As usual there were a lot of things that happened during the week, and not all of it was pharmacy or technology related. Here’s a quick look at some of the stuff I found interesting.
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My family and I just returned from a few days in Las Vegas for a little rest and relaxation. During our visit, we had dinner at the new Hard Rock Café on the Strip. This particular Hard Rock features an interactive Microsoft Surface wall on the second floor as well as Surface screens at each booth in the dinning area and a couple of Surface tables near the wall. Of course my daughters and I spent quite a bit of time playing with the Surface wall and the Surface screen in the booth we were seated at for dinner. Well, I should say my daughters had an opportunity to play with the Surface screen at our table. I couldn’t get within a foot of it because they were having such a blast with it.
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Technology Review (MIT): “At the base of the new device a “sensor tile” produces magnetic multiple fields above its surface. By detecting disturbances to these fields, the system can track the movement of a metal object across its surface, or the manipulation of a bladder filled with iron filings or a magnetic fluid. A user can drag a ball bearing across the surface to move a cursor across a computer’s screen, or manipulate a ferrous fluid-filled bladder to sculpt 3D virtual objects.” – Pretty cool stuff.
The caption for the image at right: “Bladder control: Manipulating a magnetic fluid on top of the researchers’ “sensor tile” (top) offers a novel way to control a computer. The interface can be used to sculpt virtual shapes (bottom). Credit: Microsoft”
Just some items of interest that various folks on Twitter forced me to read.
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Surface blog: “I don’t want to put any pressure on Michael and the team over at Carnegie Mellon University, but you guys should be getting an A for your class project this semester. Their Dungeons & Dragons experience called “Surfacescapes” on Microsoft Surface is amazing. This is the future of how computers will aid in board games. Remember, D&D playing aids like this are for serious role playing gamers who might normally use balsa cutouts and not just wimpy printed maps. The computer is has a technical role in the gameplay but the DM and the players are the storytellers. That’s why it doesn’t look exactly like a video game. Not that it isn’t seven shades of wonderful.” – This has nothing to do with pharmacy, but it’s wicked cool stuff. I spent many hours playing D&D with paper, pencil and physical dice. I remember when I thought hi-tech was writing a small app that would randomly generate characters on my then new Commodore 64. That was before I realized programming was hard and chose an easier career; pharmacy.
HealthBlog: ““For example, as the use of tablet PCs within healthcare continues to grow, many of us will welcome the improved hand-writing recognition facility in Windows 7. It also learns, so the recognition gets better the more I use it.” He says the same is true for voice recognition: “I just talk to my PC and it does what I want, from opening programs to dictating letters.” The true party piece of Windows 7, though, is its support for touch – not just touchscreens but what has come to be called ‘gesturing’; support for a sophisticated but more naturalistic way of interacting with technology. “Clinicians are able to zoom in on an image by moving two fingers closer together, like they’re pinching something, or zoom out by moving two fingers apart,” says Dr Crounse. “They’ll even be able to move an image on the screen by rotating one finger around another, and right-click by holding one finger on their target while tapping the screen with another.” This sort of natural manipulation of text, images and multimedia will make computer equipment less obtrusive in the clinician-patient relationship; and should make technology accessible to many communities which use healthcare extensively, yet were previously somewhat overlooked by IT: for example the elderly.” – I’ve been a proponent of touch technology for quite a while and firmly believe that it will have a positive impact on healthcare professionals. We’ve already seen an explosion in the number of devices developed to take advantage of Windows 7 and multi-touch technology. I, for one, can’t wait to get my hands on a copy of Windows 7 to install on my tablet.
Norrköping Visualization Centre and the Center for Medical Image Science and Visualization in Sweden have developed a Virtual Autopsy Table. The table makes use of high resolution MRIs to create incredible 3D images that can be manipulated on the table via multi-touch technology.
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I’m constantly trolling the internet for information on tablet PCs. What can I say, I’m addicted. And believe me, there’s was no shortage of stuff to read this week. Reports of the death of hte tablet PC have been greatly exaggerated. I was going to add these thoughts to the “What’d I miss?” post from yesterday, but it was just too much information. Anyway, here’s some tablet PC stuff I found interesting this week.
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As usual there were a lot of things that happened during the week, and not all of it was pharmacy or technology related. Here’s a quick look at some of the stuff I found interesting.
Read more…
Xavier Lanier over at GottaBeMobile.com asks the question “would [users] pay extra to have touch capabilities on their notebooks? Keep in mind, we’re not talking slates, convertibles, UMPC, netbook or MID form factors here- just plain old 12″ to 17″ clamshell notebooks.” It’s no secret that I am a big fan of touchscreen technology, but I don’t think I would be willing to pay extra for a touchscreen on a notebook. Tapping the screen on a notebook seems like it would be a little awkward. However, a touchscreen on a convertible notebook would be a completely different story. I would be willing to shell out a little extra cash for that combination.
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