Originally Posted by ragnar

This d-pad thing is quite interesting to me. Probably the best touch mobile UI's right now in the market (or at least launched), the iPhone and the Palm Pre, neither has a d-pad in the device. ...

Why would you really need the d-pad?

Originally Posted by Texrat

But for reasons I still cannot put together we have not yet managed to create a cohesive community of developers.

Originally Posted by frank.wagner

Prio. 1 - Skype inside

Originally Posted by vvaz

From marketing point of view look for KDE4 - it was delayed for *2* years if I remember initial projects correctly. Plus for one year more it is barely usable for regular user (although 4.2 is really, really good). In total: 3 years behind the schedule. But with good campaign, blogs, screencasts really showing what is happening behind the curtains they managed to keep interest - even hype beyond common sense. Technical advantage? Well, everything I see today in mobile world looks like some variation of Plasma...

Originally Posted by Naranek

This is simple. Because of it's clear, fast & simple feedback, or in layman's terms - it clicks The d-pad may not be sexy, but it's really fast to use because it's located conveniently under the thumb (N800). It's easy and quick tool for navigating in menus. It also works well together with the touch screen, for example I might open a menu with right thumb, and then browse and select items with the d-pad.

The usability is emphasized when using the tablet on the move like walking. It's a lot easier to navigate with the d-pad, because I don't need two hands and I don't need to look where I touch and I don't need to verify visually on the screen that the touch is interpreted correctly.

Even though palm's latest doesn't have a d-pad, their earlier PDA line and OS made the usage of d-pad an art. You could do pretty much anything with it. The fact that the latest competitors don't have it doesn't mean that it's become obsolete. It just means that the UI people don't know how to utilise it. D-pads might also be seen as too old and boring technology for a hype product - a bit like our old fashioned keyboards, but they aren't going anywhere.

The way I see this is that the challenge for Nokia is to make a d-pad that is useable, but still sleek looking to please the modern consumers aesthetics. (For example the Motorola Razr's d-pad failed terribly on the usability part.)

For goodness sakes - you have d-pads on all your mobile phones as the main navigation tool. Do I really need to point this out?!

Originally Posted by qole

What the heck is a CD doing sticking out of that tablet? You realize that even with dual layer blu-ray you're only talking about 50GB, and you've gotta power the laser and a motor, right?

Even the N810, with the elegant craves1 hack, now has up to 32GB of relatively inexpensive removable storage on it, without the hassle of motors or lasers or anything.

If we're going retro, why not have a VHS tape pop out instead?

Originally Posted by ragnar

But... I guess the problem might not be self-evident for somebody who has not done designs on this area, but what exactly would you control with the d-pad?

You're talking for instance about navigating in menus. That assumes that there is a focus element on screen. Look at the iPhone UI, for instance. There is no focus element there. For a proper touch UI, you shouldn't have a focus element.

A traditional UI style is to have focus elements and then means to move this focus element around; first click to move the focus to position on screen, second click to confirm. Another style is to have no focus on lists and menus: first click always selects whatever you click. But you can't really mix these styles together very well. The current S60 touch UI does this, and I'm not sure that people are very pleased with the results. (Blackberry Storm tries to do this half-child of pressing lightly focusing and pressing heavily activating, but that's slightly hackish.)

There are major implications to whether you have an UI that supports a focus element or then not. Take an example... for instance, of a file manager style application: content list on screen, toolbar on button. If you have a focus, you can click on an element and then choose a command from the toolbar. If you have no focus, then you cannot do UI's like that, but must set the commands differently. Or take another example from the S60 UI designs. They have the Options menu for commands for the focused item. It's essentially the same as the toolbar: the first click cannot activate an item, because the user must be able to click once to select item, then press Options to get commands for the focused item. It makes good sense for HW keys, but not really for touch screens.

The more you try to stick on to hard key based navigation, the less you can optimize for touch UI's. It's really that simple, fortunately or unfortunately.

Originally Posted by Bundyo

Окаy, imagine a textarea or an input in the browser. Do you click every time with your finger in the place you want to write? Now imagine a game - are you sure you will enjoy a fast paced action if half of the visible screen is under your controlling fingers?

Originally Posted by ragnar

You're talking for instance about navigating in menus. That assumes that there is a focus element on screen. Look at the iPhone UI, for instance. There is no focus element there. For a proper touch UI, you shouldn't have a focus element.

Originally Posted by ragnar

This d-pad thing is quite interesting to me. Probably the best touch mobile UI's right now in the market (or at least launched), the iPhone and the Palm Pre, neither has a d-pad in the device. ... Why would you really need the d-pad?