FuzzyCandle

Not sure if a lot of people here are talking about the ideal future IU. The conversation is mostly on Linux superiority (natch) and improving UI with our current hardware. That's healthy, we shouldn't stop that. I'd just like to dump a long feverish description of my ideal future UI (likely with notes and edits as I go) right here for some consideration. Mostly, I really think the problem isn't with software. It's the mouse, which we created in the 20th century and just never decided to change for whatever reason, alongside the keyboard which is pretty much ideal for data entry but shortcuts and rapid navigation is just not in its wheelhouse. The idea of haptic gloves has been around for basically forever, but there are a few things I think no one has ever considered with it. Basically, we have gloves that can navigate in full three-dimensional space and can have your fingers in literally any configuration yet we're still tied down to the idea of having a long flat rectangle that you need two hands to type on. Imagine, though, a keyboard that _is_ that wheel around the mouse, except there's one around each finger with haptic feedback for which key you're hovering over. And that's all just the keyboard, which could be so much better with technology we already have, just optimized a little bit. Computer mice are garbage and always have been, changing these was my first priority thinking through this. The best we have after decades of mice is just adding more fiddly buttons that are easy to press on accident? Pah! Another glove for your other hand should work, particularly when combined with eye tracking. There's so much more I could say about the potential of combining this with eye/head tracking, the possibilities with gesture modes and the fact that this would actually allow 3D interfacing with 3D space, but I'd like to leave a few mysteries and this is getting long enough as-is, just as a taste of near-future UI that's fun to think about. Most VR companies already make tech capable of this and it's only going to get cheaper, easier and more accessible in time, the biggest obstacle is tying it to a bulky head monitor when the monitors we have are perfectly fine for our needs. If I think of more I'll add it in other posts in this thread. Hoping to get feedback, but if you're planning on bashing it for being too different from what we have, don't bother. This is a rough draft and it's already worlds better than what we have now, and learning it would likely be easier than learning to use anything else from both a newbie's knowledge and pre-existing experience.