UIs, mouse replacement systems and other nonsense

Well, the decision to move away from Ubuntu (more specifically Unity) was a good one for me. It's been compounded by this :

http://www.markshuttleworth.com/archives/939

I can't see HUD being the way forward particularly. Just too complicated. It may work better with Voice Recognition, but people have been trying to get us to use that for years too no avail.

How many people do you see using VR on mobile phones ? None of us like talking to inamimate objects. We don't even really like answer phones. How many times do you ring off rather than leave a message. And if you do have too, how many times do you ring off, compose yourself and then ring again to leave the message ?

We are only really accustomed too, and comfortable with, talking to something that will give us some form of response. Ourselves, other people, and our pets.


My own solution ? If you want to move away from the mouse, why not use a touchpad ? As a part or extension of the keyboard. it keeps your hands closer to the keyboard, and is more natural than a mouse.

We use them on laptops. We use them on phones. You can use gestures et al.

Logically it would make more sense. Especially as I for one don't want my beautiful high definition monitors all smeared with fingerprints. Touch screens may work on your Pad, but not on your desktop. Reaching for a screen to touch it is is as inefficient as grabbing a mouse. And makes a right mess too.

I think that it would need some work to get the precision right. But it would be an easier leap to make than the other choices being foisted on us.

On my fairly standard keyboard I was just trying too imagine losing the cursor keys and using a pad. Hmmm. That might just work. Particularly if I could add some 'zones' on the pad for such things as up, down, left, right etc to replace the keys.....

Even better, replace the Ins, Del, Home, End, Page Up & Down keys just above and you have an A6 sized pad right next to your right hand (left handed models should be made available too !!!!!)

This is the sort of idea, but with a proper sized keyboard & pad :

Might have to get something similar to the following and build it into my keyboard.

http://www.ergonomictouchpad.com/eu/xl_touchpad.php
http://www.cirque.com/desktoptouchpad/productsandorders.aspx

Well, that's my bright idea for the day !