Linked by weildish on Fri 12th Dec 2008 01:01 UTC
Though this technology isn't incredibly new (the video is dated June of 2006, and OSNews has covered it before), it's still not publicly available; however, it'll supposedly have a beta out for subscribers to test someday. Branded "BumpTop," this new interface builds off of the idea of organization done on traditional desktops-- I mean the wooden, metal, or glass ones. People naturally organize papers and other items into piles that make sense to their own ways of thinking. This kind of organization is limited on operating systems today, but BumpTop makes an old idea new by turning your virtual desktop a little more real.
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Member since:
2006-10-08
First impression: I remember some german software company introducing something like the paperless office (which is an utipoium since the 60s) in approx 1990, with "Leitz-Ordner" on a shelf, folders and papers. I thought: "Hey, this seems to be something similar." This software didn't only try to bring the "desktop metaphor" into a computer GUI, no, it replicated more elements of an office (professional use) such as filing cabinets, faxing machines and such stuff we know from an office.
Potential for a really handy tool for those who are familiar with concepts of how to organize things on a real desk. For those who aren't, well... :-)
I had a colleague who was very messy. Half of his cubicle was a pile of junk that reached to the top of the cubicle. Whenever he wanted something, he would rummage through all the stuff, throwing things aside until he found it. One day I asked him to find a computer file for me that I'd erased by mistake. It was taking him a while, so I went to look over his shoulder. His desktop was an exact duplicate of his cubicle. It had a massive pile of icons in one corner, and he was furiously rummaging through them to uncover the right file.
Source: http://www.rinkworks.com/stupid/cs_icons.shtml
I think the "desktop metaphor" would apply here, and it would require a document-centric approach, so there are no applications for theirselves - they're referenced by the document type or content; opening a document means to run a specific program and load the file into it for further use. This approach would be a good means to hide the "technical stuff" like applications from the user who does not work with applications anyway, but with documents.
Another approach would be to organize applications like the usual office tools on a shelf or in a drawer, such as staplers, tape, glue or a ruler.
Surprisingly, I assume. :-)
I can just speak from my very individual point of view: Cool - yes. Useful - I doubt... But I'm sure, as I mentioned before, that there's real potential for some fields of use, even if it's just a training setting for people with disorders who can't keep their stuff tidy and ordered. :-)