says what it says. But, as you yourself stated, it is a small sample. What I don't agree with is the design of the experiment.

Most of what we say here isn't rigorously affirmed. When links are hard to find, as you can see for yourself with this one, sometimes anecdotal evidence is the best we can do without spending hours looking, which I've done, though not for this trivial affair.

Originally Posted by vinea

You're narrowly informed and yet claim broad expertise.

Originally Posted by Chucker

Please stop with your ad-hominem attacks. Make your points and leave it at that. Thank you.

Originally Posted by rufusr

I saw a demo of a Solaris Labs UrbanFace system that uses a no touch interface that is fast and accurate. With some tweaking this could be the way to add direct interaction with the screen to the Mac.

Originally Posted by Chucker

Please stop with your ad-hominem attacks. Make your points and leave it at that. Thank you.

Originally Posted by JeffDM

To be fair here, I think the bickering in this case is getting tiring.

Originally Posted by SpinDrift

But, but he started it.

Originally Posted by melgross


In an article published for the April 2007 issue of Discover, Seth Lloyd, the MIT engineer, who developed the first quantum computer designs, and who has written for Scientific American, several books, etc said that

"I would bet that 99.8% of ideas put forth by scientists are wrong..."

Murray Gell-Mann quoted in the article "is fond of saying, "The job of a scientist is to generate wrong ideas as fast as possible."

Estimates are that as much as 30% of all scientific peer reviewed papers are wrong, and the fear is that the number may be higher.

Originally Posted by lfe2211

Theoretical physics employs mathematical models and abstractions of physics, as opposed to experimental processes, in an attempt to understand nature. Central to it is mathematical physics , though other conceptual techniques are also used. The goal is to rationalize, explain and predict physical phenomena.

Originally Posted by lfe2211

Performing experiments in Theoretical physics is not an easy thing to do. To study, create or prove the existence of certain sub-atomic particles, you need access to massive unbelievably expensive government funded structures called Particle Colliders. Only a few of these exist in the world. Hence, most theoretical physicists mainly theorize or attempt to mathematically prove the existence of their theories. If their theories pass a complex government/scientific peer review process, they may be able to test their theories in one of the Colliders. In stark contrast to the biological, chemical, social or behavioral sciences then, it is no trivial matter to come up with a theory, mathematically offer a rigorous defensible proof, convince the government and the review committees to go to Brookhaven National Laboratory or Fermilab and "do an experiment". To put it more crudely, It's a big mother f**ken deal to do an experiment in theoretical physics!

Originally Posted by lfe2211

In the aforementioned disciplines, immunologists for example, can propose theories (if I knock out the gene for protein X, mice will not develop a certain type of autoimmune disease) , design experiments, test them, publish them and have their work peer-reviewed rather easily (Duh!) compared to theoretical physicists.

Originally Posted by melgross

You may notice that I never start it. My mistake is in responding to it in the first place.

Originally Posted by vinea

So don't. ...

It wasn't my intent to get into yet another useless flamewar with you but I'm not going to not comment when you say something as silly as that LCD comment.

Takes two to have a flamewar.

Originally Posted by lfe2211

In stark contrast to the biological, chemical, social or behavioral sciences then, it is no trivial matter to come up with a theory, mathematically offer a rigorous defensible proof, convince the government and the review committees to go to Brookhaven National Laboratory or Fermilab and "do an experiment". To put it more crudely, It's a big mother f**ken deal to do an experiment in theoretical physics!

Originally Posted by JeffDM

What I am seeing here is that you are suggesting that melgross not continue a flame war, but that you have no problem continuing it. I've heard things like that are called a double standard. If you aren't willing to stop, you have no grounds to suggest that someone else stop.

Originally Posted by vinea

I only made that comment because it seems the entire onus has been placed on me. As I said, it takes two but whatever makes y'all happy. Blame me if it makes ya feel better.

Originally Posted by vinea

Well...I wouldn't call it "trivial" to get an experiment done but it certainly is several orders of magnitude easier since the funding requirements are typically a couple orders of magnitude lower than booking time at Brookhaven or Fermi.

Even there, I'd guess that getting a space experiment done is harder to do. I worked on COBE (Smoot, Mather and Hauser were the PIs) and COBE was an effort from 1976 to 1998.

Originally Posted by SpinDrift



MacPro Multitouch

Originally Posted by icfireball

Thought I might post here as well.

Stop it with all of this multi-touch jabber.

"Multi-touch this!"
"Multi-touch that!"
"Ohh - I bet we could Multi-touch that!"
"Yes! A multi-touch toilet flusher! Amazing!"

Multi-touch is a technology invented for portable use. The advantage of a mouse interface (in non-portables) is that you can move your cursor on a 30" screen from the lower left to the upper right by only moving your hand from one edge of your mouse pad to the other.

In a portable, you don't have a lot of room for the larger interfaces like a mouse and keyboard. And THAT is where multi-touch is useful.

And when you have the precision of a mouse, why do you need gestures? With a mouse, I can easily click and drag the corner of a photo with a slight twitch of the hand, whereas with multi-touch, I'd have to lift both arms and make a huge pinching motions.

I know you are all excited for the iPhone, but cool it on the multi-touch. Think about why we don't have the click wheel as a computer interface for a moment and it might dawn on you why we don't need the multi-touch over what we have now.

Next person who mentions a multi-touch anything other than an iPhone... I'll multi-touch your mum. (JK)

Originally Posted by lfe2211

I really really really didn't want to get into this fray but I'm forced to based on one of Mel's "citations". My apologies, but this is going to be a rather long post which will likely turn off most readers. I won't be offended if you click the back button right now on you browser. However, I can't present it any other way to make my point clearly. I guarantee if you stay with me, you'lll learn a few things

I am a scientist (Ph.D in 1977 from Cornell in Biochemistry). I have not yet received my April, 2007 issue of Discover so I can't tell how out of context and/or wrong the quotes he attributed to Dr. Seth Lloyd and Dr. Murray Gell-Mann are. To wit mel's quote:



(Much of what follows is readily available in Wiki)

I'll present a little background to help the reader. Dr. Lloyd is a world renowned Professor of Mechanical engineering at MIT. His research area is in the interplay of information with complex systems, especially quantum systems. He has made contributions to the field of quantum computation and proposed a design for a quantum computer. He refers to himself as a "quantum mechanic". Dr. Gell-Mann is a Noble Prize winning Physicist who works in the area of theoretical particle physics. He is best known for his work in discovering Quarks and the Quark model, The modern theory of the interactions of quarks is called quantum chromodynamics (QCD), and is based on Gell-Mann's work. So both of Mel's references are to scientists engaged in the work of theoretical physics, a breed apart in the universe of scientists. Theoretical physics employs mathematical models and abstractions of physics, as opposed to experimental processes, in an attempt to understand nature. Central to it is mathematical physics , though other conceptual techniques are also used. The goal is to rationalize, explain and predict physical phenomena. The advancement of science depends in general on the interplay between experimental studies and theory. In some cases, theoretical physics adheres to standards of mathematical rigor while giving little weight to experiments and observations.

Performing experiments in Theoretical physics is not an easy thing to do. To study, create or prove the existence of certain sub-atomic particles, you need access to massive unbelievably expensive government funded structures called Particle Colliders. Only a few of these exist in the world. Hence, most theoretical physicists mainly theorize or attempt to mathematically prove the existence of their theories. If their theories pass a complex government/scientific peer review process, they may be able to test their theories in one of the Colliders. In stark contrast to the biological, chemical, social or behavioral sciences then, it is no trivial matter to come up with a theory, mathematically offer a rigorous defensible proof, convince the government and the review committees to go to Brookhaven National Laboratory or Fermilab and "do an experiment". To put it more crudely, It's a big mother f**ken deal to do an experiment in theoretical physics!

In the aforementioned disciplines, immunologists for example, can propose theories (if I knock out the gene for protein X, mice will not develop a certain type of autoimmune disease) , design experiments, test them, publish them and have their work peer-reviewed rather easily (Duh!) compared to theoretical physicists. In these disciplines, the statement that "I would bet that 99.8% of ideas put forth by scientists are wrong..." is pure unadulterated nonsensical gibberish. This is because there is a massive amount of verifiable and reproducible experimental data available in the biological sciences. See all the cures for certain types of cancers in recent years, the complete sequencing of the human genome, the conversion of AIDS to a chronic condition rather than a near 100 % fatal disease and the great discoveries coming out of stem cell research to name a few of the great leaps forward in medical science in the past ten years.

I'll close with " quantum mechanic " Dr. Lloyd's own words excerpted from an obit to his colleague Dr. Rolf Landauer. These words are probably the context in which he may have spoke the words in Mel's citation.

..."In any field of technology, let alone one that attempts to store information on subatomic particles, most ideas will probably not work. It is by identifying these wrong ideas that scientists and engineers winnow out those few ideas that are potentially right. Yet, despite the importance of mistakes in science, most published papers report work that is potentially right, rather than provably wrong. In such an environment, it is important for a field to have a mechanism for remembering past mistakes and for preventing them from recurring." ...

Seth Lloyd
Department of Mechanical
Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Originally Posted by PB

Thanks lfe2211 for these comments. I personally find it good even to just read some general remarks on this topic, especially for those who will never get a chance in their life to acquire scientific knowledge. I would like only to add that the goal of Theoretical Physics is not only to explain and predict physical phenomena, but to explain why the known laws of Physics are like that. This is an even more heavy challenge going deeper in the secrets of the nature than any other scientific discipline.


At last, one had to explain this! And I would change the "no trivial matter" to "highly no trivial matter".


After some point, Theoretical Physics is like Mathematics. You start with some assumptions and you go through a mathematical proof to your conclusions. I have to admit though that I don't like the way the physicists often handle the mathematical tools available to them. So, if the reasoning and computations are correct, the results will be correct, can be verified, get peer-review and published. That's why there is an important number of publications in peer-reviewed Theoretical Physics journals, that are of course correct and deal with very specialized aspects of the more general problems. The BIG problem appears when experimental verification comes forth, and it is this you are talking about I think.

Originally Posted by SpinDrift



MacPro Multitouch

Originally Posted by icfireball

Thought I might post here as well.

Stop it with all of this multi-touch jabber.

"Multi-touch this!"
"Multi-touch that!"
"Ohh - I bet we could Multi-touch that!"
"Yes! A multi-touch toilet flusher! Amazing!"

Multi-touch is a technology invented for portable use. The advantage of a mouse interface (in non-portables) is that you can move your cursor on a 30" screen from the lower left to the upper right by only moving your hand from one edge of your mouse pad to the other.

In a portable, you don't have a lot of room for the larger interfaces like a mouse and keyboard. And THAT is where multi-touch is useful.

And when you have the precision of a mouse, why do you need gestures? With a mouse, I can easily click and drag the corner of a photo with a slight twitch of the hand, whereas with multi-touch, I'd have to lift both arms and make a huge pinching motions.

I know you are all excited for the iPhone, but cool it on the multi-touch. Think about why we don't have the click wheel as a computer interface for a moment and it might dawn on you why we don't need the multi-touch over what we have now.

Next person who mentions a multi-touch anything other than an iPhone... I'll multi-touch your mum. (JK)

Originally Posted by lfe2211

Mel,

With regard to your reply to my lengthy post, I'll just let your own words speak for themselves. (BTW, have you figured out yet which Discover article is the traditional annual April "fake" entry? I'm on the road so I haven't seen my Discover copy yet).

With regard to your reply to PB's excellent reply to my post, we could start a whole forum on the excitement, promise and unimaginable brilliance of string theory, if it's even close to being correct. (I feel certain Albert E. is doing a jig somewhere in the universe).

My own perspective is that we are so fortunate to live in a truly great, exciting, unbelievably productive time vis-a-vis medicine, immunology, genomic science, stem cell science, physics (string theory), computer technology and information communication technology (i.e the internet)!

But alas, we digress from the intent of this forum.