Chapter 7 User Interface: Enabling Human-Computer Communication Chapter 7 introduces the reader to a large variety of devices and features which constitute the environment within which people communicate with computers. In addition to regular input and output devices, the chapter highlights emerging user interface and graphics features. These includes multimedia, hypermedia, geographical information systems, visual simulation, virtual reality, and natural language processing. [ Update | Exercises | IT@Work ]

Update

Let's hear it for...SPEECH!

Think of it: No more hunt-and-peck for the fumble-fingered among us. No more sore back or neck from hunching over that keyboard. No more carpal tunnel syndrome or repetitive stress injuries. It’s the ultimate interface: just talk to the computer and wonderful things begin to happen. Things like:

• Your computer recognizes commands. You say, "Call Bill" and it dials Bill’s number. You say, "Print that report" and the report prints.
• Your computer translates your speech directly into text that you can see and edit on your screen.
• Your computer grants you access to a secure database when you speak your name.
• Your computer understands requests for information that you make in your own words.

Sound a bit far fetched? The scenarios described above are all possible today using various speech recognition technologies, including: interactive voice response, continuous speech-to-text conversion, voice print analysis, and natural language processing. Windows Magazine’s James Powell describes these technologies in Head to Head: Speech-Recognition Software. Find out about how speech recognition is working its way into mainstream markets in Monica Young’s article in Computer Reseller News: Speech recognition revving up. And Microsoft is certainly not going to be left out, as was clearly signaled by Bill Gates in his most recent Comdex address—check out Paul Kapustka’s report in Communications Week: Microsoft's Future World.

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Exercises

1. Enter the Web site of United Services Automobile Association.
   1. Review the services and information provided to customers.
   2. Relate these to the imaging system of Section 7.1.
      
2. Surf the Internet to find some new input and output devices not listed in Chapter 7.
   
3. Prepare an Internet-based presentation of GIS.
   1. Contact some vendors and examine their products.
   2. Find representative business applications in addition to what is listed in Box 7.9.
   3. Find the availability of GIS software on the Internet. Can it be purchased? How?
   4. Find out how GIS is combined with GPS.
      
4. Enter the Web site of CACI, Inc.
   1. Find out what products they have for supporting BPR.
   2. Which of their products are VIS?
      
5. Harvard business students are creating prototypes of commercial products and services using AlphaWorld tool (from Worlds, Inc., San Francisco, www.worlds.net). Search the Harvard Business School and Worlds, Inc., sites for information about the project and write a report. You may download a demo of the software.

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IT@Work

Dragon Systems

MapInfo 

Weyerhaeuser

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