DailyDirt: It Turns Out People Want Keyboards... Until They Don't

from the urls-we-dig-up dept

We've seen plenty of different input devices, but it's pretty hard to displace the traditional keyboard and mouse combination. Touchscreens have their usefulness (but perhaps not on a 20" 4K display), and maybe someday gesture recognition will be more common outside of gaming. Ultimately, we're likely to see more and more options for how to best interact with various kinds of software, and that's a good thing. Here are just a few more examples of cool digital interfaces.

• Chinese company Dexta has developed an "exoglove" (aka Dexmo) that's an exoskeleton glove for detecting hand movements and providing some haptic feedback. This input device had a Kickstarter project, but it's been cancelled without much explanation. Pre-ordering appears to be available still (for $175 per hand), but buyer beware if you think this exoglove will be a plug-and-play accessory. [url]
• Flow is a (yet another) mouse alternative that includes gesture recognition and some haptics and a kind of dialing mechanism. It's a neat programmable tool that aims to be a controller for almost any computing device (phone, tablet or desktop/laptop), but it might be a bit too customizable for people who don't use Photoshop or CAD software on a regular basis. [url]
• In 2003, Steve Jobs commented on the Newton, saying "It turns out people want keyboards" -- but that obviously wasn't the end of input innovation. Virtual reality interfaces may be getting better and better, but it could still take a while for the "killer UI" that doesn't make you want to vomit in 3D. [url]

If you'd like to read more awesome and interesting stuff, check out this unrelated (but not entirely random!) Techdirt post via StumbleUpon.

Filed Under: controller, crowdfunding, exoglove, exoskeleton, flow, gesture recognition, haptics, hmi, input devices, keyboard, mouse, newton, steve jobs, ui
Companies: dexta, indiegogo, kickstarter