gestures

SAN FRANCISCO -- Apple unveiled a new version of Safari today at the company's World Wide Developer's Conference here. The browser takes some visual cues from the competition but manages to maintain its unique take on browsing.

Not unlike Google's Chrome, Safari 6 ditches its search bar in favor of a unified search-and-URL location bar. As with Chrome, and optional in Firefox, the search-location bar clears up a significant chunk of the ever-dwindling browser screen real estate. You'll have more room for extension icons, basically.

During the WWDC keynote this morning, Apple's new head of … Read more

At CES this year one of the most interesting announcements involved Samsung's Smart Interaction, a new feature on its 2012 TVs that utilizes a built-in camera and microphone to enable you to control the boob tube just by speaking and/or gesturing to it. I've spent the last few days doing just that, much to the amusement of my co-workers, and boy are my arms (and at least one finger) tired.

My takeaway? Smart Interaction has promise but feels half-baked and more like a gimmick than a compelling upgrade. Once the novelty wears off, its usefulness is limited (at best) to those times you don't have a remote in-hand. … Read more

If you want to get more natural with your pics, Japanese researchers are working on a gesture-based mini camera that lets your hands frame the shot.

The group at the Institute of Advanced Media Arts and Sciences (IAMAS) in Gifu Prefecture recently showed off something they call the Ubi-Camera, a play on "ubiquitous" and "yubi" ("finger" in Japanese).

As the vid shows below, the simple prototype attaches to your index finger while your other fingers form a viewfinder around it. Push a button with your thumb to snap the shot.

Instead of a zoom … Read more

MIT researchers are trying to get computers to correctly interpret hand signals used by crews aboard aircraft carriers so that robot planes can follow them.

As Northrop Grumman continues to develop its X-47B robot stealth plane, which is aimed at carrier use, Yale Song and colleagues at MIT are working on a machine learning system that could allow autonomous planes to understand crew directions.

In its research presented in the journal ACM Transactions on Interactive Intelligent Systems, the team used a database of abstract representations of 24 gestures often employed by carrier personnel. They trained an algorithm to classify gestures, including posture and hand position, based on what it knew from the database. … Read more

I wrote my previous app collection about Advanced task managers on iOS, but a new app came to my attention this week that's too good to pass up.

Clear (99 cents) is a to-do list app that lets you use simple gestures to manage your tasks with an interface that's as intuitive as it is easy on the eyes. People seem to like this simple task manager, because it's now No. 1 in the iTunes App Store. This app won't take the place of Reminders or other scheduling apps that offer alarms--Clear sticks to simple list making, and it does a fine job.… Read more

There were a few new buzzwords floating around at this year's CES, and among "OLED" and "4K resolution" came another: "gesture control."

What is it? Why, it's the new touch, according to its inventor, PrimeSense. But instead of touching the screen you wave at it.

But the technology isn't brand new; if you've seen an Xbox Kinect you've seen gesture control--particularly if you've played with the newest update.

Microsoft licensed PrimeSense's 3D sensor technology for use in the Kinect, and PrimeSense says it wants to see gesture control in all consumer electronics, and not just TVs. But the thing I don't understand is why I would want to wave at my telephone rather than touch it. Asus and Microsoft are experimenting with using gestures in their products, but as CNET editor Scott Stein says: why? … Read more

Hey, look at this: Kinect on a laptop. OK, so there we go. According to The Daily, companies are well on their way to making laptops--or, at least, laptop prototypes--running Windows 8 and equipped with Kinect motion camera hardware instead of standard webcams.

The Daily got to see some of this technology first hand on what it thinks were Asus laptops. Intel's CES 2012 press conference featured a stage re-enactment of a similar Kinect-like idea on a laptop, shooting a virtual catapult in a game.

The real question here is, who's going to use this?… Read more

LAS VEGAS--The company that developed the technology behind the Kinect for Xbox 360 says it sees on-board cameras and gesture control replacing touch on all consumer devices.

Israel's PrimeSense developed the sensor for the Kinect and says the potential for gesture control technology is huge--extending beyond the loungeroom into digital signage, medicine and other mobile devices.

"Everybody knows touch. What we want to do is bring [our technology] into all consumer devices," said Tal Dagan, PrimeSense's vice president of marketing. "Think of going back before touch. It's crazy. So we think this is the … Read more

LAS VEGAS--The message of CES 2012 for laptops thus far: wait.

I'd love to tell you that one of the laptops of this year's Consumer Electronics Show is absolutely wonderful, a must-buy. However, I can't. I have a strong feeling that whatever we see at this show is only a half-step forward. Worse, there's a very good chance that it'll all be out of date by midyear.

The reasons are utterly simple, and made even clearer by this morning's Intel keynote presentation.… Read more