interface

Early design concepts for Mozilla Firefox indicate that the browser continues to bend toward the light emanating from Google Chrome. Designs released for the interface-focused branch of the nightly version of Firefox reveal a look that brings the browser even closer to looking like its Google competitor, although it definitely has its own approach.

The most notable changes come to the search bar, tabs, and add-ons. The search-specific search box, long a staple of Firefox, finally has been removed. Most likely this is because the designers have merged the search feature into the location bar. Mozilla told CNET when Firefox 4 launched in March … Read more

OS X Lion contains a number of new features (over 250 of them, according to Apple), and while some of these are exciting and new features such as autosave, versions, full screen apps, and Airdrop, other changes may be a bit different and take some getting used to. Here are a few tips that may help to make the transition to the Lion interface easier or at least make it feel more familiar.

Undo reversed scroll direction

The very first new feature that might strike you when using Lion is that the default scroll direction has been reversed to behave … Read more

Some cool new gadgets aren't sold in stores. The D*Face Spray Paint Skateboard Interface took a year to create and won't be found on the shelves of your local skate shop.

Let's break down the D*Face Spray Paint Skateboard Interface. D*Face is a London-based street artist. Spray paint and skateboards are self-evident. The interface part refers to a remote control system that can trigger paints cans attached to the underside of skateboards.

This technology could easily be used for less-than-noble purposes, but D*Face created and harnessed the devices in the name of art. The canvas was a skateboarding pool in Southern California. The pool had previously been a site for a D*Face project that covered it with piles of painted skulls.

According to a behind-the-scenes look in Concrete Disciples skateboarding magazine, the chosen spray paint was a very fast-drying enamel. The cans are strapped under the deck with Velcro and are controlled by wireless remote.… Read more

Powering uphill on your bicycle often comes down to mind over matter. What if, in addition to controlling your protesting thigh muscles, your mind was master of your bike's gear shifter?

That idea is being made flesh in the form of a high-performance concept bicycle that sports a thought-controlled interface.

Electrodes in the rider's helmet pick up neuro-electrical activity. Signals from the helmet are transmitted to an electronic gear shifter mounted under the seat. With training, a person can learn to shift up or shift down simply by thinking it.

Gives "Look Ma, no hands!" new meaning.… Read more

Computer screens come in all shapes and sizes, but one thing they all have in common is clutter. Around the edges of any program window--even the Windows desktop itself--you'll see toolbars, sidebars, and other controls that take space away from the area reserved for your actual work.

The simplest way to remove the various information and shortcut bars from view is to press F11, which expands the currently open window to all four screen edges. Return to the standard view by pressing F11 again.

Likewise, the fastest way to enlarge content on the screen is by using Windows' built-in … Read more

Set in 2054, "Minority Report" revealed a future in which natural user interfaces play a major role. A memorable scene features Tom Cruise controlling a large interactive screen with illuminated gloves, gesturing back and forth to navigate through an NUI.

Less than a decade after the movie hit theaters, we now have Microsoft's $150 Kinect accessory for Xbox 360, which provides a similar experience to the one seen in the movie--without requiring special gloves or a multimillion dollar computer setup.

People have primarily used a mouse and keyboard to interact with computers for decades; this seems silly considering that nearly every other computer component has evolved significantly in the same time frame. Now that the Kinect SDK is available for Windows 7, natural user interfaces have more opportunity than ever to change how we interact with computers.

Supportive technology such as speech recognition (which has already matured greatly, as this week's launch of Google Voice Search for desktop computers highlighted), Microsoft Surface, and 3D Immersive Touch are all stepping stones to something far greater in the evolution of computer interaction. It's inevitable that years from now, aspects of these technologies will work together to free us from pressing keys and clicking buttons.

So, what do you think the most exciting possibilities for natural user interfaces are? Vote in our weekly poll. And please be sure to elaborate in the comments section.… Read more

At a California Israel Chamber of Commerce demo event yesterday, I got a walk-through of an unusual and, as-pitched, probably hopeless idea for improving the interface of touch-screen devices: The Ringbow, a ring-mounted, wireless pointing stick.

The Ringbow does solve a problem in an elegant way. Touch-screen apps generally have only limited ways to control them, so access to menu commands or secondary functions requires trips to full menus, which slows down the user. The Ringbow is a finger-mounted five-way controller (four compass directions plus pushing down) that makes blasting through accessory menus faster than it would be in most apps.

In a demo (see video; note that the wire is for an extra battery pack the prototype device requires), selecting drawing submenu options (color picker, line weight chooser, pen type), and then making selections in those submenus, was much faster than it would otherwise be. Ringbow CEO Efrat Barit proposes that software vendors who make complex graphical apps (such as Adobe) could make their products easier and faster to use for professionals by adding Ringbow shortcuts.

There are also benefits in games, where a ring-mounted controller adds a lot of control options that one otherwise doesn't have in a touch-screen device.

… Read more

LauncherPro is a free Android app that lets you strip down and customize your Android interface without any rooting, hacking, or coding. Set the number of home screens, customize your dock, or modify the appearance of your Android OS by way of an exhaustive menu of Preferences.

After installing, press Home, and choose to "Complete action using" LauncherPro instead of your device's stock interface (e.g. HTC Sense for HTC EVO owners). Then, press Menu, and go to Preferences (not Settings) to start exploring the world of customization possibilities. You can set your number of home screens … Read more

Windows 8 will include a PDF reader, greater customization of the Aero interface, and a new version of Internet Explorer 9 that works like its Windows Phone counterpart, according to new details posted online by Microsoft partners.

Offering new tidbits and screenshots from a Windows 8 pre-beta build, "Windows 8 Secrets" co-authors Rafael Rivera and Paul Thurrott revealed some notable new features this week via the Web site Within Windows.

Windows 8 will reportedly offer a new interface dubbed Immersive as an alternative to the traditional Aero user interface introduced in Vista, according to Windows 8 Center and … Read more