Predict the Future - the Graphical Interface

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we've got used to folders, little bits of paper flying twixt one folder and t'other, panes, dialog boxes etc., but what does the future hold? How will our pooter desktops look in ten or twenty year's time?

― MarkH (MarkH), Thursday, 15 January 2004 10:35 (twenty-two years ago)

or if that's too hard, say what you'd LIKE to see!

― MarkH (MarkH), Thursday, 15 January 2004 10:35 (twenty-two years ago)

ILX Desktop = everytime you want to delete a file a virtual Andrew or other mod pops up and drags it kicking and screaming into the Recycle Bin

― stevem (blueski), Thursday, 15 January 2004 10:45 (twenty-two years ago)

We will all use N. v4.0 to search ILX (internet 4.0)

― Andrew Farrell (afarrell), Thursday, 15 January 2004 10:49 (twenty-two years ago)

http://i.imdb.com/Photos/Ss/0181689/CN362_14.jpg

― Andrew Farrell (afarrell), Thursday, 15 January 2004 10:51 (twenty-two years ago)

i remember seeing a programme on BBC2 about this once. It had all these developers, in California or somewhere, all demonstrating their new whizzy ideas for how our desktops will look in the future. But they all looked so darn complicated! It's hard to see why anyone would bother with them! For example, one had a rotating 3d drum structure on the screen with lots of horizontal lines across it, each one containing a link to something.

― MarkH (MarkH), Thursday, 15 January 2004 10:55 (twenty-two years ago)

In twenty years time we'll probably be talking to our computers and dealing with cutesy avatars. Like the Bounty Bear in "Until the End of the World".

― Alfie (Alfie), Thursday, 15 January 2004 11:13 (twenty-two years ago)

expose function on the mac will surely soon pop up in other windowing GUIs. if you haven't used this, it's hard to explain why it's so very good.

― Jaunty Alan (Alan), Thursday, 15 January 2004 11:14 (twenty-two years ago)

I imagine things being softer and less boxy. Maybe candyfloss coloured.

― N. (nickdastoor), Thursday, 15 January 2004 11:23 (twenty-two years ago)

expose function on the mac will surely soon pop up in other windowing GUIs.

A version has been available for Gnome for a couple of months now.

― caitlin (caitlin), Thursday, 15 January 2004 11:24 (twenty-two years ago)

What is this 'expose function'. Do I have it? (I'm on 10.2.4)

― N. (nickdastoor), Thursday, 15 January 2004 11:27 (twenty-two years ago)

it'd be good if they finally get rid of old input devices e.g. keyboard and mouse and replace it with voice and eye focus recognition (like the computer will have cameras or something that works out where on the screen you're focusing on and that'd be like moving the mouse)

― ken c (ken c), Thursday, 15 January 2004 11:35 (twenty-two years ago)

I don't trust voice recognition - how do you pronounce all the important symbols like | ? ' ` & without being incredibly wordy? I'm not sure there'll ever be a convenient solution for it.

Eye-control of the pointer will be classic, of course.

― caitlin (caitlin), Thursday, 15 January 2004 11:39 (twenty-two years ago)

I am surprised the the mouse is still going. I kind of the like the contemporary dance moves Tom Cruise pulls to operate the computers in Minority Report though it does look kind of tiring.

― N. (nickdastoor), Thursday, 15 January 2004 11:39 (twenty-two years ago)

The mouse is awfully inefficient compared to the alternatives.

My computer is set up with both a mouse and a pen/tablet thing. The pen requires much smaller hand movements to move, and gives easier accuracy, but using it for quick move-click actions is still slower because of the effort it takes to pick the pen up and put it down again.

― caitlin (caitlin), Thursday, 15 January 2004 11:42 (twenty-two years ago)

They will put chips in you brain and you can just think on to the screen.

In fact you would probably not even need a screen the chips in your head would enable a two way transfer of information between the computer and you.

― Davel (Davel), Thursday, 15 January 2004 11:43 (twenty-two years ago)

in ten or twenty year's time?

did you read that bit, Davel? ;)

― MarkH (MarkH), Thursday, 15 January 2004 11:45 (twenty-two years ago)

Does Expose let you see the computer nekkid?

― Pete (Pete), Thursday, 15 January 2004 11:45 (twenty-two years ago)

I am now wondering if "internet porn" is pictures of servers with their cases off.

― caitlin (caitlin), Thursday, 15 January 2004 11:48 (twenty-two years ago)

yes pete it does, but N, only from 10.3

― Jaunty Alan (Alan), Thursday, 15 January 2004 11:48 (twenty-two years ago)

To be fair it will probably tak a bit longer to put into practice but in twenty years I think that the science will be in place to do it, but the fact that you have to put stuff in peoples brains will mean that the testing of the technology will take years and years, also I am not sure how the safety of it will work. Such as can people "hack" your brain? Or maybe manipulate your thoughts?

― Davel (Davel), Thursday, 15 January 2004 11:52 (twenty-two years ago)

Bah. Has no-one made a nice piece of shareware that brings the expose effect to the un-panthered?

― Dave B (daveb), Thursday, 15 January 2004 11:53 (twenty-two years ago)

there's already the technology to pick up your brain (electomagnetic?) wave patterns, i saw a TV program once where you could play a game of pong using the mind.

And also there are the replacement limbs that works by calibrating your natural movements (although i can't remmeber whether that worked by detecting muscle movements or brain activity), like you pretend to be moving your non-existent arm, and then the computer works out what that looks like on the sensor and later will move the arm in that way when you think like that again.

― ken c (ken c), Thursday, 15 January 2004 12:02 (twenty-two years ago)

Tabbed browsers! TABBED BROWSERS!!

― Sarah (starry), Thursday, 15 January 2004 12:08 (twenty-two years ago)

tabbed browser is something for the future?

― ken c (ken c), Thursday, 15 January 2004 12:13 (twenty-two years ago)

it'd be good if someone made a tool where if you (say) press ctrl and right click on a word on a webpage it will automatically google/dictionary.com that word on a popup window.

― ken c (ken c), Thursday, 15 January 2004 12:15 (twenty-two years ago)

(if they haven't already made such a tool)

― ken c (ken c), Thursday, 15 January 2004 12:15 (twenty-two years ago)

it IS a real pain to highlight something and copy it into the google toolbar

― Jaunty Alan (Alan), Thursday, 15 January 2004 12:26 (twenty-two years ago)

For mass market use, yeah Ken!

― Sarah (starry), Thursday, 15 January 2004 12:31 (twenty-two years ago)

it becomes it when you do it often enough. and why waste screenspace for a toolbar when a mouseclick will do?

and everyone should use GHOSTZILLA anyway - all tabs, and HIDES ITSELF WHEN BOSSES ARRIVE. fantastic.

― ken c (ken c), Thursday, 15 January 2004 12:32 (twenty-two years ago)

er assuming you have panels running across the bottom of your screen and not a drop down thing at the top which gives bugger all indication about which window is why...

actually i really don't care

― Sarah (starry), Thursday, 15 January 2004 12:34 (twenty-two years ago)

also safari has "Google Search" in the contextual menu when you highlight something. :-p

― Jaunty Alan (Alan), Thursday, 15 January 2004 12:41 (twenty-two years ago)

yay! my prayer is answered.

― ken c (ken c), Thursday, 15 January 2004 12:43 (twenty-two years ago)

oh i suck - you can configure ghost/mozilla to do this too.

― ken c (ken c), Thursday, 15 January 2004 12:46 (twenty-two years ago)

Back in the 80s they kept saying that eventually, mouses and keyboards would give way to control gloves and voice control. The GUI would be holographic 3-D and we'd control our computers the same way Tom Cruise controlled his "time viewer" in Minority Report.
It's been more than a decade an a half. Where's my power gloves and 3D display, bitch!?

― Lord Custos Omicron (Lord Custos Omicron), Thursday, 15 January 2004 19:12 (twenty-two years ago)

who wants to wear some silly dorky glove in the office?

― MarkH (MarkH), Friday, 16 January 2004 09:59 (twenty-two years ago)

i prefer to refer to it as Compu-Gauntlet

― stevem (blueski), Friday, 16 January 2004 10:01 (twenty-two years ago)

I think you should throw down the Compu-Gauntlet. Then stamp on it repeatedly.

― MarkH (MarkH), Friday, 16 January 2004 10:04 (twenty-two years ago)

The gloves might not be required if the system is sophisticated enough. Again I refer to this:
http://www.movieconnection.it/schede/minority_report/minority_report-a.jpg http://www.movieconnection.it/schede/minority_report/minority_report-a.jpg
http://www.scifi.com/sfw/issue270/cruise2.jpg http://www.scifi.com/sfw/issue270/cruise2.jpg
WATCH TOM CRUISE DO THE BATUSI!

― Lord Custos Omicron (Lord Custos Omicron), Friday, 16 January 2004 12:26 (twenty-two years ago)

he doesn't look very happy tho does he? Maybe he's thinking "Give me back my keyboard and my mouse!"

― MarkH (MarkH), Friday, 16 January 2004 12:28 (twenty-two years ago)

He doesn't look happy because he only knows 2 facial expressions, and 'happy' isn't either of them.

― Lord Custos Omicron (Lord Custos Omicron), Friday, 16 January 2004 12:34 (twenty-two years ago)

Occasionally his "the devourer" expression can look like a grin.

― Andrew Farrell (afarrell), Friday, 16 January 2004 12:51 (twenty-two years ago)

Doesn't Sisqo wear a glove like that?

― Davel (Davel), Friday, 16 January 2004 13:39 (twenty-two years ago)

"Wave your hands in the air like you just downloaded a particularly complicated spreadsheet"

― Markelby (Mark C), Friday, 16 January 2004 13:39 (twenty-two years ago)

if we do end up operating computers by winking, waving our hands in the air etc, how long will the initial, self-conscious "ohmygawd, don't I look a prat" phase actually last? I can't help thinking the answer is "a very long time".

― MarkH (MarkH), Friday, 16 January 2004 13:42 (twenty-two years ago)

There is another downside: "Gorilla Arm"
But after a few years working at a desk job, everyone would have bulging biceps like Schwartzenegger.

― Lord Custos Omicron (Lord Custos Omicron), Friday, 16 January 2004 14:00 (twenty-two years ago)

I did see an article or year or two back which predicted we would be typing on keyboards consisting of beams of light. So you would move your fingers up and down in a light-constructed space where the keyboard would be. perhaps if we did this we would not look quite so silly, seeing as it would be the same size and shape as the keyboard.

― MarkH (MarkH), Friday, 16 January 2004 14:03 (twenty-two years ago)

Yes, it's important to keep up appearances while in front of a computer. I myself am in a tuxedo as I type this.

― Andrew Farrell (afarrell), Friday, 16 January 2004 14:04 (twenty-two years ago)

http://www.dragonhawke.net/sakuracon2k2/images/ppp.jpg

― ken c (ken c), Friday, 16 January 2004 15:16 (twenty-two years ago)

I'm wearing a top hat, it doubles as a USB hub.

― Jarlr'mai (jarlrmai), Friday, 16 January 2004 15:19 (twenty-two years ago)

Dance Dance Revolution! == The new user interface

― Lord Custos Omicron (Lord Custos Omicron), Friday, 16 January 2004 20:45 (twenty-two years ago)

"Wave your hands in the air like you just downloaded a particularly complicated spreadsheet"

:postoftheyear:

― Baked Bean Teeth (Baked Bean Teeth), Friday, 16 January 2004 20:49 (twenty-two years ago)

two years pass...

http://mrl.nyu.edu/~jhan/ftirtouch/

― Yawn (Wintermute), Thursday, 9 February 2006 10:37 (twenty years ago)

that's pretty nice.

that said, even something like netbeans annoys me because some things are worse when done graphically. compiling 3 or 4 disjoint projects means pressing a button. waiting for it to finish. pressing another. another wait... whereas i can script the entire thing and just type a single word (or uparrow and return) to execute it.

the new xgl thing is also interesting - palm everything off to the video card and make that do the work rather than the main processor. results currently don't do much in the way of 'new' (unless you like your desktop texture mapped to a spinning cube) but hey...

― koogs (koogs), Thursday, 9 February 2006 11:17 (twenty years ago)

Using an ide as an example of poorly applied gui is like using the pope as an example of a catholic.

I've never seen an ide...esp the build/project side of it...that didn't suck.

― mikef (mfleming), Friday, 10 February 2006 04:06 (twenty years ago)

Organic flexible touchscreen inputs. Kind of like thin plastic sheets you can touch anywhere to select, move, type, whatever you need to do. OLEDs are getting towards achieving the thin portable screen thing.

I liked how the concept was visualised in Joss Whedon's Firefly/Serenity. It almost looked like regular printed text but it was fluid, dymamic and interactive/tactile.

― Trayce (trayce), Friday, 10 February 2006 04:17 (twenty years ago)

three months pass...

Where's my power gloves and 3D display, bitch!?

hi dere

― fez (fez), Wednesday, 17 May 2006 15:10 (twenty years ago)

i have no idea how this works though. "transformed air"??

― fez (fez), Wednesday, 17 May 2006 15:29 (twenty years ago)

expose function on the mac will surely soon pop up in other windowing GUIs. if you haven't used this, it's hard to explain why it's so very good.

-- Jaunty Alan

there's a firefox plugin that does this for your tabs... I haven't tried it yet, or even have a link though. Maybe I dreamt it.

― fandango (fandango), Wednesday, 17 May 2006 15:35 (twenty years ago)

> i have no idea how this works though

smoke and mirrors. (perhaps literally - you can see the odd wisp on the 3d car).

> Using an ide as an example of poorly applied gui is like using the pope as an example of a catholic.

but that example doesn't show ANY real world application. people use their pcs for reading and writing (including code) and the odd sum. and for listening to music. the above (above above) demo is only really useful for that last of those (and even then the interaction is minimal - transport buttons, (interactive?) visualizations).

― koogs (koogs), Wednesday, 17 May 2006 16:50 (twenty years ago)

two years pass...

http://news.yahoo.com/s/cnet/20081215/tc_cnet/83011138631012289476

― very very serious (gabbneb), Tuesday, 16 December 2008 16:56 (seventeen years ago)

People have adjusted to hearing individuals dictating information in public to their computing devices.

I will fight this.

― Kerm, Tuesday, 16 December 2008 17:03 (seventeen years ago)

I predict the graphical interface will evolve further in the direction of the present-day video game interface. iow, the graphics and icons will become ever more photo-realistic, so that a file folder will look more like a real manilla file folder and you'll put it into a metal filing cabinet that sits in your virtual office.

To make this work better, you'll be able to set up hidden passageways and other semi-magical shortcuts. You will have a virtual office assistant you can speak orders to, who will understand them and carry them out. The internet will begin to resemble Second Life more and more.

This trend will not make working on a computer appreciably easier (and no more productive) than it is right now, but will add an element of entertainment to work that will be wildly popular with computer users.

(he lays down crystal ball, which rolls off tabletop, smashing itself to bits on the floor)

― Aimless, Tuesday, 16 December 2008 18:45 (seventeen years ago)

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