by Arondale Withers

Brief History of Personal Computing
The first breakthrough in personal computing was the invention of the computer mouse by Engelbart in 1964. The first computer to be marketed with a mouse was the Xerox 8010 Star Information System in 1981. The Apple Lisa is one of the first known computers to have used a mouse, but at $9995 US in 1983 ($21,482 in 2008 dollars), it can hardly be called a “personal” computer. Altair, IBM, Apple, Commadore (Amiga) and other IBM Clones all made advances in personal computing in the 80s and early 90s that brought computers to the masses, standard with mouse controllers. In 1985, Amiga was the first personal computer to ship their computers with a two-button mouse as standard.

A lot has changed in the world of personal computing. Today computer scientists are making some existing technologies more accessible in the market place and are changing the way in which we interact with computers. Gestures are quickly becoming the preferred and most logical method of quickly and efficiently navigating new interfaces and accomplishing tasks that are accomplished by mouse clicks today it’s a natural step toward Fitts Law.

A New Era of Multi-touch Gestures
Many companies have been working on multi-touch interfacing since the early 80s. In January 2005, Apple Computers applied for a patent titled Gestures for touch sensitive input devices (pictured right). In it you will see the pinching gestures used to zoom an object in and out. In that same year, Apple released a PowerBook with a trackpad that would accept a limited number of multi-touch gestures. One example is using two fingers being dragged vertically to scroll thru content. Another circular gesture with two fingers would page up/down content.

Multi-touch in the Marketplace
Over the past few years there have been many advances to bring multi-touch products to the marketplace. Most notably, the Apple iPhone and iPod Touch. Featuring single and multi-touch gestures, users can quickly and easily navigate thru songs, playlists, contacts, resize images, magnify text, access special menus and more.

Jeff Han of Perspective Pixel has one of the most advanced customizable multi-touch solutions to date. His solutions are currently reserved for private government applications and Fortune 500 corporations. Han’s 3x8 foot interactive wall starts around $300,000 with the ability for his 10-man team to customize the solution to your exact needs thru custom development and configuration.

Bill Baxton, one of the pioneers of multi-touch technology, is now working for Microsoft to further develop the Microsoft Surface tabletop computer. With Surface, you can put a wifi or blue tooth-enabled camera on the table top and its sensors will recognize the camera, extract the pictures from the camera and display them creatively on the screen to toss, resize, and more.  Its sensors are so advanced it can recognize a number of objects. If you set a glass on the MS Surface, it will animate creative imagery from the placed object. Set two phones on the MS Surface and you can trade contacts between phones... all wirelessly. Today’s applications include trade shows, car show rooms, luxury hotels, and homes. Pricing is between $5000-$10,000 US. As pricing falls, you will soon see an increase of these interactive coffee tables in homes and offices.

Replacing the Mouse
Replacing the mouse and changing the behavior in which we interact with computer interfaces may happen sooner than you think. Note: it took 20 years from the time the mouse was introduced by Engelbart in 1964 until the time the two-button mouse became standard in personal computing in 1985 with the Amiga 1000. It has been approximately 26 years since the conception of multi-touch technology. The transition of from mouse controllers to multi-touch interfaces has already begun and is becoming more affordable every year. Not only are we starting to see touch displays on the shelves of computer stores, but we are also see multi-touch interfaces in the audio production industry.

Mark my Words
In the next several years you will see an exponential growth in multi-touch technology. It will trickle down from government and corporate usage to many types of home applications; from personal computing to your microwave.

Multi-touch technology is changing the way we use computers and interact with devices. In 2007 the iPhone was introduced, selling millions of phones. The very next year A/V installers began offering iPhone solutions to their high-end clients to control their blinds, lights, HVAC systems, home theater and more with their phone. It is only the beginning. Soon, personal computing will be using multi-touch as the standard method of operation. Companies like N-trig, Jazzmutant, Perspective Pixel, Apple and Microsoft are working hard to be the first to change our digital lifestyle with products available at affordable prices.

Mouse be gone!