Microsoft Touchscreen DigiDesk
When I was watching Click, I noticed a futuristic device that Adam Sandler had that I wished I had. I am not talking about that Universal Remote that could control his universe, but the computer he had in his future life. It was a desk that was nothing more than a huge touchscreen.
There is certainly nothing new about this idea, and I've seen it in several science-fiction films such as The Island. It seems like the next logical steps in improving workstations to a completely digital format and removing the countless paper shuffle. It is no surprise that Microsoft is working on developing this technology. A recent demonstration at Convergence '07 showed a Microsoft Touchscreen DigiDesk that uses a document digitizer and speech recognition search engine.
The video, which I included here is quite impressive. I'm not really a fan of what the Touchscreen Digidesk is mounted on, but I like its giant laptop look. The only difference is there is a screen where the computer keyboard would be. In fact, the whole thing is nothing but screens. Awesome.
During the presentation which is shown here, the Microsoft Developer revealed another cool feature. The presenter took a document and put it on the screen interface, and it scanned it quickly. The document was now saved in text form, so I'm guessing that meant someone could easily update it on Word, or something. The document could be resized so it was the size of the screen, and even display the watermark! Impressive, most impressive.
The presentation showed that the desk was designed for some manager, like at a factory. The situation they set it up for sounded, of course, perfectly ideal. If you wanted to see if you could increase production, the computer would figure out if it was possible. Personally, I can't remember when I used my computer for something like that, but I liked how the presenter did it with a vocal search engine. The presenter said what he wanted, and the info came up, just as if he typed it into Google.
This is something that you would have to see to believe. Sadly, I doubt we'll be seeing this in operation anytime soon. However, I look forward to the day when every computer will look like the Mircosoft Touchscreen Digidesk. Especially with the scanning document operation, because it would reduce the amount of paper we use. I mean, how many hard copies do you really need? I really think just hard copy is enough. Of course, I don't want a society that is entirely paperless. Otherwise, what you going to do with the power go out?