OK, fair enough, but Apple popularised it. In the same way they popularised the MP3 player without inventing it. Or USB.
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A Look Inside Apple's Magic Trackpad
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I still don't understand why it's needed. It's just an oversized MacBook trackpad for desktops.
Seems great alternative to a mouse for controlling a HTPC from your couch.
To be fair, I want them to do the same with the Optical drive that they did with the Floppy drive.
double rainbow?
whoa - is that a _double_ rainbow?
I totally agree. It's getting old.
whoa - is that a _double_ rainbow?
Yes i know Mister Engelbart created it... but Apple took it to the world with the Apple Plus....
True story: I have many friends who work at Chiat/Day in LA. Before the launch of the initial iPhone they were thrown into panic. Steve had decided the device would be called "iMagic". This caused such a kerfuffle that Lee Clow and a small cadre flew to Cupertino that night, at the agency's expense, to convince him the name wouldn't stick. Eventually they managed to change his mind.
Kid you not.
It is a great product but I don't want a wireless one, I want one with a wire. I don't understand what the fetish is with wireless given that my keyboard and mouse never leave my desk so why make it wireless in the first place? keep the battery companies in business? (yes, rechargeable do wear out).
It's called an old iPhone and a free Logitech app:
http://blog.logitech.com/2010/01/29...-touch-into-a-wireless-trackpad-and-keyboard/
Yea - you really need to look at the originators: fingerworks / touchstream: it was like two magic trackpads together - it had a keyboard layout and could detect when you were typing /mousing/cursoring/scrolling - based on gesture (number of fingers down: we call that multi-touch) many many many more gestures were built in for gaming, image editing (maya), and it was all customizable.
Right now the HCI (human computer interface) paradigm is quite simple: point and click - this is very inefficient -> you have to move your hand off the keyboard over to the mouse- slows you down - causes rep stress injuries
even an emacs users likes the fact that you can use a program without having to move your hands off of home row - with the touchstream keyboard - you never move your hands to scroll/mouse/cursor.
my favorite gesture was a two handed gesture for resizing/moving windows: you place three fingers down at the same time on each hand - and your left hand represents the top left corner of the window, and your right hand is the bottom right. as you may be able to imagine - you can move/resize your windows very precisely and much quicker than the click drag move click resize.
my most used: cut and paste: three finger drag over what you want to select - then ring/thumb pinch (cut) move cursor (two finger touch on left pad) over to the destination and un-pinch - more like a flick actually (paste). Folks observing over my shoulder would always say: "whoa! how did you do that so fast"
I can only imagine how creative gestures will transform games and image editing out of the dark ages of keyboards to the new "gesture" age we approach now.
summary: gestures let you do so much more than point and click - so much faster as well - with less rsi.
j
ref: www.fingerworks.com
The only problem I see what the trackpad is maybe an ergonomics problem. With a mouse you can kind of rest your hand on the mouse while navigating around. But with the trackpad it seems like it might get awkward after a while. I have no problem with the trackpad on my MBP but there's something about an external one that just seems like it would be awkward for me. Maybe I just need to play around with it.
What I've found is that it needs to be positioned differently to a mouse. Rather than being at a pivoted arm length, if you stretch your arm fully out across your desk and place it there, it is much more comfortable. For me, the reason I got it was because of finding mice uncomfortable, and once I had this placed correctly, it is a big improvement over my now retired Magic Mouse.
This was my one concern... how effective those little feet are as a clicking mechanism. Say I wanted to use the trackpad on a fabric-covered chair armrest? But by using this metal plate that spans the entire front of the device, that may actually make the feet work better than if they were separate since pressure from both would contribute to the same click. Smart.
I can only agree with the others. I love my MacBook Pro trackpad. It is nothing compared to a regular trackpad (they are resistive as far as i can tell). Your fingers just glide over the glass. 2 finger 2d scrolling is awesome. It needs some getting used to but after 1 week or so you will love it.
I am not sure if newbees will be happy with it because I wasn't at first. But since on a laptop you are forced to use it regulary you learn very fast.
Also it sucks bigtime on Windows (using Windows 7 x64). Scrolling sometimes only up/down (i.e Exel) and always way to fast.. So I wouldn't recomend it to Windows users (which will still buy it though)
I still don't understand why it's needed. It's just an oversized MacBook trackpad for desktops.
...and c'mon, the monicker "Magic" for their touch peripherals is lame...
So rather than just bitch and complain, why don't you try one and come up with some better name ideas?
Posts like yours are why I don't get why I spend time in these forums sometimes...
Just enable tap to click. Check it out in the System Preferences and it even shows you a little video as to how to do it. Much better than using the hardware click if you ask me
I prefer it over a mouse specifically because the two places I use a non-portable mac (at home) are on glass surfaces, which essentially zero optical mouse will work on without some kind non-glass mousepad.
The only negative thing I've found about Magic Trackpad is that, since it's the feet that click, you're definitely not going to be able to use the physical click if it's sitting on your couch or something soft. Tapping obviously works fine though.
Shut up! "iMagic"??? What is going on with Jobs? Not sure if it would have killed the device from succeeding, but "iMagic" for a smart phone? At the time I liked "iMobile" as it was more than a phone, but even then I realized that may be lame. "iMagic"???
Probably to hold the firmware for the small embedded controller.
Note it's 256 kilobytes of memory, not megabytes.
This is the thing. I don't mind using a mouse; I don't mind using the MBP trackpad. What I do mind is switching back and forth between them. I want to use the same interface on the laptop and desktop. Up until now, that has meant carrying a small BT mouse with the laptop. Now, I can put the MT on my desktop and won't have to bother with the BT mouse. As a bonus, I'm using similar interfaces now on my desktop, laptop and mobile (iPhone) device. Win-win-win.
Hmm...my 1993 Powerbook 165c has a trackball in it. Haven't really used a mouse since on my own computers, other than gaming, which I hardly do anymore.
This is hardly the first nail.
See, a mouse requires you to move your wrist and/or elbow. This is (1) annoying, (2) takes up space, (3) far more likely to cause repetitive motion injuries, and (4) does not allow for leaving your cursor stationary, reaching over and just clicking, because the freaking mouse always moves.
I vastly prefer stationary 'mice', and never use a mouse with a laptop like most of the business world. (I always find it hilarious when they pull out a mouse and 10' power cord for a supposedly portable PC) My Magic Trackpad is sitting here, I can't use it with the Bluetoothless tower I am forced to use at work. Can't wait to fire it up tonight. And download BTT.
(the Magic is over the top, already sick of that)
A trackball is really just the same concept as a mouse. You move the cursor to where you want it and click a button. Standard trackpads are also the same concept. What's new about what Apple (and others) are now doing is that it's gesture based. The mouse pointer isn't as central to what's going on. Instead we are beginning to manipulate objects on screen directly.