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Multi-touch

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Multi-touch screen

Multi-touch is a method of interacting with a computer screen or smartphone. Instead of using a mouse or stylus pen, multi-touch allows the user to interact with the device by placing two or more fingers directly onto the surface of the screen. The movement of the fingers across the screen creates gestures, which send commands to the device. The term multi-touch is a trademark of Apple, Inc. [1]

Multi-touch requires a touch screen (screen, overlay, table, wall, etc.) or touchpad, as well as software that recognizes multiple simultaneous touch points, as opposed to the single touchscreen (e.g. computer touchpad, ATM), which recognizes only one touch point. This effect is achieved through a variety of means, including: heat, finger pressure, high capture rate cameras, infrared light, optic capture, tuned electromagnetic induction, ultrasonic receivers, transducer microphones, laser rangefinders, and shadow capture.[2]

Many products using multi-touch interfaces exist and are being developed. Multi-touch is used on computer products, notably the Microsoft Surface and the Apple MacBook line; it is also used on mobile devices such as the Apple iPhone, Microsoft Zune HD and the Palm Pre. Hobbyists have developed extremely low cost touchscreen technologies using webcams, projection of image, and software that senses touch patterns via the webcam. Multi touch screens larger than 50" are possible at costs under $100 to $400 depending on the projector & equipment used. DIY multitouch screens of extremely large size (wall sized or larger) are also quite possible and very cheaply constructed and posted in numerous places on the web.

History

Multi-touch technology dates back to 1982, when Nimish Mehta at the University of Toronto developed the first finger pressure multi-touch display.[3]

In 1983, Bell Labs at Murray Hill published a comprehensive discussion of touch-screen based interfaces. [4] In 1984 Bell Labs engineered a touch screen that could change images with more than one hand. The group at the University of Toronto stopped working on hardware and moved on to software and interfaces, expecting that they would have access to the Bell Labs work.[3]

A breakthrough occurred in 1991, when Pierre Wellner published a paper on his multi-touch “Digital Desk”, which supported multi-finger and pinching motions. [5][6]

Various companies expanded upon these inventions in the beginning of the twenty-first century. Mainstream exposure to multi-touch technology occurred in the year 2007, when Apple unveiled the iPhone and Microsoft debuted surface computing. The iPhone in particular has spawned a wave of interest in multi-touch computing, since it permits greatly increased user interaction on a small scale. More robust and customizable multi-touch and gesture-based solutions are beginning to become available, among them TrueTouch, created by Cypress Semiconductor. The following is a compilation of notable uses of multi-touch technology in recent years.

The use of multi-touch technology is expected to rapidly become common place. For example, touch screen telephones are expected to increase from 200,000 shipped in 2006, to 21 million in 2012.[7]

Multi-touch displays

Jefferson Y. Han debuting his initial multi-touch system at TED

Microsoft Surface

Microsoft Surface.
Main article: Microsoft Surface

In 2001 Steve Bathiche and Andy Wilson of Microsoft began work on an idea for an interactive table that mixes both physical and virtual worlds. Research and Development expanded rapidly in 2004, once the idea caught the attention of Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates. In 2007 Microsoft introduced Microsoft Surface, a functional multi-touch table-top computer based on a standard PC platform including an Intel Core 2 Duo processor, Windows Vista, and 2 GB of RAM.[8]

Essentially, Microsoft Surface is a computer embedded in a table with a large, flat, touch-responsive display on the top. The table uses small cameras (as opposed to finger pressure or heat) that enable it to react to the touch of any object. The unit has eight different modes that allow users to perform an array of activities,ranging from organizing pictures and videos to ordering food at a restaurant. Multiple users have the ability to work on the table at one time. The preliminary launch was on April 17, 2008, when Surface became available for customer use in AT&T stores. Although the product is not available for widespread purchase, it can possibly be bought directly from Microsoft for $13,500.[9]

HP TouchSmart

The HP Touchsmart is an all-in-one PC introduced by computer manufacturer Hewlett-Packard, first released in 2007. It is HP's first "PC-In-A-Box" computer, quite similar to the iMac G3, released in 1998, although incorporating a multi-touch display. It is the first mass marketed "touch screen" PC made commercially available. The technology behind the first generation TouchSmart, however, does not support the same class of multi-touch interaction as the previously mentioned products. Because of the nature of its optical touch sensors, the display can not effectively sense touches that fall within the same sensing beam. {{citation}}: Empty citation (help) This shadowing problem makes the screens prohibitive for many of the multi-touch interaction scenarios that other options can support. Newer generation TouchSmart systems feature larger display sizes, up to 25.5", and improved touch technology. The improvements confine the "area of confusion" to a smaller footprint, inhibiting multi-touch by very small fingers immediately adjacent to each other. {{citation}}: Empty citation (help)

Perceptive Pixel

Perceptive Pixel is a company founded by New York University consulting research scientist Jefferson Y. Han that creates wall displays and tables. The displays use infrared light emitting diodes along with an infrared camera to determine the point of contact. Perceptive Pixel’s technology is currently being utilized, in the form of the Multi-Touch Collaboration Wall, by CNN and an unspecified government contractor.[10] The system is currently very expensive (with a 6-figure price) and so is not suited to consumers or small businesses.[11]

DiamondTouch Table

The DiamondTouch table is a multi-touch, tabletop touchscreen with the unique[12] capability of allowing multiple people to interact simultaneously while identifying which person is touching where.[13] The technology was originally developed at Mitsubishi Electric Research Labs (MERL) in 2001[14] and later licensed to Circle Twelve Inc in 2008[15].

Demand Evolution

Demand Evolution has released two multi-touch displays based on infrared vision sensing and open-source software. Its product, the LCD based Gecko, is one of the cross platform, high-resolution multitouch displays available directly for consumers. The interactive display utilizes a 30" LCD, and as opposed to the wall mount and table designs of many competitors the Gecko is designed for workstation and kiosk scenarios. Currently, such open source multi-touch units on the market are low cost, because no developer kit, business software, or OS can directly support. It is aimed only at the open-source developer community and early adopters hoping to get in early on the industry shift to multi-touch interaction.

Multi-touch pads

Wacom Bamboo

Wacom have three tablets in their Bamboo series which feature multi-touch input. The gesture recognition is dealt with by the tablet itself and is not compatible with Windows 7's multi-touch capabilities.[citation needed]

Apple products

In 2005, Apple acquired FingerWorks, a Newark-based company which produced early multi-touch products.[3][verification needed] In 2007 they introduced the iPhone, marking the first time multi-touch technology was used on a phone.

Following the release of the iPhone, Apple expanded its use of multi-touch computing with the new iPod Touch, as well as the new MacBook Air. As of 2009, multi-touch can be found on the MacBook, MacBook Air , MacBook Pro and Magic Mouse.

Others

  • CUBIT is an open source multi-touch system developed by Nortd studios as a competitor to Microsoft's Surface.[16]
  • Many laptops and netbooks now feature multi-touch mousepads.
  • In April 2009, Sharp unveiled the upcoming first laptop with an optical-sensor LCD pad, the Sharp Mebius. The optical-sensor LCD technology combines LCD and CCD elements within its pixels and can detect fingers and objects such as a stylus, and is claimed to be able to scan a business card placed on top of the screen. Further improvements to this function are expected to enable fingerprint authentication in the future[17][18]. There is no information on when this laptop will be released.

Many laptops now feature multi-touch mousepads.

Notebooks and tablets

HP Touchsmart TX2

Released in December 2008, the Touchsmart tx2 was touted as the first consumer notebook and tablet PC with on-screen multi-touch control. The tx2 features multi-touch technology by N-trig.[19], which also allows use of a stylus.

Dell Latitude XT/XT2

In July 2008, Dell released multi-touch touch-screen drivers for the Latitude XT Tablet, claiming the "industry’s first convertible tablet with multi-touch capabilities."[20] Dell has partnered with multi-touch technology startup N-trig to enable multi-touch capabilities for its tablet. [21]

There have been numerous reports of serious problems with the XT multi-touch drivers or hardware interface, which, as of October 2008, remain unresolved by Dell.[22] The major issue is centered around the multi-touch drivers failing when the computer is booted when USB devices are connected at boot, or when certain internal media drives are present. Often, but not always, the issue is resolved if the computer is booted without the USB devices and they are connected after boot.[23] A similar, but not identical, issue may also be caused by interfering software, such as the iTunes helper.[24] Issue resolution is complicated by the possible failure of the driver install program to function in the presence of damaged drivers, requiring manual removal of related files and registry keys..[25] With the introduction of Windows 7 which offers native multi-touch support, preliminary tests have show that many of these issues with the XT have been solved, together with a much improved N-Trig Win 7 driver.

Other multi-touch enabled notebooks include the Dell Studio 17, Lenovo X200 and T400, and the Acer Aspire 1820PT and 5738PG.[26][27][28]

Software

iPhone OS

iPhone OS support multi-touch. This extends from the windowing environment, through to Safari and other software.

Linux

Most Linux distributions support multi-touch in their recent versions, such as Ubuntu (since version 7.10), Google's Android, Palm's webOS and Xandros.

Windows 7

File:Windows 7 Touch Photos Application.jpg
A multi-touch photos application is demonstrated in a pre-release version of Windows 7.

Windows 7 is the first version of Windows to support multi-touch without the addition of third party add-ons.[29] The operating system is known to have a multi-touch mapping application, photo viewing program, and incorporation in Internet Explorer 8. In January 2009, Microsoft joined with other investors who invested twenty-four million dollars in N-Trig Ltd., which plans to make computer hardware that takes advantage of Windows 7's multi-touch support.[30]

Frameworks

Multi-touch for Java (MT4j)

MT4j [31] is an open source multi-touch application development platform which is designed for rapid development of graphically rich multi-touch applications based on the Java programming language. It runs on common PC hardware and operating systems (Windows, Linux). Multi-touch hardware technology is abstracted via TUIO Protocol. MT4j provides a component model. Many multi-touch user interface components are already included. There is a support for common input formats (e.g. svg, 3ds, obj, various image formats) and OpenGL is used to provide high performance 2D and 3D graphics rendering.

PyMT

PyMT [32] is a python module using OpenGL for developing multi-touch enabled media rich applications. Currently the aim is to allow for quick and easy interaction design and rapid prototype development. PyMT support natively Windows WM_TOUCH/PEN, MacOSX multitouchpad, Wiimote, SMK, Tuio, and lot of widgets are available by default: keyboard, video, scatter, audio, layouts, cache...).

Pop culture has also portrayed potential uses of multi-touch technology in the future. The 2002 science-fiction film Minority Report showed different Multi-touch features like enlarging and moving objects around. The television series CSI: Miami introduced both surface and wall displays similar to Microsoft Surface in its sixth season. Another form of a multi-touch computer was seen in the motion picture starring Ewan McGregor The Island, where the professor played by Sean Bean has a multi-touch desktop to organize files, which was based on an early version of Microsoft Surface[5]. This technology can also be seen in the James Bond film Quantum of Solace. In a parodic episode of the popular TV series The Simpsons, when Lisa Simpson travels to the underwater headquarters of Mapple to visit Steve Mobs, the erstwhile pretender to the throne of Apple is shown to be performing multiple multi-touch hand gestures on a large touch wall.

A device similar to the Surface was seen in the 1982 movie Tron. It took up an executive's entire desk and was used to communicate with the Master Control computer.

The interface used to control the alien ship in the movie District 9 features such similar technology. [33]

See also

References

  1. ^ Apple Trademark List[1]
  2. ^ Pennock, Jacob, Tabrizi, M.H.N, 2008, A Survey of Input Sensing and Processing Techniques for Multi-Touch Systems, CDES'08
  3. ^ a b c "Buxton, Bill". ""Multi-Touch Systems that I Have Known and Loved."". {{cite web}}: |access-date= requires |url= (help); Missing or empty |url= (help); Unknown parameter |web= ignored (help)
  4. ^ Nakatani, L. H., John A Rohrlich (1983). "Soft Machines: A Philosophy of User-Computer Interface Design". Proceedings of the ACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI’83): 12–15. Retrieved 2009-01-28.{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  5. ^ Wellner, Pierre. 1991. The Digital Desk. YouTube video
  6. ^ Pierre Wellner's papers via DBLP
  7. ^ Wong, May. 2008. Touch-screen phones poised for growth http://www.usatoday.com/tech/products/2007-06-21-1895245927_x.htm (Accessed April 2008).
  8. ^ Reimer, Jeremy. 2007. A day on the Surface: a hands-on look at Microsoft’s new computing platform. http://arstechnica.com/articles/culture/surface.ars (accessed March 16, 2008).
  9. ^ Microsoft Surface price tag steeper than anticipated [2] (accessed July 11, 2009)
  10. ^ {{ Green, Kate. 2007. Touch Screens for Many Fingers. [3] (accessed March 16, 2008).
  11. ^ ""Can't touch this". Retrieved 2009-07-11.
  12. ^ Blough, K., "All Together Now", InformationWeek, 4 March 2002
  13. ^ Sandhana, L., "Interactive display system knows users by touch", New Scientist, 25 May 2006
  14. ^ Dietz, P. (2001). "DiamondTouch: A Multi-User Touch Technology". Proceedings of the 14th annual ACM symposium on User interface software and technology. UIST: Orlando, FL. Vol. f. pp. 219–226. {{cite conference}}: External link in |conferenceurl= (help); Unknown parameter |booktitle= ignored (|book-title= suggested) (help); Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help); Unknown parameter |conferenceurl= ignored (|conference-url= suggested) (help)
  15. ^ Circle Twelve press release BusinessWire, 12 June 2008
  16. ^ Open-Source, Multitouch Display http://www.technologyreview.com/Infotech/20703/?nlid=1044&a=f (accessed March 16, 2008)
  17. ^ http://www.itworld.com/hardware/66731/sharp-debuts-laptop-optical-sensor-lcd-pad
  18. ^ http://www.japancorp.net/Article.Asp?Art_ID=15247
  19. ^ [4]
  20. ^ Dell Propels Laptop Innovation With First Multi-Touch Convertible Tablet, Larger Solid State Drive
  21. ^ Exclusive: Hands-On with Dell’s XT Tablet Now with Multi-Touch
  22. ^ Tablet Touchscreen Died : Latitude XT : NtrigApplet Can't connect to driver
  23. ^ Can't connect to driver" How common is the issue?
  24. ^ How Many N-trig Driver Problems Are There? 2,3,??
  25. ^ WARNING: Latititude XT N-Trig software uninstall leaves Digitizer unusable
  26. ^ ""Acer launches new touchscreen monitor, notebooks"". {{cite web}}: |access-date= requires |url= (help); Missing or empty |url= (help); Text "url"http://www.pcworld.idg.com.au/slideshow/318267/acer-launches-new-touch-screen-monitor-notebooks/"" ignored (help)
  27. ^ ["http://www.n-trig.com/Content.aspx?Page=PressReleases&PressReleaseId=574" ""N-trig Multi-Touch Solution Available on Dell Studio 17 Laptop""]. Retrieved 2009-12-24. {{cite web}}: Check |url= value (help)
  28. ^ {{cite web |title="N-trig strengthens presence of Hands-on computing within enterprise market" url="http://www.n-trig.com/Content.aspx?Page=PressReleases&PressReleaseId=566" |accessdate=2009-12-24
  29. ^ Windows ista Team Blog. "Microsoft demonstrates Multi-touch". MSDN Blogs. Retrieved 2008-05-28.
  30. ^ Kenneth Pennington. "Microsoft Invests Big in Multi-Touch". Windows 7 Info. Retrieved 2009-01-12.
  31. ^ Multi-touch for Java (MT4j) software development platform Website http://www.MT4j.org (accessed Oct. 14, 2009).
  32. ^ A Python Multi-Touch library [http://pymt.txzone.net http://pymt.txzone.net)
  33. ^ District 9 at IMDB: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1136608/
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