Path: utzoo!utgpu!watmath!clyde!att!osu-cis!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!mailrus!ames!pasteur!ucbvax!hplabs!hpda!hpdslab!hpdsla!garye From: garye@hpdsla.HP.COM (Gary Ericson) Newsgroups: comp.cog-eng Subject: Human Factors: Paper-Like Interface Message-ID: <2690003@hpdsla.HP.COM> Date: 8 Dec 88 17:23:39 GMT Organization: HP - Pacific Technology Park Lines: 22 A few months ago, IBM announced it was working on something it called the Paper-Like Interface (PLI) project. To quote InfoWorld: "It uses an electronic pen to write on the transparent [digitizing] tablet, which lies directly on an LCD screen, combining the functions of a keyboard and a monitor, according to project manager Jim Rhyne. The computer was trained to recognize handwritten characters and symbols, allowing users to perform tasks faster than possible with either a mouse or keyboard, IBM said." The idea of this kind of interface has been around for a long time. Have there been any human factors studies done on this type of technology? Specifically: - would a user consider this kind of interface more intuitive than, say, a mouse and keyboard, as some have claimed? is it "faster"? - what are the ergonomic effects of looking *down* at a tablet instead of *straight-ahead* at a screen for an extended period of time? Gary Ericson - Hewlett-Packard, Technical Systems Division phone: (408)746-5098 mailstop: 101N email: gary@hpdsla9.hp.com