A year ago the BumpTop virtual desktop software left many people in an "I want it" frame of mind. I was surely one of those people as the demonstration showed files being thrown around the desktop just as you would in real life. You could crumple icons up like a piece of paper, sprawl pictures across a desk, and organize everything into tidy stacks with just a few clicks.
So now here we are, a year later, and we don’t have this in our hands. Don’t worry, the project is still very much alive as we saw at at the TED conference:
I still have a hard time comprehending whether this would be useful for me when organizing the things on my desktop. It’s one of those things that has an amazing demonstration, but can it be put to practical use?
One thing that bothers me a little bit is that you have to identify your files by the icons, since there are no filenames being displayed for them. I guess that they could go the route of a real desktop and allow previews of files, for example, if you hover over them with your mouse. Most operating systems now have the capabilities of generating these previews so that shouldn’t be too horrible to integrate.
The other thing that I would like to see is an option to create multiple rooms. Each demonstration that I’ve seen only includes one room that the user has to organize files, but it would be nice to have a separate room for photos, another for videos, and then one for my files. That way I have even more organizational power.
So now that you’ve seen another demo of BumpTop, what do you think? Is this something that can really takeoff or is it doomed to failure?
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Tags: Software
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bumptop microsoft surface would be nice.
bumptop
I was kinda thinking that as well, it seems like the two would fit so naturally together. It almost looks like it would be a lot of work using a mouse, but if you had a touch screen it might be a lot easier.
Microsoft Surface has got alot of the concept that Bumptop uses, but I think from what I’ve seen in the video is that there is much to be desired. Because they’ve got only icons, I would assume a mouse-over identification of each file would at least give hope to someone trying to use this interface, but I didn’t see any evidence of that in the video. Not sure if I could get used to it, and I think Microsoft’s got the right idea with Surface, I couldn’t see this type of interface working with anything but a touch display. One of the things I like best about the computer anyways; is that it’s much easier to keep things organized than in real life.
I want it. I’m all about visuals and interactivity. I’m a college student, I don’t need to be productive
I imagine that the touch screen computing will be becoming popular though. Tablet PC’s are finally on the rise so true touch screen computers can’t be too far off.
Well, I’ sure it would kill what little productivity that you do have.