Ways that SNW actually improved TOS

SNW 2x02. I got the image from Memory-Alpha, but I think it's from the start when Pike is meeting with the lawyer.

Edit: yeah, on Canadian P+ it's 6:51 in

 

I hate the touch screen controls in my Honda van. I much prefer physical controls I can reach over and recognize/operate by touch alone. To change anything from climate systems to the radio I have to take my eyes off the road, reach over and tap three different parts of the center screen just right, each touch changing the screen to a new configuration.
My older cars were much easier to operate with the physical controls, I didn't even have to look to operate every feature.

 

LCARS could have a tactile interface for blind officers. Tuvok used it in Year of Hell. We never actually saw it, but I’m guessing bumps formed on the surface to form braille or something

 

Yes, the TNG Technical Manual confirms on p. 33 that the control panels give tactile and auditory feedback. Probably some kind of electrostatic field effect that you feel when your fingers are over the surface, rather than an actual shape change.

 

Even today, simple vibrating motors can feel exactly like a clicking button in things like my computer's solid-state trackpad. It probably won't be too many year before the technology can be more subtle or directed so it can be used to distinguish individual controls.

Though even then, it'll be on smartphones and tablets, not cars. My understanding is that a big part of car companies going for touchscreen consoles is that a single low-grade commodity touch-screen display is much cheaper than a traditional control panel, which has to be designed, and mass produced, and each individual button has to be assembled, and it all has to work, an economic motive that far outweighs the fact that many people hate using touchscreens while driving, especially cheap ones that are harder to see in sunlight and less responsive to touch.

 

Yeah, every time my hand even floats towards the touch screen, my wife gets pissed about me taking my eyes off the road to fuck with it.