The beginning of the end of the PC?

[ThomasSoerensen]

Is a keyboard all that? Whatever happened to voice recognition? To embarrassing or slow to use?

Imagine sitting the train in the morning loudly dictating into the device "Due to this latest of many dangerous product failures, we will have to cut back and sack 50% of the lazy permies. Do not leak this as it will be stock price sensitive!"

Not the best scenario.

[OwlHoot]

Is there any reason why touch screen typing, that can be tailored to the size of an individuals hands (albeit give a large enough screen area to play with), need be slower than typing on a mechanical keyboard? If a pressure response or feedback is what's missing, there's always Quantum Tunnelling Composites on the way. iPad3?

Long term the solution is a holographic keypads and displays hovering in mid air.

That way, the phone itself can be the size of a sugar lump but the interfaces more than adequate.

[gingerjedi]

Imagine sitting the train in the morning loudly dictating into the device "Due to this latest of many dangerous product failures, we will have to cut back and sack 50% of the lazy permies. Do not leak this as it will be stock price sensitive!"

Not the best scenario.

I do enough shouting at word formatting styles as it is, I don't see how you could possibly zip around a document with anything other than a mouse/pad and keyboard?

Doing a mundane task like listing something on eBay would be a monumental struggle if you had to actually tell it what to do.

[TimberWolf]

Long term the solution is a holographic keypads and displays hovering in mid air.

That way, the phone itself can be the size of a sugar lump but the interfaces more than adequate.

Yeah, keyboards are so 2D.

[NickFitz]

Steve Jobs says PCs will be lorries that will be largely superseded by sleek iPads, or some other trucking metaphor. Is 2011 to mark the beginning of the end of the gas guzzling PC? Apple are targeting the business market with the iPad too, while other manufactures jostle to catch up and produce cheap imitations of yesteryear.

When is Steve Jobs supposed to have said these things? He definitely didn't say any of them at yesterday's iPad 2 launch.

[Durbs]

Steve Jobs says PCs will be lorries that will be largely superseded by sleek iPads, or some other trucking metaphor.

Nah, certainly not in my line of work.

Can see the demise of the desktop PC pretty soon though. My main one is getting old now so was going to replace it but then thought what use do i have for one? The only reason i've kept one around is for gaming but my new laptop is more than capable of running the latest games and new and upcoming mobile graphic chipsets are slick-as. So in my world the desktop could disappear no problem but tablets replacing laptops? No.

[PAH]

For me the tablet devices are only interesting in a casual surfing ebook reading capacity.

Otherwise I prefer using a keyboard/mouse either via laptop or full blown PC and only really wish I had a tablet device (for portrait orientation) when trying to read something that is A4 in size, such as a digital magazine.

Therefore I am hanging fire until proper colour ebook readers with OLED or better screens that are still readable in strong sunlight and offering A4 size become available. Not some half-baked interim solution like the iPad or Kindle.

[TimberWolf]

When is Steve Jobs supposed to have said these things? He definitely didn't say any of them at yesterday's iPad 2 launch.

I can't remember where I saw the trucking metaphor, I'll look again later. He refers to pos-PC devices (which I guess is a typo for post-PC) in his talk yesterday.

11:12AM Our competitors are looking at this like it's the next PC market. That is not the right approach to this. These are pos-PC devices that need to be easier to use than a PC, more intuitive."
Live from Apple's iPad 2 event (update: it's over!) -- Engadget

which of course you've already seen. The Apple website has a business section selling iPads for business.

[gingerjedi]

11:12AM Our competitors are looking at this like it's the next PC market. That is not the right approach to this. These are pos-PC devices that need to be easier to use than a PC, more intuitive."
Live from Apple's iPad 2 event (update: it's over!) -- Engadget

Having sewn up the gullible market they're now aiming at the stupid people?

[Sysman]

Still is...I tried accessing 3270 sessions over a smartphone, it was utter crap but web-enabling applications, i.e. CICS works pretty good.

I haven't sat at a real 3270 since the mid 1990s, but CICS over the web is instantly recognisable, and brings a pleasant feeling of nostalgia.

I only really see it in timesheet apps nowadays, though.