Magic Trackpad needed for iLife 11 / Mac OS X Lion?

[bbtrinet]

Observing Apple's recent strategy, I feel that Apple is going to make a new leap forward with touch interfaces in iLife 11 and Mac OS X Lion, and we'll hear more about this at Wednesday's event.

I don't think we'll ever have touchscreens on our desktops. It just seems like such a horrible idea. My arms are not meant to reach across to my screen, but rather stay on my desk, and I don't want fingerprints all over my desktop screen. This is a different strategy than what the Windows world seems to be doing, which is letting you actually touch the monitor. Yuck!

I imagine that touch gestures will be 'needed' to run a lot of features in both iLife 11 and Mac OS X Lion. Will there be a short supply of Magic Trackpads after Wednesday? What are everyone's thoughts?

 

[spinnerlys]

Mac OS X 10.7 Lion will not be released on next Wednesday, that is not Apple's MO with its major OS releases. The will give a preview to developers ot test it out and well will see 10.7 most likely next year.

And using the Trackpad can be really tiring too, thus I hope, there will be plenty of mouse inputs left.

 

[Bernard SG]

And using the Trackpad can be really tiring too, thus I hope, there will be plenty of mouse inputs left.

The Apple trackpad's strain is nowhere near what a mouse can do to your carpal tunnel, really. It's just that the trackpad allows for less accuracy.

The trackpad definitely opens a whole world of potentiality. I don't think there's more needed from the Mac OS side, though. Now, it's all about Mac Apps developers to incorporate it in their upgrades.

About touchscreen on desktops, it's certainly something on the Mac team's mind, otherwise they wouldn't have patented it. However, the final form it will take is still a mystery.

I was just thinking: people often say the iPad is "just a big iPod Touch", but actually, you could also say "iPad is just a small iMac, with a touch screen"

Maybe the iMac of the future will be an giant iPad that transforms into a full fledged desktop when you put it in some dock containing a hard drive and additional RAM.

 

[bbtrinet]

And using the Trackpad can be really tiring too, thus I hope, there will be plenty of mouse inputs left.

I agree. I would like to use BOTH the mouse AND a magic trackpad.

I would like to use a mouse for moving the mouse cursor, clicking and dragging things. I would like to use a trackpad for pinch/zoom, rotate and swipe gestures.

If I could have a magic trackpad to the LEFT of my keyboard, and a mouse to the RIGHT of my keyboard, I would be more productive. For example, open iPhoto from the dock with my mouse, move the window around with my mouse, select the picture library with my mouse, then find pictures by swiping with the trackpad, then rotating and zooming them with the trackpad. Name the picture with my keyboard, and selecting checkboxes of tags with my mouse.

I think they could all work in harmony with the right trackpad interface. A mouse and keyboard are just not good for zooming or rotating.