Hands off technology?

When the computer mouse was introduced in 1968 at a presentation in San Francisco, it was used merely to demonstrate a working network system. Since this modest inauguration, it has become accepted as the standard format for negotiating computer screens. However, with the success of the Nintendo Wii and Apple’s iPhone, the 21st Century consumer market is more than comfortable with the concept of interfacing with computer systems in unconventional ways. So does this mean the beginning of the end for the humble mouse? Anyone familiar with the film Minority Report will recall the technology used to perform the intricate forensic analysis. Computer displays were navigated by a series of complex hand gestures and without a mouse in sight. While you’d be forgiven for thinking that such technology is the stuff of a scriptwriter’s effulgent imagination, the movie’s science adviser Dr John Underkoffler was working stealthily on the real world implementation of these interfacing techniques. The technology is, unsurprisingly, comparable with the 2002 movie – even down to the gloves. Described as a spatial operating environment (SOE), Oblong’s g-speak allows operators to ‘grab’ items from one screen and deposit them on to another. Underkoffler, chief scientist with Los Angeles based Oblong Industries, is clearly not a fan of traditional interfacing techniques. “The mouse is a fairly constrained physical object,” he notes. “It has to sit on a surface and heavy use often leads to repetitive strain injuries. The mapping between the axes of mouse motion and the two axes of on screen pointer motion is indirect, so it would be nice to bypass it entirely and control pointer motion and position directly.” The gestural interface not only challenges the traditional keyboard and mouse as primary interfacing tools, but is also set to become established in many consumer entertainment devices. Stephen Prentice, vice president and fellow at electronics analyst, Gartner, predicts: “The keyboard is likely to remain the primary text entry device for the near future. However, the growing use of real time video interpretation and inertial sensors is enabling a more intuitive control interface in 3d environments.” Business leaders, he warns, must not ignore these trends. “As the consumerisation of IT proceeds, the separation between enterprise and personal devices – and their control metaphors – will become increasingly unsustainable.”