Surface Computing

Many of us might have heard the term Surface Computing and for those who didn’t, “Its the term for the use of a specialized computer GUI in which traditional user Interface elements are replaced by everyday objects. Instead of a keyboard and mouse, the user interacts directly with a touch-sensitive screen.” Hence a surface computer is a computer that interacts with the user through the surface of an ordinary object, rather than through a monitor and keyboard.

   

Earlier work in this area was done at the University of Toronto, Alias Research, and MIT. However Recent minor innovations in the surface computing field are attributed to Apple, Inc and to Microsoft Corporation. Apple had demonstrated surface computing interfaces intended for professional use since 2006, with no expected product release date. Microsoft unveiled plans for the Microsoft Surface in May 2007. The Microsoft Surface (code name Milan) seems to be closer to production. Finally, there is Linux surface computing software aswell, called Linux MPX.

The Surface is a horizontal display on a table-like form. Somewhat similar to the iPhone, the Surface has a screen that can incorporate multiple touches and thus uses them to navigate multimedia content. Unlike the iPhone, which uses fingers’ electrical properties to detect touch, the Surface utilizes a system of infrared cameras to detect input. Uploading digital files only requires each object (e.g. a Bluetooth-enabled digital camera) to be placed on the Surface. People can physically move around the picture across the screen with their hands, or even shrink or enlarge them. This could be the next generation of KIOSK. Below is the diagram from Microsoft Surface (Codename Milan).

 

1. MultiTouch Screen: This is the multitouch screen display. The Surface is so far advanced than we could imagine that it can recognize objects by their shapes or by reading coded “domino” tags when placed on the table.

2. Infrared: Used for collection input/s. When objects touch the tabletop, the light reflects back and is picked up by multiple infrared cameras. 

3. CPU: Surface uses many of the same components found in everyday desktop computers.

4. Projector: These are set of projectors inside to display images. 

references: http://www.microsoft.com/surface/index.html  

Brain Teaser # 1

Three people check into a hotel. They pay Rs 3000 to the manager and go to their room. The manager suddenly remembers that the room rate is Rs 2500 and gives Rs 500 to the bellboy to return to the people. On the way to the room the bellboy reasons that Rs 500 would be difficult to share among three people so he pockets Rs 200 and gives Rs 100 to each person. Now each person paid Rs 1000 and got back Rs 100. So they paid Rs 900 each, totalling Rs 2700. The bellboy has Rs 200, totalling Rs 2900. Where is the missing Rs 100?

Behind every CLOUD is another CLOUD

As we all know we are entering into cloud era where to build an application like Youtube, mySpaces, etc an individual does not have to worry about massive infrastructure to serve millions of user requests, data centers, database space, memory, scalability and moreover administration and maintenance of such a big infrastructure. Amazon, Google and Microsoft have provided us these infrastructure for minimal cost and with application platform to build such big applications.

Amazon is in cloud business for quite long time with its Amazon Web Services, S3 (Simple Storage Service), EC2 (Elastic Compute Cloud) and SQS (Simple Queue Service) services, Google have provided this platform few moths back with its GAE (Google App Engine) and BigTable for Data Storage and now Microsoft came up with its Windows Azure, Live Services, .Net Services, SQL Services, Dynamics CRM Services, etc. Now an individual or small firms can easily access world level ground to compete with old big giants. Good thing is that Google and Microsoft have provided these services initially free to a certain limit so any one can start building such application right now without any constraint. 

Below is an article explaining the advantage of cloud war to Asian software firms and individuals.

http://www.zdnetasia.com/news/software/0,39044164,62048490,00.htm

Stack Overflow

Just have heard the news on my official blog and in case if you have missed the news as well, let me break news of one of the most important development on the cyberspace: Jeff Atwood (of CodingHorror.com) and Joel Spolsky (of joelonsoftware) have teamed up and launched Stack Overflow last month. It’s a must visit site for all developers. It can save you several hours since people people are quite fast at responding to your queries. And the most important aspect is the reputation and badge system of the website.