Apple Working on Touchless Control and Curved iPhone Screen (bloomberg.com) 74
Apple might be working on touchless gesture control and curved screens for future iPhones, Bloomberg reported on Wednesday. From a report: The control feature would let iPhone users perform some tasks by moving their finger close to the screen without actually tapping it. The technology likely won't be ready for consumers for at least two years, if Apple chooses to go forward with it, a person familiar with the work said. Apple has long embraced new ways for humans to interact with computers. Co-Founder Steve Jobs popularized the mouse in the early 1980s. Apple's latest iPhones have a feature called 3D Touch that responds differently depending on different finger pressures. The new gesture technology would take into account the proximity of a finger to the screen, the person said. Apple is also developing iPhone displays that curve inward gradually from top to bottom, one of the people familiar with the situation said. That's different than the latest Samsung smartphone screens, which curve down at the edges.
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Is there a point to it or are they just out of real ideas?
I get the marketing angle, I'm sure Apple buyers won't want to be seen dead holding one of those traditional flat screens from last year.
What I'm wondering is if there's anything more than that.
Re: Courage (Score:2)
Yep this is a base level tech needed for holgraphic displays.
If your display doesn't have a physical surface then you need to be able to pick up finger movements in the air.
The apple Hwatch in 2025 will combine iPhone and new holgraphic tech into a watch sized device. You can expand your fingers and watch YouTube at a 7-8" display resolution, but text messaging is done at smaller display sizes.
The only issue so far is that the battery requires access to your blood stream to generate the power required to r
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"watch YouTube at a 7-8" display resolution"
Sure, but can it do the Kessel Run in less than 12 parsecs?
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Would that be the iTheramin??
That would be too cool....I could listen to the live versions of Whole Lotta Love, or No Quarter, and play the theremin parts along with Jimmy!!!
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Actually, the only people to claim that "Apple did it first" are the fuck-shits like you who infest slashdot.
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Like much of R&D there is a lot of working on ideas, that rarely will come out to a real product, if it does is a significantly different then the early uses of the idea.
Multi-touch display Microsoft was showing its early R&D of the Surface early use of a multi-touch display, At the time of the early 2000's it wasn't planed to be a tablet, but an actual Surface of a table or desk. Figuring that people would use them to play games in a restaurant, order meals off the table. Then Apple got to the ma
Mind Control (Score:2)
Apple knows what you are thinking.
Now it will act on it.
The pinnacle of innovation... (Score:1)
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Only fuck-wits like you think that Apple expects everything they do to be the best. Meanwhile, Apple is rolling in dough, and you're an anonymous pile of shit.
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But what ... is it good for? (Score:2)
What's the advantage of not touching your display? I mean, aside of fewer greasy fingerprints.
Sorry, I don't see the huge advantage, could anyone clue me in?
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Had to think about it myself. Presuming the touchless version implies a move away from capacitive touchscreens, this new tech means it can be used with gloves and in wet conditions.
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The advantage is that Apple has a reason for you to buy an iPhone 11.
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Sorry, I don't see the huge advantage, could anyone clue me in?
Getting to make hand gestures to dismiss a phone call while doing Obi-Wan impressions seems like something I obviously need in my life. I'm sure there's probably other stuff you could do as well, but who cares about any of that?
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Douglas Adams foresaw the pros and cons forty years ago in The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy:
A loud clatter of gunk music flooded through the Heart of Gold cabin as Zaphod searched the sub-etha radio wave bands for news of himself. The machine was rather difficult to operate. For years radios had been operated by means of pressing buttons and turning dials; then as the technology became more sophisticated the controls were made touch-sensitive--you merely had to brush the panels with your fingers; now all you had to do was wave your hand in the general direction of the components and hope. It saved a lot of muscular expenditure, of course, but meant that you had to sit infuriatingly still if you wanted to keep listening to the same program.
Zaphod waved a hand and the channel switched again.
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What's the advantage of not touching your display? I mean, aside of fewer greasy fingerprints.
Assuming the sensing technology can penetrate, you'll be able to put it in a completely water-tight case. Lots of other case and mounting options become possible actually.
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I could already do that with a normal touch display. I actually have touch sensors (more like proximity sensors, actually) behind the tiles in my bathroom. All that takes is a relatively large electromagnetic field you can disturb, which is of course harder to do for smaller structures, but then, the glass of a phone cover is thinner than the average tile.
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I always though it was eating with the right and shitting on the left?
Price? (Score:2)
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Apple doesn't give a shit about you, and neither does anyone with any self-esteem. Ferrari won't sell you an econobox, either.
Our prophet, Douglas Adams (Score:2)
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Good idea (Score:2)
Meanwhile... (Score:3)
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Siri still bites, no workstation level computer (mac pro), iOS is getting bloated and the Home Pod is a flop. But sure, curved screens, work on that...
None of the things you listed will have a huge impact on profitability if they are improved. Curved screens are more likely to break and should increase sales.
Wow! (Score:2)
Wow! A handset with a convex face so your check doesn't press into the screen/keypad! Just like the Nexus S from 2010 [pocketnow.com] (and pretty much every phone prior to touchscreens). I hope they are granted a patent for this truly revolutionary new idea.
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News at 11 (Score:2)
Air Gestures (Score:2)
The new gesture technology would take into account the proximity of a finger to the screen
You mean like the Air Gestures feature Samsung had at least as far back as 2013 [youtube.com]? They died with the S6 because nobody used them, I'm sure Apple's "innovative" solution will be different.
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Which way is it curved (Score:2)
I guess from the summary it is concave - and only in the length, not in the width.
Is it cuved at the back too? (convex)
If so when you lay it on a desk it would rock
BTW I gave up Apple products in 1988
Another "original" feature (Score:2)
My Galaxy S4 with its hover controls called and would like it's innovation back.
And while my none of the Galaxy S series curve inwards from top to bottom I'm sure LG has something to say about Apple's innovation.
I see an advantage (Score:2)
When I get a telemarketer, I can just flip him the bird, and the phone will hang up on him.
So they're copying Samsung (Score:2)
So basically, Samsung's Air View [samsung.com] which they introduced in 2013.
(I don't think they're really copying, given that proximity is a basic universal concept and thus an obvious choice for an interface. But I figured I'd use the term in honor of Apple fans throwing "copying" around at everything and everyone who does anything remotely similar to what Apple does, even if they d [dw.com]
Insolent and daring iPhone X... (Score:2)
Facial recognition would actually DO something valuable beyond unlocking your phone for after you're found dead or criminally arrested.
Welcome Apple fans (Score:3)
Now you too can join the misery of curved phone displays some of us Samsung fans have been offered!
I for one, will not purchase ANY phone with a curved display, period. When my Note 5 dies, I'll be sadly leaving Samsung, who I've been very happy with. If they can't have the common sense to offer the option, they lose the money.
Easier to break, harder to replace, virtually impossible to get one of those thin glass screen protectors.
Nope.
Young Zaphod (Score:2)
Anyone else here remember Douglas Adams' short story Young Zaphod Plays it Safe?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
The story, set in the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Universe universe, includes reference to a radio that is tuned by waving your fingers it. And it drove Zaphod nuts because any accidental movement would tune it to another station. He would often just throw things at it.
Adams was ahead of his time.