Multi-Touch Interfaces

Interaction Design February 18, 2008

The multi-touch interface is emerging of late as the new interface for digital devices, what with the iPhone, Macbook Air, Microsoft Surface and others. With this comes a whole new way of human-computer interaction which mimics more real-world gesturing. This breakthrough in HCI can open the doors to a whole new array of human interface guidelines - we're still very attached to the mouse as the main interaction device with the computer, but perhaps the touchpad on the Macbook Air will help transition to using fingers.

However, it's clear that although this new way is quite different yet intriguing, we will need to thoroughly understand its capabilities and ways in which people use it before we can fully transition over to the multi-touch interface. It's too early to tell if we'll all make the switch, but it's already evident that it offers several advantages and improvements to old-world interfaces.

The switch has its disadvantages. For one, people tend to be much better at making small movements with a mouse versus their fingers. Likewise, supposing we had touchscreen computers, we'd have to do a lot more work with our arms to touch the screen rather than keep it more-or-less stationary, resting on the mouse and making slight movements. Perhaps touchscreens on a large scale are meant for commercial uses rather than personal use - I could see it being very effective as a communication tool for presentations, but not so much for someone sitting along in their room working on a Word document.

I'm waiting for the interactive media box that will replace TVs and computers. Soon.

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