How many years have people been predicting the demise of Apple? Get over it.
That reminds me of an article that said that Windows days are over...
Yeah, sure...
Unless (and until) you are talking about direct neural input and interaction, the UI issue remains.
I don't think that changes much. The human brain doesn't get more powerful just because we stick a cable in it.
So what? Part of the nice things about newer technology is that we can make things simpler to use by abstracting more. With greater abstraction tends to come simpler design. Simpler design tends to increase usability. Greater usability generally means more information presented to the untrained user.
No. The opposite is the case. Greater usability means less information is initially available to the user. But it is the information he wants or needs.
To use Apple as an example again - the iPod comes with a simpler design instead of a more complex one. The iPhone is not all that different in that regard, too. It takes away most of the buttons, and replaces it with a touch screen. You only have as much buttons as you need in any given situation.
Microsoft introduced Ribbon UI with the new Office 2007. What you see is a mix of a toolbar and a menu, with most information hidden away from you, the ones you usually need being visible and the ones you sometimes need concealed. Gigantic menus with several of submenus and wizard screen popping up are gone.
No, the trick with usability is restricting the amount of information initially available - never give users more than they chew off. (Because users love to do this - how many of us would, if an interface give the option "Expert Mode" click that option first?)
Of course, the bigger trick is restricting information while still keeping them around somewhere and make them "discoverable". A Sub-Sub-Menu that starts a dialog option is not discoverable.
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Now, that this is over.
Computers can't replace the table top experience. But they can augment it.
For example, imagine something like the Surface or just any type of multi-touch display as your gaming table (we probably need something bigger than the Surface). With a few touchs, you switch to "gaming mode". The DM puts his cell phone on the table, a small menu appears around the phone. He touches the Icon labeled "Thunderspire Labyrinth". A progress bar labeled "downloading" appears.
In a similar way, the players download their character sheets. While this happens, one of the players is setting up the webcams. Shortly there after, the 5th player comes online, his webcam input displayed on a part of the screen.
The Character Sheets are now displayed before them.
After talking about what happened last session (The players referring to notes that they can look at if they double tap on their character sheet, the DM having his DM notes on his screen.), the DM opens a map that he has prepared at home (or maybe he downloaded it from WotC?).
The game begins. The players already have their minis (stored in their character sheet), the DM loads his minis from the downloaded adventure description, but notices that he forgot to include a monster, so he opens a monster gallery and picks the mini from there.
Finally, initiative is rolled. To roll dice, several methods are possible - just roll the dice as usual (three of the players prefer that) and announce it to the DM, or have the computer roll it by dropping the dice description from the character sheet on a dice roller application (you can enter modifiers manually), and you can use even dice prepared with a special signature so that the table can identify the dice and the position it lands on.
"Miniatures" (actually just graphical representation of monsters) are moved via touch. This map has been configured by WotC 4E Classic Map rules, so it actually knows how to calculate movement and can indicate legal positions and opportunity attacks the moment you touch the positions.
Players can add notes to their character sheet via the online keyboard or by writing it on the sheets with their finger or a pen device.
- I found the article discussing the Windows Vista on the Mac... to qualify myself, I was shown the article second hand in print form and the entire article wasn't there when I read it.
