Bricklin on Tablet PCs 257
t482 writes "Dan Bricklin gives his first impressions of the Tablet PC.
'The most important thing to know about the Tablet PC, as far as I'm concerned so far, is that Microsoft did a great job...of naming it.' and then goes on to give a fascinating history of pen computing."
Question... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Question... (Score:5, Interesting)
Students, people attending any form of lectures, people who want to check their e-mail on the couch, people who want to cruise the web on a coffee shop (so basically the same people who want laptops).
It's also really, really spiffy. Or maybe I'm just gullible...
Re:Question... (Score:2, Interesting)
Are you an idiot?
The thing costs $2,000!
What student would buy this instead of a PowerBook G4?
You know, you Slashdot people really do miss out. It's like, here you are bashing Microsoft for stupid reasons. "Oh, it's just a fad." "Oh, it's going to blue screen!" "Oh, where's the market for this?" And unsurprisingly as all fuckall, your points are completely wrong but what's worse is that you miss the biggest, most obvious target -- the tablet PC is $2,000 more than anybody would ever pay for it.
Oh well. Have fun bitching about M$ and blue screens that anybody with half a brain never has a problem with and crap while the company walks all over you as you miss the primary opportunity to attain victory because you're too busy being morons to notice.
Re:Question... (Score:5, Insightful)
Maybe because it's a tablet PC. I'm not sure about you, but I couldn't type notes. I need to write them. Which means that the G4's out.
>>the tablet PC is $2,000 more than anybody would ever pay for it.
Of course, I could have said the same thing about ENIAC: it was $450,000 more than anyone would pay. And I'd be wrong. Because there were people (the gov't) who built it. There are people who will buy the tablet PC because there's nothing else like it on the market, at least that I'm aware of. And the people who can afford it will spur development of more models that won't be expensive.
Re:Question... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Question... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Question... (Score:2)
Huh?? Wacom (Score:2)
I think the limit is in how well the handwriting recognition software works, not in the hardware.
Re:Question... (Score:5, Insightful)
The thing about prices is that they change.
The primary market for these things seems to be for people who need to be able to record scribbles in a lecture or meeting. This is probably not a concept that needs huge amounts of computing power. People's buying decision will probably me made not on computing power, but mainly on price.
The main consequence of this is that the prices of the most popular models will go down with competition, not up with increased specs.
I agree it's not the sort of thing one would choose as a main machine, but as a second device for specific tasks, and that £2000 may be a bit much for a machine for this role, but the price they'll be in two years time probably won't be.
Re:Question... (Score:2)
Pfft! Search? Catgorize? Edit? (Score:2)
Huh? If the handwriting rec. works, you could search, edit, digitize and store your notes! I have a closet full of notebooks full of notes from college, man I wish I had all those in digital format!
Further, I'm not sure how the M$ software works ITR, but the Wacom software we use allows one to annotate a pic or a presentation, like a PDF or Powerpoint, and save the annotations with the file! Very nice for students, esp. if their text books are also in digital format that works with the annotation SW.
Re:Question... (Score:5, Informative)
It's called paper. (Score:3, Funny)
Re:It's called paper. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:It's called paper. (Score:2)
I use both a notebook and paper notes. And trying to find anything older than 3 months is a pain in the arse...
Re:It's called paper. (Score:4, Informative)
The Tablet PC's handwriting recognition is quite good and can recognize both my print and my cursive). What's better is you can leave your notes in digital ink format and the program converts and indexes the text in the background. Then when you need to find something, you do a search, and it will bring up the page(s) of your handwritten notes that match your search criteria. That is one of the powerful things about the Tablet. If I'm not mistaken, there is no Linux application that can do that. For now, at least.
For all the M$ bashing that goes on here at
Re:It's called paper. (Score:2)
The reason why I find this type of search difficult is because most notes are part of a larger group of notes. And if you do a search on this larger group you will get most documents in the group. Result, you do not find your note.... Or at least you need to investigate each note and figure out which one you want. I do the exact same thing with notepads....
Re:It's called paper. (Score:2)
I'm sorry, but to me it seems that results like that indicate that you haven't refined your search terms well enough, and if you can't seem to refine any better then it sounds like you're not sure what you're looking for. These are problems not with the medium the notes are in, but with the person doing the searching.
Re:Question... (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Question... (Score:2)
But if I get a small PDA-gadget with lots of stuff, and has completely different text-entry UIs (speech recognition, dasher [cam.ac.uk]with some pointing device), then I'll consider it.
Re:Question... (Score:2)
Re:Question... (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Question... (Score:5, Insightful)
Me^3.
- I'm an artist. I use a tablet to draw with right now. The ability to draw right on the screen would totally rock. Right now Wacom sells LCD tablets that plug into your VGA port, but they're in the $3,500 range.
- I attend lots of meetings and drag a laptop around with me. I'd prefer a TabletPC so I can jot sketches along with notes. Right now I use paper and a scanner to do this, I'd like to skip the paper step.
- I wouldn't mind having a Tablet PC around the house. The tablet form factor is much easier to tote around than the 'laptop-that-doesn't-really-sit-well-on-your-lap' approach.
I don't know if I represent a 'whole big market' or not, but I can tell you that office-life would be easier with them. I'm certain these will start appearing in my office within the next 12 months.
Re:Question... (Score:2)
Wait, you're an artist. That explains it
Re:Question... (Score:2)
Re:Question... (Score:2)
Re:Question... (Score:2)
I couldn't say without telling you. I think the worst case scenario is that I can at least do rough sketches to refine later. I've done sketchwork on my PocketPC before. I want more pixels to play with now.
Thanks for the heads up, though.
Re:why not the Seiko InkLink? (Score:2, Interesting)
o_O
What's that mean ? You prefer 32 bit ?
You know that's just 24bits with 8bits padded on to speed up processing, right ? There's not even any alpha channel to deal with when displaying (unless Your monitor goes transparent), before anybody brings that up.
Or do You work on 48-bit Matrox/ATI displays ? So then Your target audience must be Matrox/ATI users ? Because whilst You're working on 16bit/channel graphics, most of the world is still running 8bit/channel. And that's for display - good luck finding a benefit of this in printing (other than colorspace conversions which are entirely marginal.)
This isn't a flame - honestly just curious as to what You're referring to.
Re:Question... (Score:5, Insightful)
Any records that docs might need instead of putting the chart on the door, each doc gets his own and you can send it his patient list, their chart, all the details, ASAP. No need for records to send up the chart. No need for stationary PC.
A Doc could have all his info point and click.
Puto
Re:Question... (Score:3, Insightful)
Actually, that wouldn't be such a great idea, considering the fact the tablet PCs would need to remain updated. How would you ask? I'm pretty sure the majority of people on here would reply to my question with "wireless netwworking". However, do remember these are hospitals we are talking about and you're not even allowed to carry regular mobile phones around due to interference with possibly sensitive equipment. (at least not here in The Netherlands) Do you think they'd allow the building to be saturated with possible harmful wireless transmission?
Re:Question... (Score:2)
Re:Question... (Score:2)
But they could all have an rj45 dongle that they could plug in from room to room. That would lower the cost of having a pc in each room. 3 foot patch cable in the pocket. Doctors would love this cause the charts would always be ready. No excuses and the nurses could be doing important stuff.
Step further is sync it like a pda at the nurses station. By the time the patient is in the room you know who he is so the info will be shunted to the box.
Easy solutions if you don't think to hard about them.
I have been doing medical IT for awhile now, 6+ years, and it for about 12 i suppose, and best thing is the problems and solving them. There is always a solution.
Puto
Re:Question... (Score:5, Insightful)
They said one of the design goals was that it should be able to do everything that a normal pen-and-pad method can do. That includes the use-with-one-hand from above, but also hot-plugging (so you can always take it out of the docking station and run away...). Some of them can be used as a laptop as well, simply by turning the display around.
They were pretty nice, and remindet me of the Pads they use in startreck. There are, however, still some useability-problems. The resolution of the EM-Sampler that checks for the pen is not very good at the edges, resulting in a "shaking" mouse cursor when holding the pen still. Another one is the right mouse button - the ones I held in my hands thought you want to press the right button if you didn't move the pen for some time. This resulted in context-menus that popped up when writing slow. Anotherone is the problem of your hand that overlapps some part of the screen when using the pen. Its annoying if menues keep opening right under your hand, so you have to move it away again to see whats on the screen.
The text recognition was nice, but they mentioned a error-rate of 10-15%, so it's not really very useful, especially when writing fast. My opinion is that it's nice, but still needs some time to get "mature" and really useable.
Re:Question... (Score:5, Interesting)
If they work really well, huge. If they only sorta work, almost none.
It is exactly the sort of situation where Microsoft has been able to clean up by making a previously obscure technology mainstream.
Case in point was powerpoint. I used electronic slides back in the early days when you printed them out onto acetate one a $9000 printer. After Microsoft bundled Powerpoint into Office manufacturers started to make decent LCD projector displays (not the tatty things you stuck on to of an overhead projector).
The idea of tablet PC is not new, but until now nobody has been able to make it mainstream.
I strongly suspect that the problems of tablet resolution will be quickly sorted out. They may also be the catalyst for higher resolution displays - resolution as in dots per inch, not dots per screen. There are very few screens with 100dpi resolution, to make handwriting look good you need about 200dpi minimum.
I suspect that the killer app for these PCs is to have something you can surf the web on while watching tv. After that, taking notes in a meeting.
I have also seen them used in a presentation, they are pretty impressive used this way, you can draw on the slides to direct attention to one part or another.
It should not take that much to get Linux up on one of the devices, but making the result work well is likely to be a lot of work.
Another issue that is somewhat odd is that there does not appear to be an IBM tablet PC yet. Somewhat odd when you consider that IBM has been plugging this idea as assiduously as Gates.
Re:Question... (Score:3, Funny)
Even the Lindows guy [lindows.com] is talking about $500 tablets... though he's thinking handwriting recognition isn't needed.
I think tablets look cool, and do have applications in medical/retail/industrial settings, but not for $2,000, not yet. Hoping Midori or whatever, plus other chip options, besides full-fledged Pentiums can get the cost down.
Re:Question... (Score:2)
Tablet pc + wifi + barcode scanner + rugged outer shell == new possibilities for information access.
I would give you a great, specific example, but I don't want potential competitors to get wind.
Re:Question... (Score:2)
There are many things that REQUIRE a larger, high-color screen to be of any use, otherwise you'd just use your PDA for everything. I will leave it at that.
Counter Question... (Score:2)
Sometimes letting its developers decide that something is cool and should be made into a product is the worst decision a company can make. Sometimes it works out, and creates a new category of product that nobody imagined before. I can't really begin to guess which one this is going to be, except maybe noting that I don't want one. I also thought Netscape Navigator 1.0 was a stupid product, and that Netscape is doomed if it thinks it can make money on it.
Re:Question... (Score:2, Insightful)
For 9 years (from 91-2000), I was the lead developer of the Chicago Board of Trade's Order Routing System, which allows clerks in the phone booths ringing the trading floor to send orders into the pit (and for pit clerks to send fill information back out) via pen-based interfaces. COMET (the booth device) and Electronic Clerk (the pit device) both have used various incarnations of the Microsoft Windows For Pen Computing platform.
This is definitely an environment that needs pen-based input. The booths and pits are UNBELIEVABLE space constrained, and adding PCs with keyboards was just not an option. At the beginning of the project, there wasn't any handheld hardware to speak of (although the CBOT had partnered up with Sharp(?) for some custom handheld tech for another project), and the first wave of tablets were just coming out. Given the severe amount of jostling going on in these trading pits, handhelds had some big downsides as well. We ended up mounting devices to the railings of the pits (or flush mounted them into the desktops for the booth clerks). We evaluated both PenWindows and Go (I liked Go, but we knew they were going to fail in the marketplace) and used a whole bunch of different devices. Dauphin (sweet tech, lousy company), GRiDs, NEC VersaPads, Amitys and others in the beginning, eventually migrating to Fujitsu Stylistics (best of a bad bunch). We got to learn all sorts of things about digitizers (like the active digitizers with battery-powered pens would interfere with each other if mounted too closely, while tethered pens put out enough juice that if you held one in your left hand, you could use your right index finger as an input device).
Like many (most?) Microsoft products, the initial version of PenWindows was rushed out to kill a competitor, and then they sat on the tech for years before killing it. The last "release" of PenWindows was on Win95 (we eventually ended up just copying the Pen DLLs to Win98 when Win95 hardware stopped being produced). The functionality of PenWindows was crap - I ended up writing a number of custom controls that wrapped the basic BEDIT controls so we could have good-looking displays.
When they finally pulled the plug on Pen development altogether, CBOT started migrating to CIC's PenX controls for Win2000. (I left around this time - but they've dragged me back for some part-time consulting to help with the latest release). They've spent 1 1/2 years migrating to Win2000 + PenX, only to see Microsoft obsolete them just weeks before the big new release.
All that said, given an appropriately pen-centric application (minimizing data entry and screen movement are really important in pen-app design), a well-written pen app is amazingly productive. A booth clerk who has used the COMET app for a while can easily enter orders in under 2 seconds, while a pit clerk can manage thousands of orders from dozens of sources very easily. I was always amazed at how fast these guys worked - I was probably the only developer who could approach their speed, and they'd clean my clock anyday. Nothing like having responsibility for orders worth tens of millions of dollars to help focus the mind...
2nD college Students (Score:3, Interesting)
Plus the ability to digitize notes, and later then search, edit, catagorize and store the notes, well when I was a science student I would have loved to have that ability (esp. areas like science & engineering where diagrams and drawings are frequently part of the notes, not so nice to do on a laptop, not to mention 100 students writing is much less distracting than 100 students typing).
I'd say numerous smaller markets exist as well in sales, medicine, presentors, etc., basically anywhere folks now use paper notepads or folders of similar size.
It also seems to me that with a docking station adding more functionality (2nd monitor, key board, etc.) one could see many laptops replaced by dockable tablets.
I know I am going to be looking at a few of these the next time I get authorized to get more laptops at work, if they are capable enough to edit presentations/present with, I'd love one!
Ok so Bill did a good job of naming it... (Score:2)
We all know the answer to that one...
Re:Ok so Bill did a good job of naming it... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Ok so Bill did a good job of naming it... (Score:2)
The biggest problem... (Score:5, Insightful)
The problem with tablet PCs right now is the battery life. The whole advantage of a tablet PC is it lets you use it on the go, but if you have to plug in every two hours to recharge the batteries, that defeats the purpose.
I think there are some applications for tablet PCs now, hospitals, etc., but in order for them to reach mainstream-acceptance, they need to tackle the power/battery issue.Re:The biggest problem... (Score:4, Informative)
Not exactly a problem (Score:2)
Re:The biggest problem... (Score:5, Informative)
The REAL first tablet PC (Score:5, Funny)
Re:The REAL first tablet PC (Score:2)
I saw a documentary called "The History of the World", they covered that marvel of technology. Unfortunately, the TabletPC's back then didn't survive crashes too well. Some important data was irrecoverably lost.
Re:The REAL first tablet PC (Score:2, Funny)
Mark
Re:The REAL first tablet PC (Score:2)
Re:The REAL first tablet PC (Score:5, Funny)
Tim
Wow! (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Wow! (Score:2)
Re:Wow! (Score:4, Insightful)
The screens are the right size... (Score:5, Interesting)
That's why the media loves them. And that's why I think I would love it. I don't like my PDA because the screen is too small. I don't like to surf the net on my phone because the screen is too small. I want something that is about the size of a piece of paper. Microsoft did not invent it... but they will get the word out (the bastards).
Re:The screens are the right size... (Score:2)
and anyways.. the screensize being too small physically doesnt hurt that much if it has enough resolution/smart quirks to display the information, for example, web browsing on zaurus would be a total b*** unless opera had such great zoom option, making it possible to view most sites pretty much like they show on normal-non-320x240-screen.
10cm*10cm screen would be totally usable for almost anything a normal pc screen is good for if it had 1024*768 resolution..
Re:The screens are the right size... (Score:2)
I like my PDA because the screen IS too small. When I have to pound in somebody's address, grab a note or hit play in the media player, I don't want to whip out this giant tablet. I want something small, like a little black book. It doesn't need to be able to display 1024x768 on a 15" diagonal landscape, it needs to be small and subtle.
"Your phone number is...? Just a second while I mount my giant tablet PC with its huge screen on my arm...- give me room, OK, ready..."
Re:The screens are the right size... (Score:2)
Functionality over Internals. (Score:5, Interesting)
My new tablet computer (I got it 2 weeks ago) is so perfect it made me forget it is running XP and I simply haven't had time to try and get Linux running on it.
It suits my way of working so well that I can't think how I managed before. I don't do my main development on it, I still prefer typing to writing for that. But it allows me to do my email and do lots of design (both development and UI usability) while commuting to work on the train each day [yeah, I know I'll be criticised for being conned into working during personal time, but I'm not stupid - my productivity is higher so I go home early!].
Back to the internals
which one did you get and why? (Score:2)
Re:Functionality over Internals. (Score:3, Interesting)
My new tablet computer (I got it 2 weeks ago) is so perfect it made me forget it is running XP
It's interesting to hear somebody say that. I've thought for quite some time that we would reach a point where most people don't care or even know what OS is running. (Quick--what kind of circuit design is in your TV?). I think our expectations of what an OS and apps can do are just beginning to converge on some common items. By the time we reach a consensus, Microsoft will be as important as, oh... a car headlight manufacturer (Quick--who made the headlights in your car?).
In other news... (Score:4, Funny)
Magnets (Score:4, Funny)
Heck this might be the coolest fridge magnet yet!
Re:Magnets (Score:2, Funny)
Put on some powerful magnets on the back of one of these, and you got yourself a cheap internet fridge.
Yep, and after you corrupt all the data on its hard drive from those magnets, you can stick post-it notes to it and have a really expensive bulletin board.
I'd entertained (Score:3, Insightful)
Dan Bricklin said (Score:4, Funny)
Can you say Visicalc???
I'm a legend dam it!!!
Come again? (Score:5, Funny)
Must... Resist... The... Urge... To... Make... Jokes...
Re:Come again? (Score:2)
I'm not sure if the word wang meant then what it does today, but i used to call it (being 10 years old) the WangComputer. (Say the two words in quick succession, out loud, and let the ten year old inside of you giggle like a shcoolboy.)
great job of naming it? (Score:3, Funny)
Ahhh yes they stayed up all night, but it was worth it.
RTFA! (Score:2)
Take off the 'I hate Microsoft' goggles... (Score:5, Interesting)
Basically, don't be so quick to jump on the 'let's bash MS' bandwagon; it's a bit tired. There are actually some very cool things going on with the TabletPC - it's just that the price and the batterly life are too prohibitive to be taken seriously with this generation (for me and most people I have talked to anyway...).
Price problem? (Score:2)
Comparing them to larger laptops, which are often cheaper, isn't really appropriate, in my mind. Those larger laptops may be more capable in terms of screen size, processor power, drive bays & sometimes battery life, but they aren't anywhere near as portable and are often to big to use on a plane or bus.
As for battery life, from what I have heard, the tablets do pretty well. They may not run all day on a charge, but they should get you through lunch.
My big problem with the tablets is that they are not good enough to be your primary PC, but the software & hardware isn't quite where it needs to be to mitigate that shortcoming.
What I would like to see is either:
1) A docking solution that uses a single flexible cable & software support to provide seamless desktop extension so you can use the tablet as a tablet while making use of a full sized monitor, mouse and keyboard. (Ideally this would be wireless, but that isn't going to work well enough to give decent video performance) Either the tablets lack a docking station, or they aren't very useable as tablets when they are docked.
2) Better cooperative computing so I can use my tablet in conjunction with another system. At the very least, I want file & preference synchronization/sharing between machines to be seamless, but process migration would be even better.
This concept is really cool... (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Heh! (Score:2)
I find a tablet PC as a complementary device, not primary. And I find a large chunk of the population would feel the same way. (Otherwise typewrighters would not have beaten hand writing).
When I owned a Newton it was great. The form factor was right, had enough apps and RAM to keep me happy (at the time). And the battery life was fine. Of course the cost was good too.
Do that to the Tablet PC and you have a winner....
Re:BTW (Score:2)
A few datasheets ... (Score:5, Informative)
Dirty Fingers... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Dirty Fingers... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Dirty Fingers... (Score:2, Funny)
So it isn't much of an issue.
Want the best Unix-compatible Tablet PC? (Score:5, Interesting)
For Microsoft to claim IP on "TabletPC" is outright disgusting. Search eBay for "Tablet" and you will come across the aging Fujitsu Tablet Computers that still are and excellet addition to your slashdotting, hacking, cracking, and light-weight gaming needs. I must say, the most-hacked Tablet Computer is the Netpliance I-Opener; of which the BIOS on these computers is now able to be re-flashed and rather use a mere 200MHz Winchip CPU, you are able to now install and use an AMD K6-2 CPU and as well support for higher quantities of RAM. The only component holding back the Iopener in features is the slow, yet well-supported, Trident Cyberblade video. Alas, if I were to choose between a Netpliance I-opener and another, I would choose the Cidco Mailstation. The Cidco Mailstation uses a verry nice and wide grayscale LCD and it is able to last for over 12 hours on a single set of batteries...in my experience.
Linux on the Cidco Mailstation is A+ material. Too bad nobody has been able to do it yet.
Thin Clients (Score:3, Insightful)
Anything goes if someone is watching DVDs and running SETI@Home in the background while downloading the latest Harry Potter. I wouldnt expect the battery to last that long at all. Then again, the same goes for normal protables.
Another factor to consider is heat. If the WinXP OS is running all sorts of junk in the background, the system will heat up considerably. Much like thier desktop brothers, the new pentiums and athlons
But then again, this is nothing new. I think I've seen people with devices like this before. Usually, its all proprietary programs. They seem to work well, since its just a thin client with connections to a server somewhere.
I think this guy missed the point. (Score:3, Insightful)
Wha!? A *Tablet* PC? (Score:5, Funny)
There's no way I could swallow one of those!
Opportunity to Crack the Desktop (Score:3, Insightful)
So, if an open source project were to arise that did a better job of writing recognition, it could be a "killer app" that gets more of the mainstream PC users interested in Linux desktops.
Caveat: no, I'm not going to do it. My research area is security, not HCI.
Crispin
----
Crispin Cowan, Ph.D.
Chief Scientist, WireX Communications, Inc. [wirex.com]
Immunix: [immunix.org] Security Hardened Linux Distribution
Available for purchase [wirex.com]
Re:Opportunity to Crack the Desktop (Score:2, Informative)
100% success rate recognizing. There are a few words it's not sure about, but every single one of them, it has chosen the correct word, as the first possible choice.
The recognizer works on patterns and context, as much as it does on pure stroke recognition. I find that most people who think the recognition sucks are either block typing (which makes it difficult for the recognizer to seperate words), or are simply writing a few words to test the recognizer. Write full sentences, hell, write entire paragraphs. The more you have it recognize at once, the better it does, as it is able to use the context of everything you've written to help it recognize your writing.
Re:Opportunity to Crack the Desktop (Score:2)
Who writes home about their handwriting? Really...
Why the tablet? (Score:3, Insightful)
I'm seeing a lot of questions like "Why would anyone want a tablet when you can just buy a laptop"?
The answer is simple: Because laptops SUCK for working in your lap.
Laptops are the most misnamed device ever. They are portable PCs. Useful, but difficult to use in any position other than in front of you -- like a PC.
Re:Why the tablet? (Score:2)
If they sucked that much, I think this guy [theregister.co.uk] would have been happier
What a TEPID level of enthusiasm... (Score:2)
It's hard to believe this is the wave of the future when the first kid on the block to have one can barely say more than "When I write in a way that my ink is readable (slowly and big), the recognition is surprisingly good, but not wonderful" and "[I was struck' with how little advance there had been since the last try for pen computers... the pen/tablet software and hardware aspects appear just a bit better..."
He keeps SAYING that what's been done is just great and important and bound to be the wave of the future, but it sure doesn't sound to me as if his heart is in it.
Re:What a TEPID level of enthusiasm... (Score:2)
You can bring tears to the eyes of any Newton user by asking them to imagine what kind of softare and hardware they'd have today if the technology hadn't been strangled. (Thanks in large part to MS itself.)
MS Bashing Continues (Score:3, Insightful)
Let's be reasonable here. If Microsoft does something stupid or evil, let's post it. But if Microsoft puts out a new product, and the hardware manufacturer does a less-than-spectacular job of implementing it, don't blame Microsoft...
if patents hold up, pen computing is in trouble (Score:4, Insightful)
Furthermore, with the release of TabletPC, Microsoft has shown again that they simply can't innovate. Microsoft's TabletPC software is the same old stuff we had 10 years ago, only in a more bloated software incarnation. The only thing that has really gotten better is the hardware and processor speed, as well as the quality of real-time graphics those machines support.
Few if any of those patents should hold up if challenged in court, since most of the techniques had been used for quite some time by researchers before that. This is the usual case of a bunch of upstart startups not knowing what has been happening in academia and patenting like mad (Bricklin is aware of this [bricklin.com]). But that won't stop those patents from causing great harm: the threat of a lawsuit from Microsoft or Compaq/HP is sufficient to scare away investors from startups and to cause bigger players like Palm, Sony, or Apple to avoid certain features or functionality entirely.
While Compaq/HP holds some important patents, they are in bed with Microsoft. That means that Compaq/HP will willingly license their patents to Microsoft. Microsoft will use their patents to force other companies to adopt their TabletPC even if those other companies would have wanted to develop their own pen software. And for companies like Apple, who will likely develop their own software, Microsoft will use the threat of lawsuits to limit functionality and stifle their creativity: "you can only use our patents if you make this part of your software 'compatible' with ours".
Penny Arcade's review of Tablet PC (Score:3, Informative)
Gabe talks [penny-arcade.com] about using a Tablet PC to produce his comics.
For an example of a sketch made on it, go here [penny-arcade.com]
Slick (Score:2, Insightful)
Some of my friends don't like the palm though, they want a laptop. These are a good bit more expensive than a normal laptop, and don't seem to be that much more functional. So my friends who want or already use laptops, still think their laptops are a better deal. I just can't see anyone buying these while they are much more expensive than a laptop.
People who need a handheld will buy a handheld, and people who need a laptop will buy a laptop. This doesn't fully meet the needs of a palm-user, and it charges the laptop user more for functionality that is arguably useless.
Go's PenPoint was one of the great OS innovations (Score:4, Insightful)
Bricklin is concentrating on application development for PenPoint, and winds up giving short shrift to the OS it's self. It really was an innovative operating system, possibly the most unique one in the last 20 years. (OK, I realize that is a bold claim, and will produce a lot of argument, but bear with me...)
PenPoint was the first commercial OS where the user didn't interface with "applications" and "files". The primary interface element was the page. The user started with a blank page, and if she started writing, it would start translating the handwriting into test, like a word processing application. But if she drew a box, it would start graphing. The user could move through pages with a "flicking" gesture; use proof-reading typographical marks to edit. Very clever.
Microsoft borrowed some of the embedding for OLE, but they didn't actually get it. Or maybe they got it too clearly. They saw that an OS that didn't follow the application-launcher paradigm meant smaller sales for their Applications division.
Anyway, I didn't own one of these, so I may have gotten some details wrong. I just remember being impressed by the ideas behind it and was pained to see Microsoft's sorry-ass "Pen Windows" appear, kill PenPoint, then disappear like a serial killer.
$2,000 breakdown (Score:2, Funny)
TabletPC - $1,000
X Box Loss - $500
Gates' bank account - $500
Anyway... I'd not give up my WACOM tablet forever! PERIOD!
*sigh*
Re:Browser Anywhere! (Score:2)
Re:Browser Anywhere! (Score:2)
Most of them have keyboards. The only requirement is to be able to flip the keyboard under monitor so that notebook turns into tablet.
Re:I'd like to know... (Score:2)
They're wireless. Yeah, you doodle during commercials. You check e-mail during commercials. You pull up TV listings [yahoo.com] that are so much better than the dead tree listings or that "preview channel" that takes 3 minutes to scroll all the listings while subjecting you to a half-screen full of commercials. You check the servers at work to make sure the new night admin hasn't turned them into warez servers. You turn down the thermostat. You command your robot to get you a beer. You command the robot to get you some ice cream. You command the robot to get you your heart medication.
Hmmm... actually... you're right. TabletPC is a very bad idea.
Let's not tell them that right away though. Let's have the heart attack, sue somebody, and then tell them.