The Future Computer 6

[ajetrumpet]

Anyone want to comment on the computer environment that we saw in "Minority Report"? The stock market wizards seem to think that this is the next big step for interface. Anyone think we'll get there soon? An interface based on the user's hand motions?? I see voice recognition as the next "kick", that still has a long way to go, like the "Demolition Man" movie!

-J

 

[Tuscolablue]

Does anyone remember The Cube from 8-10 years ago? It was going to change the way we store data, the replacement for the hard drive. No moving parts, the size of a sugar cube and next to unlimited storage.

 

[Opieo]

I remember the movie The Cube, it was pretty crazy. They also had Cube 2 Hypercube, and Cube 0. Never heard of the computer cube idea. We will be there someday I am sure.

~
Give a man some fire, he will be warm for a day, Set a man on fire, he will be warm for the rest of his life.

 

[jsteph]

In some ways I think these 'future' interfaces are actually moving backwards.

Consider the "database interface" in the movie "Disclosure" with Michael Douglas and Demi Moore.

It consisted of set of virtual-reality goggles where the user accesses a database by walking down a virtual corridor full of virtual 1960's style wood file cabinets, opening a drawer, flipping through the tabbed manilla folders within, and pulling out the virtual file and finally reading it.

And as I recall there was no irnony in that scene--they truly thought that would be futuristic and 'neat'.
--Jim

 

[dilettante]

Yes. Ideally they'd simply "think" their query at it, possibly with some VR visual feedback to help edit the query. Then the targeted info would just zap into their short term memory and they'd "know" all of it.

 

[thefourthwall]

They already aim guns on helicopters by where the pilot looks for what 30 years?

Have you seen the size of the defense budget, or how much they pay for a hammer? That technology applied to PC's would probably boost the price of an average Dell from $500 to $14,362,796.95, give or take a few thousand ;-)

 

[lionelhill]

jsteph, thank you for cheering my day by asking me to consider Demi Moore.

On a more serious note, screens, I see, are short and wide and getting wider by the month. Meanwhile office paper (and hence a .pdf file) is still long and narrow.

 

[Sympology]

On a more serious note, screens, I see, are short and wide and getting wider by the month. Meanwhile office paper (and hence a .pdf file) is still long and narrow.

Ah the joys of Pivot Monitors.
The one to my left is nicely vertical....

Only the truly stupid believe they know everything.
Stu.. 2004

 

[kmcferrin]

It consisted of set of virtual-reality goggles where the user accesses a database by walking down a virtual corridor full of virtual 1960's style wood file cabinets, opening a drawer, flipping through the tabbed manilla folders within, and pulling out the virtual file and finally reading it.

And as I recall there was no irnony in that scene--they truly thought that would be futuristic and 'neat'.

Well, that's what Hollywood thought would be futuristic and 'neat' circa 1997 or thereabouts. Fortunately, for IT types, the Hollywood-types don't design technology. Unfortunately for IT types, they make up ridiculous things that ruin our suspension of disbelief and put them in movies about technology.

 

[jsteph]

The one thing Hollywood was somewhat close on was of course the 'communicator' from Star Trek. They are eerily similar to today's clamshell cellphones. What was never mentioned or shown of course was the massive infrastructure involved in making that technology possible.
--Jim

 

[kmcferrin]

You'd be surprised how much Star Trek tech has made it to the real world. Add to the communicator the PDA. Also, Lt. Uhura's wireless earpiece. There are currently prototypes around of hand-held "tricorder"-like devices.

Not only that, there's a lot of true physics that goes into designing the systems for the show. Modern scientists looking for ways to travel long distances through the universe are have actually begun to accept the possibility of "warp drives" and "wormholes" as transportation methods.

My wife likes to make fun of Star Trek...if she only knew.

 

[Sympology]

If you ever want to see future predictions that have come true, read Arthur c. Clarkes "Sentinal" short stories book. That is really scary....

Only the truly stupid believe they know everything.
Stu.. 2004

 

[dilettante]

... or Huxley's Brave New World or Orwell's 1984 or Knight's A For Anything or Kornbluth's The Marching Morons or ...

 

[zarkon4]

Interface jacks installed at birth, and to use a computer all one would have to do is "plug in" and think it.

 

[DPlank]

Scary - what happens with a virus Zarkon?

Cheers,
Dave

"Yes, I'll stop finding bugs in the software - as soon as you stop writing bugs into the software." <-- Me

For all your testing needs: Forum1393

 

[lionelhill]

Quote: "Interface jacks installed at birth, and to use a computer all one would have to do is "plug in" and think it."

Aren't those the strange plastic things sprouting out of everyone's ears nowadays? Or is it the borg?

 

[Welshbird]

How about it going here?

Fee

The question should be [red]Is it worth trying to do?[/red] not [blue] Can it be done?[/blue]

 

[monkeylizard]

Sugar Cube" holographic storage:

http://domino.watson.ibm.com/comm/pr.nsf/pages/rsc.holo.html

kmcferric, tell your wife to thank those Star Trek dorks every time she uses her iPod. Star Trek (TNG) inspired MP3s and subsequent players. IIRC, The guy that led the team that developed MP3s started his work after seeing Data (the android, not the bits & bytes) calling up multiple songs at once from a library on the Enterprise's computer. At that time, the largest HDD available to the general public using then-current compression would allow the storage of something like one 3-minute song. I'm pretty sure this same dude was one of the chief designers of the iPod.

Monkeylizard
Sometimes just a few hours of trial and error debugging can save minutes of reading manuals.

 

[gbaughma]

I just want a Chobits



Just my 2¢
-Cole's Law: Shredded cabbage

--Greg

http://parallel.tzo.com

 

[GwydionM]

What I'd like is an expression-reading computer. It knows when you look hard at something. A few simple codes could let you do things like add or delete.

No doubt it would need to be trained to each individual face, just like voice-recognition, which has to learn each new person and will not understand anyone else. But such a system would avoid intruding.

I'm sure also you'd still need a keyboard for text. What's really needed there is a new script, one which relates much more closely to the sounds we speak.

------------------------------
An old man who lives in the UK

 

[Opieo]

I believe Google was said to be working on a Facial search. So if you had a picture of somebody it would search the internets pictures and return pictures with that person in them.
At least that was the idea of it. Don't know if they actually made any progress (or dropped the project).

~
Give a man some fire, he will be warm for a day, Set a man on fire, he will be warm for the rest of his life.