Wonder if it could raise Braille and relief images for blind people?
Unless you can run your fingers across the keys without registering like on a physical keyboard will that make much difference?
Tactile feedback makes typing so much easier. If they can make those blobs appear anywhere on screen, in custom shapes, and invisible when not in use, that will change technology interaction forever.
Trouble is those blobs don't provide any tactile feedback, just... positionalness. Which I don't think is necessary/useful for an onscreen keyboard. If they actually provided tactile feedback then it'd be useful I think.
Throbber - that's a fantastic idea!
Druid - maybe they will work tactile feedback into it? If not I agree with you. If tablets are going to be useful for anything other than consumption something like this has to be figured out. I think it's at least a cool beginning!
I think it is a company who have a technology and don't know what to do with it.
But yeah, if they can actually make it programmable and do stuff for the visually impaired as Manthorp said then that'd be great.
Isn't that the same as a normal keyboard, though? Discounting the odd key with a strange shape, you'd have to look at a keyboard to see what the letter on it is.
Don't really understand the question but I think... no. You need to feel where your hands are on a physical keyboard because (if you type properly) you're not looking at the keyboard and you're using different fingers for all the keys.
Since you're generally looking at (or at least near) a phone/tablet keyboard andit's generally pretty small and you're not really using all your fingers you don't really need the positional awareness that these bumps would provide. What would help is tactile feedback (i.e. being able to feel when you've pressed a key) so that you could type faster and more accurately, and this bumpy thing doesn't provide that.
Ah, right. I misunderstood. And my short-term memory is so bad that I can't actually remember what I misunderstood. Jesus.
I reckon touch-typers are a minority, by the way. Freaks, the lot of you.
Typing on a mobile display is completely different to typing on a proper keyboard. Even when you're looking at the phone and can see where your fingers are pressing (or at least where you think they are which is a little different to where your eyes tell you half the time) it's too easy to make mistakes.
I can't really see this helping unless pressing each bump registers a particular key so it could make it more accurate but it's not the tactile feel where your fingers are, press the key, kind of thing.
I don't really touch type :((
Sort of half-and-half :((
I had to learn how in college. Glad I did but at the time I hated it. I had typed myself into a pretty good self style for years before, and having to undo those years was a pure bitch. But now I type like Doogie Houser so all's good.