Thursday, December 16, 2010

Playing with My Virtual Keyboard on My Mac


Not too long ago I dreamed of the Newton like tablet that Apple would produce allowing me to have touch technology to operate a tablet device. Apple came through with a remarkable device called the iPad.

As I walked through the aisles of Target or Walmart last week, I scoured the aisles for gifts to buy for friends and family. It amazed me that most of the items I saw, have been replaced by virtual devices or apps on my iPad. Consider the alarm clock, the weather station, the numerous board games, the GPS, just to name a few. If you own an iPad you have a myriad of devices at your finger tips, controlled by mere gestures of touching and swiping.

Today, I was contemplating the idea of a touch computer screen on a future laptop device. Would that not be amazing? I believe this would open the market to all ages and to all abilities for computing. Apple has always tried to implement new means to provide computing for all: via voice command technology and touch technology. It only stands to reason that touch computer screens must be next.

I was playing with the virtual 'keyboard view' under 'System Preferences' on my Snow Leopard system driven Mac Pro. I could set the keyboard to be visible on my screen (via the icon in the upper right hand corner of the Mac) and using my trackpad, I could tap on the letters on the screen, typing in the word 'Beatles' in my iTunes music library to search for a song. Imagine when I can use a laptop Mac and tap on the screen.

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