Reconnected

Oh, joy! After a difficult two weeks with a spotty DSL connection at what Pat calls “The Rental,” we appear to have, once again, high-speed access to the Internet. Now, I must be careful that I don’t (a) become overly optimistic about it persisting (there were bursts during the two weeks when things seemed O.K.) or (b) OD.

More hands-on computing

Writing in the July 08 issue of Scientific American, Stuart F. Brown provided an overview of how multi-touch systems work, are currently being employed, and ways they may affect computing in the future. As the regular reader of this blog knows, I find this topic worthy of attention, because I think it reflects the beginning of one of the most substantial changes in personal technology applications, comparable to (a) the advent of the PC in the late ’70s, (b) the popularization of the graphical user interface in the middle ’80s, and (c) maybe even the development of the Web in the ’90s.

Here’s Mr. Brown’s lead: