Okay, so this is last minute and I know it, but there are five essential concepts that I?d really like to see in an Apple Tablet.
1) Perspective View: This may be hard to explain, and I?ll add a video of what I?m describing soon if it?s not in the tablet. Essentially, it?s hard to type on a tablet and see the screen on a flattened axis. What I propose here is that when the tablet is placed flat on a surface, the onscreen keyboard stays full size, but the rest of the screen visually tilts in perspective so that looking down on the screen, you see the image as if the screen were recessed into the table before you. Therefore you have the illusion of looking directly into the screen and have it appear in the proper perspective to your seated position. (A graphic will be added soon.)
2) The return of WYSIWYG: The original Mac was breakthrough in the fact that what you saw on the screen was ACTUALLY what you saw on paper, etc. Somewhere down the line we lost this. What needs to return (and on the Mac as well) is when you review ANYTHING in 100%, onscreen rulers should appear, as 1 inch is ACTUALLY 1 inch. There is really no excuse for this not to be the case, and with Apple producing their own screens; it should be a standard, especially IF you use apple screens.
3) Wireless Operation, INCLUDING CHARGING! We?re in the 21st Century People! Why do we have to plug in everything? The tablet should be able to sync, charge, print, communicate, etc., all without one cable connected! EVEN headphones! There really is no technical excuse why this shouldn?t happen now.
4) VideoPhone/Conferencing: We have the technology, and we just need an influential company to push it in to existence. Apple changes the world; let?s have our world closer to the future we all dreamed. VideoPhones should be here now! (As for the tablet, its camera should identify the caller talking, and track them digitally even if the tablet is on a table. Again, we?re all about perspective here. When you place the tablet on a flat surface, the image should change to the perspective to be accurate for the caller. (Graphic soon.)
5) Voice, Voice, Voice, Voice! 2001: a space odyssey featured the HAL-9000, a computer that could communicate with us and us back using a voice interface. That film is ahead of its time, and took place nine years ago! The keyboard was born with the typewriter decades ago, why are we still using it as our primary text input device?
Apple created a video with the help of George Lucas? Industrial Light and Magic called ?Knowledge Navigator?. It was introduced many years ago as the computer of the future. Watch it, and see how it relates to today.
Sadly, I expect NONE of the concepts above to be in the new tablet, as much as they truly are exceptionally necessary to our future. I?ll follow up this article with another five after the launch.
Cheers, and May today deliver one of the greatest breakthroughs in our lives!
David
