9 revolutionary controllers: from the mouse to Project Natal

by Dean Evans at Thursday 4th June, 2009 at 12:17 pm [0 comments]

Microsoft wowed attendees at the recent Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) with its revolutionary games control system – Project Natal. This hardware-free, gesture-based approach to user input is the latest attempt to evolve how we interact with our technology.

It’s a far cry from the traditional interaction mechanisms of buttons, switches, dials, levers, dials and knobs. Which got us thinking…

What have been the most important control systems in the history of the digital home? How has our connection to consumer technology changed? And will ‘mind-control’ ever truly work?

1. The QWERTY Keyboard

The modern-day keyboard has its origins in 1868, when Christopher Latham Sholes patented the “type-writer”. The first commercial models were sold by the Remington Company nine years later. And despite the introduction of handwriting recognition systems, speech recognition software and touch-sensitive interfaces, the keyboard (and keypads) remains the most efficient way to quickly enter information into a device.

2. Pen-computing/handwriting recognition

The idea of using pen-computing and handwriting recognition to control and interact with a device actually pre-dates the ‘mouse’. While pen-computing had its heyday in the PDA boom of the mid-1990s, the Stylator and RAND tablet systems were using the technology almost 30 years earlier. Today, pen-computing has largely been sidelined by advances in touch and multi-touch systems.

3. The Mouse

While Apple certainly popularised mouse control with the Apple Macintosh in 1984, the first appearance of a ‘mouse’ is attributed to the Xerox 8010 Star Information System in 1981. Despite the fact that a PC columnist once wrote: “there is no evidence that people want to use these things”; the mouse and its various alternatives (the trackball, the touchpad, the joystick, etc.) provide the foundation for intuitive ‘point-and-click’ control.

4. The Remote control

Combining keyboard technology with Infra red (IR) wireless communication, remote controls have become a common feature of the digital home. And thanks to the popularity of TVs, DVD Players, Blu-ray decks, hi-fi systems and digiboxes, you’ll probably have more than one lying around.

It’s amazing to think that the idea of a remote controller is over 80 years old. In the 1930s, for example, some radio manufacturers offered wired ‘remote controls’ to operate their more expensive models. But the first true wireless remote was probably the Philco Mystery Control, a battery-operated radio transmitter produced in 1939.

5. Voice recognition

While AT&T Bell Laboratories takes the credit for developing a device that could recognize speech as early as the 1940s, we’ve yet to see the full potential of voice/speech recognition and voice control.

The technology not only requires a great deal of processing power to decipher natural speech, but systems often require extensive ‘voice training’ before use and need to decipher different accents, odd word pronunciation and background noise. Modern-day usage (for consumers, at least) is confined to speech recognition software and voice-dialling.

6. Touch and Multi-touch

It arguably took the arrival of Apple’s iPhone to show that touch and multi-touch input is the natural successor to traditional mouse control. Simply put: ‘Touch-and-click’ is far more intuitive than ‘point-and-click’.

Touch technology is now starting to find its way into all manner of different products – mobile phones, MP3 players, laptops and netbooks, digital cameras and ebook readers (like Amazon’s Kindle). Products like Microsoft’s multi-touch table (Surface - see the video below) show how the technology could be incorporated into bigger devices in the future.

7. Mind-control

Yes, mind-control. It exists today. The Neural Impulse Actuator from OCZ has been designed to add an element of ‘mind control’ to gaming. All you do is strap on the headband and its manufacturers claim that the carbon nanofibre-based sensors inside will translate your body’s electrical bio-signals into computer commands.

8. Gesture control – Nintendo Wii

Before Microsoft’s Project Natal came along (see below), the Nintendo Wii kicked off the gesture-based gaming revolution. The Wii’s motion-sensitive controllers abandoned the traditional joypad and translated how players moved their Wii Remotes onto the screen in real-time. At this year’s E3, Nintendo again showed off its new MotionPlus technology for the Wii (pictured), which aims to add extra precision to the existing control system.

9. Gesture control – ‘Project Natal’

What the PlayStation’s Eye-Toy started, Project Natal continues. Rather than ape Nintendo’s motion-sensitive controllers, Project Natal uses a combination of full body motion capture and voice recognition technology to translate a player’s movements into onscreen action. Watch the video below to get an idea of how Project Natal works. This controller-free system may well revolutionise gaming (again).

If you enjoyed this article, make sure you subscribe to the Digibode RSS feed!