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RE[2]: Why so different
by Alfman on Mon 3rd Sep 2012 07:02 UTC in reply to "RE: Why so different"
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"Touch screens work very well if you can hold them in your hands or place them where you normally place a keyboard."

That's actually why I like a tablet where the keyboard can fold out of the way. While interacting with the desktop via a touch screen should be possible, that's not exactly what I personally have in mind, which are more application specific use cases. I like to see applications where touch input can enhance a traditional paper notebook, instead of enhance the WIMP desktop to use touch everywhere.

Some examples:
For note-taking, even a simple paper notebook can rival a keyboard/mouse laptop because it is much easier to sketch out quick diagrams the "old fashioned" way. To this day, I sometimes prefer to draw things on paper and scan them in than try to enter them using a mouse.

Keyboard calculators (such as bccalc) are great but they suck at visually representing formulas. With a touch screen I had envisioned a stylus input algebraic calculator where one could write math formulas (symbolically as mathematicians intended) and the software could solve them on "paper" in a different color. It could also warn of logical inconsistencies in your note's equations or "scratch paper". It could annotate spelling corrections in the same way.

There is no reason that laptops should not also be able to do these things.

"(occasional touches or drags but without the whole WIMP overhead)."

I prefer not to have the OS exclude WIMP entirely. The exact same motivation for having multi-window to display documents simultaneously on the desktop will re-emerge on tablets - touch input has absolutely nothing to do with it. In a classroom setting I can read a book, a handout, and write in my notepad at the same time. In principal I'd like to produce the same experience on a sufficiently sized tablet. (Hint: I shouldn't need to have multiple tablets running to view multiple things at once)

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