New tablets as input devices?

[Ptrope]

With new tablets and large-screen phones all over the market, has anyone heard of apps or even efforts to make these function as input devices for full-scale PCs? I guess most of them don't use a pen or other stylus, but it seems like pretty much everything else needed is right there to make the same sort of device as a Cintique or regular Wacom tablet. I'd love to have something like the Galaxy Tab (or the color Nook, for that matter!) that I could use portably, but at home, use it as a graphics tablet or tools screen for Photoshop or my various 3D apps.

 

[sojourner]

Just get a remote desktop application for the device, connect to your desktop and wa la!

 

[Flavius]

The iPad has a number of apps now that allow you to add the iPad as additional screen to your Mac.

 

[Ptrope]

As interesting as both of those are, neither of them really accomplishes the task. The iPhone/iPad/Win7 tablet/ etc. would need to function both as an additional screen and as an input device - a stroke would bring up the tools on the tab-pad, then selecting the tool would turn it into a small duplicate of the main screen (or just show the shortcuts for the tools) while all the movements on the tab-pad execute on the main screen - it would be a mix of the two functions, a second screen that swaps to a remote desktop and back based on the strokes. But I still think the fingertip isn't a fine-enough control, and I don't know whether these devices have levels of pressure-sensitivity. But it does look like that would be a definite direction they could go in.

 

[Flavius]

Possibly the X protocol is closer to what you need.

 

[sojourner]

As interesting as both of those are, neither of them really accomplishes the task. The iPhone/iPad/Win7 tablet/ etc. would need to function both as an additional screen and as an input device - a stroke would bring up the tools on the tab-pad, then selecting the tool would turn it into a small duplicate of the main screen (or just show the shortcuts for the tools) while all the movements on the tab-pad execute on the main screen - it would be a mix of the two functions, a second screen that swaps to a remote desktop and back based on the strokes. But I still think the fingertip isn't a fine-enough control, and I don't know whether these devices have levels of pressure-sensitivity. But it does look like that would be a definite direction they could go in.

A virtual desktop app would be acting as both an extra screen and an input device. Do you think you'd suddenly have to use a mouse with your Ipad when the app was running?
Depending on how advanced the app its, it may allow the device to act as an extension of the main screen or some of the other features you want. Pressure sensitivity - not built into the hardware from what I have seen.

 

[Australis]

I had a short term contract with a startup that specialises in creating what has been called Software As A Service. They make a version of the client's website specifically designed to run on a wireless mobile device. So instead of getting a lot of graphics and text designed for a desktop squashed down onto a mobile screen, you get amore elegant, easy to use system set up just for mobile users. And this is being developed for iPads and Android tablets of various types. Have alook at this.

On the left is the normal website as it appears on an iPhone.. On the right is the mobile version.

Gotta stress: this isn't an app - it can run from any website OS/browser and any mobile OS/browser. It connects through to the website's databases and image files in real time, and this also means, suing their forms option, that for example, Council workers out and about, can update the databases directly - example, a list of council assets (fences, benches etc) that need to be repaired. Just as you update a database from a desktop, the system can be updated from the mobile device. The big saving here, continuing on the example, is that it's being done in one go, rather than a field officer filling in the form, then the form going to head office, then someone entering it into the system, hopefully without errors. That's a huge saving of time and money, right there.

It's very, very clever, what they can do, and when the company gets s a bit bigger, I'm going to apply for a full-time job. It's the way of the future.

 

[Australis]

Aaaaand my thread killing abilities continue...

 

[Ptrope]

A virtual desktop app would be acting as both an extra screen and an input device. Do you think you'd suddenly have to use a mouse with your Ipad when the app was running?

Not at all - really what the pad or phone would need to be is a second screen that transfers its screen input to the primary screen; the best route would probably be to window the primary screen in the second one, making a 'live' area, and then the rest of the screen would have pop-up tabs that would open up tool palettes when tapped, you'd select the tool, the tab would minimize again and your input screen would allow your strokes to draw/paint on the main screen - it wouldn't need to be a virtual desktop, just an input device.

Just brainstorming here - if it turns up on the market, I'll be happy to take my cut . But the lack of pressure sensitivity would probably limit its usefulness, although there are a number of paint/draw apps now for the iPhone and Androids.

Not to worry, Australis (although your post didn't really have anything to do with the topic, which may have been the reason why it didn't get a response ). As a separate topic, though, it's a pretty good idea - I tried to interest my own company in a similar web-deployed mobile app for our sales force, where they could fill out a production ticket and an intake form for electronic discovery on their phones (they'd need to upgrade to a smartphone with a bigger screen than our current CrapBerries), rather than taking hard copies out in a briefcase, writing them in, then transferring all that manually once they got back to the office; we could have the job in our system, production could already start allocating resources, and when the account manager walked in the door with the client's materials, it would be ready to run. But my company doesn't really think in those terms, unfortunately.

 

[Australis]

I'm a little puzzled - one of the things they do is allowing clients to use tablets and phones as input devices, direct to their website/database. In the same way as info is drawn from the website, so info can be sent to it.

<rereads OP carefully>

Mmm, okay, as a wireless device on a network, to input data onto a specific PC? Shouldn't be impossible. The tricky part is what kind of interface you use, and do you remote into the PC from the tablet, I guess. What about a PC and a tablet set up with the LCARS OS that someone here developed, or a seriously graphic driven interface rather than keyboard/mouse?

In the same way that a screen on your desktop can have a window on it showing another PC's main screen, and you can interact with each other rather than them being 'separate' (as, I think, remote sesions usually are. Well, are in Windows, maybe *nix is different).

I suppose I'm a little confused as I'm not sure how it could be better than ways we already have. Can you give an example of how it would be used?

Mmmmmmm. I'll have to think about it. It's an intriguing idea.

 

[Ptrope]

I guess you're not seeing it the way I intended, as an input device equivalent to a tablet, not an interface to input data. I'm sure you've seen graphics tablets - this would be the same thing, basically, with the extended capability of displaying the toolset, on demand, functioning like a combination second screen and pen device. Wacom makes a line of tablets called "Cintique" that essentially function as a pressure-sensitive monitor, and I haven't used one to know if they function as a duplicate of/replacement for the primary upright monitor <i>only</i>, or whether they can function as a second monitor with a different display entirely - the toolset, apart from the actual artwork - and still communicate the user's pen input into art that is on the primary monitor. What I'm talking about is an app for the iPhone/iPad/Android-driven phones and tablets, which does this multi-task - a unique monitor that also functions as a graphics tablet for the primary monitor, the main advantage being that it consolidates the functions of a graphics tablet into your portable computing device, eliminating the need for another piece of hardware. The idea isn't to remotely control your PC - that's a pretty standard idea; the idea is to expand the available screen real estate to unclutter the monitor, so one can work on the art at a good, viewable size, by shifting the tools all to a second monitor that doubles as a graphics tablet where the actions are executed not on the second monitor but on the primary. The 'window' on the pad wouldn't be a remote desktop, but basically a solid color or grid that corresponds to the coordinates on the workspace monitor.