bro@massalia.rice.edu (Douglas Monk) (12/22/89)
In article <1942@crdos1.crd.ge.COM> davidsen@crdos1.crd.ge.COM (Wm E Davidsen Jr) writes: #In article <1989Dec20.231509.10823@ICS.COM> david@ics.ics.COM (David B. Lewis) writes: # #| RE: the displayijng of mouse-functions on the screen as they change. #| AT&T uses this device in the DMD terminals, and it works well. # # Yes, it's done by others on function keys, as well. HP labels the #function keys with two lines of text just above them. Evans & Sutherland #have a small LED (sic) 12x2 display over the function keys on some of #their stuff. # # I have seen experimental keyboards which had a display right in the #keytop. Five or more years ago, we were talking about this on Human-Nets. We referred to the topic as "the keyboard as an OUTPUT device". The idea in general is to have the keytops reflect the actions that hitting a particular key would cause. # The intent was to allow (a) QWERTY and Dvorak layouts without #cap changing, and (b) to let people turn the whole kb into function keys #with labels, if that was appropriate. I believe the process was very #expensive at the time, but what isn't, when it's new? # # Human interface question: using the above technology, would it be #useful to have labels right on the keys themselves? I have the feeling #that most people have their eyes on the keyboard, some have their eyes #on the screen, but NOBODY is looking at the mouse, and you would have to #lift or shift your fingers to see the labels, anyway. Perhaps the people #who can't remember what key to press would not mind shifting their eyes? The compromise that seem(ed/s) most useful is to use this for function keys only, and to use LCD labels near the key instead of ON the key: this cuts down on the stress that the label must bear and simplifies the whole design by orders of magnitude - standard keys can be used, with standard LCD displays, etc. Depressing the SHIFT, CONTROL, etc. keys could dynamically display the changing potential results of each function key, etc. In general, it would seem that having a label in each "regular" key would not be worth it except for the Sholes/Dvorak example: for the most part, regular keytops are too small for anything except a very few letters. Moving the labels off the function keys and onto nearby empty keyboard space similarly allows more symbols in the labels. The real "cost" of such a system in user interface terms can be modeled in terms of user interaction "penalties": x = Base cost of hitting a function key whose function is remembered. y = Cost of moving one's eyes from the screen to the keyboard and scanning for desired function, hitting the key, then returning eyes to correct point of focus on screen and hand to rest position on keyboard. z = as y, but with labels on the keytops, adding the step to remove the hands or raise the fingers to see the keytops. I note that as I type, I can almost always see the keytops of all the function keys without the "z" step, and the surrounding keyboard space for labels is also clearly visible. Also, for me, the cost of "y" is MUCH less than the cost of moving my hand off to a mouse and searching through menus to find a desired function. #bill davidsen (davidsen@crdos1.crd.GE.COM -or- uunet!crdgw1!crdos1!davidsen) Doug Monk (bro@rice.edu) Disclaimer: These views are mine, not necessarily my organization's.