Re: Kate Alhola's Maemo Presentation
 

Actually, the post said "without a lot of change", not straight ports. Ie, this is more about ports like claws, gpodder or xournal rather than running an arm-compiled openoffice on the tablet (although as we know that is also possible). And indeed that is one of the core strengths of the platform IMHO, and at least part of the reason Nokia is pushing home-grown projects upstream, tracks other upstream projects more closely and so on.

This goes much deeper than GUI apps btw. Systems today are so complex that the "standing on the shoulders of giants" approach is really the only sensible way to build them if you want to get anywhere before you're obsolete, and why proprietary alternatives will ultimately fail. Just a trivial example: how many mainstream non-POSIX OSs are still around today, and is their popularity growing or declining?

Re: Kate Alhola's Maemo Presentation
 

It's a different paradigm in every way except for the network protocol. Wap tried to bring the SAME functionality in a portable form factor.

Which of these optimizations do not apply or do not have an equivalend in a desktop browser ?

Why exactly ? Seriously, people think about the stylus as a must-be-like-a-pencil form. As we've seen with the Tube, this is not necessary.

Great features that would not be necessary in the first place had you not opted to make an UI design choice (and ones that could equally well be used in a stylus GUI). Apple is a master of presenting great solutions to problems that usually never existed (or were obsoleted ages ago) in the first place.

Also, variable factor zoom is dead easy to do with a single touch stylus, even PocketUniverse from 2000 got that right. The fact that Maemo want for zoom buttons and dialogs does not mean stylus zooms can't be elegant.

No. It's not optimized for usage on the tablet. It's rewritten to accomodate a change in UI paradigm. That has nothing to do with tablets. I could make the same argument for voice controlled UIs. You clearly equate finger control with optimized. In what way is using a finger UI over a stylus based one 'optimized' ? What does it do better (except prevent stylus loss) ?

It never allows you to select files/folders (in terms of settings). Download folder ? Internal card/External card/Home. Want something else ? Too bad. Or worse yet:

Tap Settings.
Tap Library.
Tap Media folders.
Tap Audio folders.

I did 4 beautifully animated finger taps just to get to a fixed Internal card/External card/Home choice again. NUTS ! :) (and to make things worse, it doesn't even allow you to cancel. If you press OK, it rescans. If you press the CANCEL button, it rescans. If you click outside the tab like you would otherwise, it won't budge. NUTS ! :) And on top of all this it doesn't even do copy/paste. NUTS ! :)

As a general approach, it doesn't. Again, the form factor thing. See the Tube example.

You just gained a completely new UI to worry about and keep consistent with your 'other' UI. That's a step backwards, unless the new UI gives you functionality you didn't have previously. And if your original app is a run-of-the-mill open source program, you need quite a bit more work to do than plain hildonization.

Can I get an example how exactly Maemo 4 tried this (admit, I'm a n00b, started with Chinook) ? Or, to be more precise, which base maemo/hildon apps conciously used a hybrid approach ? Having big OK/Cancel buttons is not what I'm talking about. It's not about input that you can use with BOTH input devices, but about actively separating input defined by the advantages of each input device.

EDIT: Vagalume is the example UI-wise how I like stuff. A main, finger friendly area for common operations. A stylus friendly settings+advanced functionality menu. Liqbase does something similar too, but it's more linked to stylus by it's core functionality anyway.

Re: Kate Alhola's Maemo Presentation
 

They did, it's called OS2007, it was basically an utter failure. It sounds nice as an idea but in practice you're limited by both technology and time. Programming two UIs for everything takes a lot of effort and introduces a lot more edge cases and failure points and generally results in a mediocre experience with both rather than an excellent experience with one or the other.

It just doesn't make sense.

Maemo 3, actually, Maemo 4 was the halfway step between it and Maemo 5.

According to the current kernel changelogs, it's a TI panel, much more than that is hard to say without actually using it.

None of which is going away with Maemo 5, so what's the fuss about?

Re: Kate Alhola's Maemo Presentation
 

I'll add this (and then I'm done with these roundabout UI discussions): if Nokia really were totally abandoning stylus input, why in the world would they still be using a resistive touchscreen?

Re: Kate Alhola's Maemo Presentation
 

We're still not talking about the same thing. See my vagalume example. If Canola would do it's settings in a similar (of course visually matched) manner and kept it's current UI for general operations, I'd be super-cool with that, too. You know, the I'd wear a Canola T shirt and hat kind of cool instead of writing NUTS ! :) about it.

No fuss really, it's just that some people don't understand why other people think an (only) finger based spatial input is an *upgrade* from stylus input. I can understand if someone prefers one over the other, but am under the impression that the well executed *implementation* of a finger oriented UI in the form of iPhoneOS is making people believe that ANY finger oriented approach is in itself superior to ANY stylus oriented (or hybrid) one.

Re: Kate Alhola's Maemo Presentation
 

because they have a good connection to a supplier of them?

Re: Kate Alhola's Maemo Presentation
 

Because a stylus sucks for mobile usage. Simple as that.

Re: Kate Alhola's Maemo Presentation
 

While I agree that a stylus sucks for mobile usage (not to mention it would take two hands instead of one). I still find the approach of using a stylus for more precise operations versus finger input for more general operations better than finger for all. As atilla77 mentioned, vagalume is a good example of that.

Re: Kate Alhola's Maemo Presentation
 

Stylus vs. finger debate, take 273...really, this has all been discussed ad absurdum in various threads, and until the new tablets are presented, there's little point in these debates imho.

Re: Kate Alhola's Maemo Presentation
 

And after that it will be too late. In fact it is already.

Re: Kate Alhola's Maemo Presentation
 

True, but it's also more of an issue of design of programs. Though in the end it's up to the developer for his/her preference of interface and usability design.

Re: Kate Alhola's Maemo Presentation
 

In all fairness, it was a brilliant idea let down by the touchscreen hardware not being up to it (unreliable detection of stylus vs finger events, getting worse with age).

Re: Kate Alhola's Maemo Presentation
 

Being able to use device with just fingers is great, especially through actual physical keys that give tactile feedback so that you can acccurately operate even small keys, this enables a device to provide instant access to many different functions at once. Plus, with input and output somewhat separated, the precious output space can be dedicated to displaying more information.

What worries me about finger friendly touchscreen is that the screen is roughly 5 by 3 thumbs big, which puts a limit to the amount of inputs instantly available, and it has to be combined somehow with displaying the actual content/information...

On a more practical note, the touchscreen of my N800 and N810 is too insensitive to consistently register fingerpresses without exerting disturbing amount of force. Something sharp works better, except for pressing 'o' on the osk of my N810 and enter in N800, there I need to press with stylus until the colors go funny on the LCD. I dare not even try make it recognize finger in those areas. As I still like to use the device one handed, while holding it, I've become accustomed to using my thumbnail as stylus. It's not entirely free of frustration, because you have to keep nails long enough to register when jabbing the touchscreen, but short enough to not get in the way when typing on the hw keyboard. Still, I manage to both hit links and keys on osk (when nail length is optimal).

If the device had a dpad or joystick on the left, centred vertically, and you could rotate the device to portrait, and there was a browser with virtual pointer like opera mini, or microb jump-to-link that wasn't so random and perhaps with added pointer clue so you knew where you were, I'd probably use the device like that a majority of the time.. Kinda like a traditional phone but with bigger screen... I still browse the web on my phone instead of tablet and normal computer sometimes, because it's more comfortable physically to handle.

I use the tablet the most at home, and probably spend more time browsing web on it than on my computer... It's a compromise in comfort and information-at-once.

Re: Kate Alhola's Maemo Presentation
 

I've never had any problems.

Re: Kate Alhola's Maemo Presentation
 

I'd have let this endlessly argued point go, but not after an absolute remark like that.

Tell me just how it sucks for mobile usage? Yeah, it would suck if you're driving a car, but you can't, or shouldn't, do much in that situation anyway. Or I can see how maybe it's universally inconvenient to bother with the stylus for very brief uses, like tapping in a phone number or pausing a music player.

But, for example, I walked around Cairo last month using Maemo Mapper (thank you, gnuite!) and the stylus was not an issue at all. OTOH, I don't think I could have accurately managed the tap-and-holds on the Points-of-Interest icons without a whole lot of zooming in and then back out if I had been restricted to using my fingers.

If Nokia took away the convenience of the stylus holder, then dealing with the stylus would suck for mobile usage.

Re: Kate Alhola's Maemo Presentation
 

Dear Nokia:

I heard the most preposterous rumor and I was hoping you could clear things up for me. Is it true that none of your future hand-held linux devices will have a stylus and a stylus holder? Thanks in advance.

Yours truly forever and ever,

daperl

Re: Kate Alhola's Maemo Presentation
 

So, moving right along.

It would seem that the speculation of a Nokia App Store (based upon standardised QT toolkit for S60 and Maemo) was right on the money (forgive me if this isn't new info). It's called the OVI Store and is currently accepting publisher registration.

Considering that Maemo seems to constitute a large part of Nokia's future strategy, and news of the cross platform QT (and Java and flash), it wouldn't be out of place to see these apps find their way into Maemo. It is rumored that Nokia is considering Linux (read: Maemo) for future high-end phones.

Here's the question though: would you mind having closed apps on your open system?

I think it would be a FANTASTIC idea, that would open the tablet to a much broader market, and provide real incentives for developers.


YARR!
}:^)~

Capt'ns Log.....

Re: Kate Alhola's Maemo Presentation
 

right... for mobile use, one-handed finger usage is essential, and a small set of hardware keys (d-pad) is the best interface for this as you don't even have to look at the device when operating it.

a touchscreen based interface cannot provide this, finger-friendly or not, as it lacks the tactile feedback. you cannot feel the "OK" button when you slide over it.
more important though, all tablets so far were much too big and heavy for me to consider them for any mobile use case. they're too big for my trousers, too heavy for my shirt.

that's why i think maemo UI work should focus more on the couch and restaurant use cases than on the "walk in the park"-ones. the couch use case is when you take the device not only to skip a track, but to do something with it for 20min or more. surfing, chatting, working through your mail,... these are the strengths of the tablets, and it's a lot easier to perform such tasks over a longer period of time with an efficient, high-precision input device.

(of course, maybe the next device will be as small as my phone.... i could see me taking it to the park, then. i still wouldn't use a touchscreen, though, only hardware keys.)

Re: Kate Alhola's Maemo Presentation
 

We already do, including Nokia and third-party (maps, flash, skype & gizmo installers) packages in the stock firmware and packages available elsewhere (garnet, boingo, hava player, rhapsody etc).

From a purely practical point of view, yes I mind (particularly the first category, no one is forced to use the rest or keep them installed to avoid breaking updates) because invariably they get far fewer fixes than the open ones.

However, openness and price are orthogonal, and such an app store doesn't necessarily imply closed-source (leaving aside the GPL implications of certain fruity store & SDK terms). I suspect a lot of current maemo users, myself included, wouldn't mind paying for F/OS packages (and other things being equal would even prefer them to closed alternatives) and the larger "consumer" audience wouldn't know the difference.

Re: Kate Alhola's Maemo Presentation
 

we always had closed/proprietary applications on the tablets. as long as i can decide to install/uninstall them, i see no problem. i do use proprietary apps on my desktop, too. it's a decision you have to make for each single application.

proprietary components in the core system are a different issue, but i guess most of us learned to accept those as a part of the maemo reality we can cope with.

and as for an app store: maybe i'd pay. i do pay for software, i am that kind of person.
the question is: if there's a commercial app in the store that i want to have, how likely will it be that i find a free (beer and speech) one with the same functionality somewhere else that runs on the device? probably very likely. it will be interesting to see what kind of applications people will pay for. games? apps that come with data (like navigation apps come with maps)?

Re: Kate Alhola's Maemo Presentation
 

on that stylus issue, i guess it depends on how one expect to use the device.

and as always with a open ended device like the tablets, those expectations will wary to a great degree.

Re: Kate Alhola's Maemo Presentation
 

Bah! What kind of response is that? In your time on ITT, have you not learned that one's own use case is definitive and all others aberrations? Sheesh.

Re: Kate Alhola's Maemo Presentation
 

Obviously the future is subject to change, whatever one might now say. But to phrase this issue differently: there are resistive touchscreens and capacitive screens. Resistive screens support styluses, capacitive do not (except special ones, but that's a bad idea).

Now, people seem to prefer capacitive screens in general. To ship a capacitive device, having stylus UI elements is obviously a very bad idea. For a platform, there can of course be many different devices, with differing screen technologies. But branching the UI software would also be a bad idea.

Re: Kate Alhola's Maemo Presentation
 

Variety is the spice of life - If Nokia hadn't branched their Symbian OS UIs there wouldn't have been a Series 90 so no 7710, hildon or tablets and we wouldn't be arguing finger vs stylus here today ;-)

Re: Kate Alhola's Maemo Presentation
 

A finger sucks in just as many (albeit fundamentally different) ways for mobile usage. So what we have here is a discussion about preferred suckage. And let's stop right there.

Now that we have all that covered, let's get on to the real deal, pupil-tracking pointers. Fast, no hands needed, does not obscure the screen, high resolution and much more uniform among human population than fingers. We just need a higher resolution user-facing IR sensitive webcam.

Re: Kate Alhola's Maemo Presentation
 

Okay, then I'll rephrase:

Will any future Nokia hand-held OMAP3 linux devices have resistive touchscreens? If so, will any of them have a stylus and a stylus holder? And lastly, will these same devices have screen resolutions less than 800x480? Thanks in advance.

Re: Kate Alhola's Maemo Presentation
 

While that might seem like the superior pointer technology I think there are a lot of serious problems with it... namely, discrimination:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rp-b5hJ1HCs

Re: Kate Alhola's Maemo Presentation
 

Why is it such a bad idea to have a special stylus? The current hardware supports using any physical object to press the screen, a capacitive screen would allow flesh or a special stylus.

I've only ever touched my tablet screen with my finger (or nail) or the supplied stylus (since it's always to hand in the in-build stylus holder).

Re: Kate Alhola's Maemo Presentation
 

If I no longer had a stylus option, touching the screen would still be my last choice. But with laptops, a touch pad is my first choice. So, here's a front and back picture of some 2002 technology (the touch pad of my poor, dead Evo N410c. I miss you). It's wafer thin, cheap and I wouldn't need the buttons. Why can't something like this be on the backplate? Nokia is already going to need one for their netbook. Just have someone reach over to that assembly line and slap it on my tablet. Then you could capacitate till the cows come home. But just to be clear, this would be a compromise; I would still prefer a stylus for my RX-81.

Attachment 3341
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Re: Kate Alhola's Maemo Presentation
 

do they? they might be willing to accept the limitations of the technology in a few selected use cases. what they really want is a touchscreen that works. neither capacitive nor resistive do very well today.

Re: Kate Alhola's Maemo Presentation
 

Actually I want a portable 30+" screen infront of me at distance, and a wireless/laser stylus for input. Touchless touchscreen! Anyone remember duck hunt on nintendo? A N810 stylus-sized device instead of the big pistol..

Another thing, has anyone thought about adding a sensor to the sylus holder? Switch to playskool fingerpainting big happy text and icons if stylus is present, switch to stylus-friendly size if user removes stylus from holder..

Re: Kate Alhola's Maemo Presentation
 

something like this you mean?
http://www.umpcportal.com/2009/04/ps...-touch-devices

Re: Kate Alhola's Maemo Presentation
 

Yes, that idea has been proposed previously--and to poor reception. I remain unable to turn up the original post or recall who made the initial suggestion, but I mentioned the idea in the "What woud you realistically like to see in the N900?" thread.

Re: Kate Alhola's Maemo Presentation
 

I had a similar idea -- to put the D-Pad and other buttons on the back -- which I still really like; but one problem is that the back-mounted device would be unavailable when the Tablet is lying flat on a table (which is a position I never use it in; I'm always holding it).

Re: Kate Alhola's Maemo Presentation
 

because you don't need to sell devices to customers who use them. you need to sell devices to so called journalists. they have no idea what they're writing about, but to make up for this, they agreed on judging products by certain buzzwords they find on the box. these buzzwords change over time, but for now, we have to live with the fact that one of these buzzwords is "touchscreen". (another one is "intuitive". nobody knows what it actually means in regard to an electronic device, but it has to be printed on the box.)

Re: Kate Alhola's Maemo Presentation
 

Actually - and if somebody knows this to be wrong, please correct me, I'm not an expert in the technical side here - the "bad idea" of a capacitive stylus is (well, apart from the physical issues that they all seem to be very big - has anyone seen a tiny capacitive stylus?) that a capacitive screen is simply not as accurate as a resistive screen, because... umm, because the area is large.

Perhaps the size and accuracy issue are connected. Can you even do a tiny capacitive stylus? Why are all the examples I find really big?

Re: Kate Alhola's Maemo Presentation
 

go buy a wii

No, the closest to ideal would be a dual format screen.
Capacitive for when you put your grimy fingers on it, resistive for when you use your stylus (or both together)

its expensive and out of the question.

resistive screens are perfect for poking with your finger, but have deficiencies with stroking
cursed things

Re: Kate Alhola's Maemo Presentation
 

I bought this stylus from DealExtreme for my girlfriend's iPod touch. Maybe it's the particular stylus, but it's clumsy and the screen is much less responsive to it than to a finger. We threw it out.

Re: Kate Alhola's Maemo Presentation
 

Well. It's the sum of the total device, of course. The touch screen technology, the physical screen itself (material etc.), and the hardware and software that interprets the signals from the touch screen (the quality of the original signal, how the drivers possibly filter the signal to get something more reasonable etc.).

Out of the mobile devices that are publicly available that I've tried (and I've tried many, for understandable reasons), the latest Apple iPhone for me provides the most comfortable total touch screen user experience, and by some considerable margin. The capacitive screen isn't of course the only piece of the question, but it is an important part nonetheless.

Resistive technology is not optimal for fingers, I'm sure we can all agree on this part. And capacitive technology is "really not optimal", i.e. not available, for styluses. As somebody said in this thread before, it is about making a choice of what we want to provide, and then eventually doing the best possible UI for that experience. I don't believe in being able to "do both" equally well.

Re: Kate Alhola's Maemo Presentation
 

Sorry, I cannot discuss exact details about future products. Product announcements are done the official way. But you don't need to wait too long anymore. :)

Ultimately the future isn't about any single product. What Maemo does and what kind of devices run Maemo are separate questions.