Some cool Surface examples

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Some cool Surface examples

posted @ Tuesday, September 09, 2008 8:55 AM | 14 Comments

Saw some posts today over at Don’s site about Surface. The Surface SDK is starting to get more visible whereas before it seemed a little black-boxish to me. Turns out (as we all knew) it really is just WPF with some unique Surface-like behaviors in the SDK. Take this quick demonstration from a program manager on the SDK. With using the same concepts that we use in WPF and Silverlight for data binding, etc. you can come up with a quick application using the inherent gesture support from a Surface device:

Pretty cool huh? Same XAML concepts we apply in current work today, but instead of StackPanel, you add a ScatterView and boom, you get some of that simiplistic gesturing support. Now I know we aren’t all running out to create a photo album viewer to stretch photos, but it’s a good demonstration of some of the simplicity in the SDK. I kinda wish the ScatterView was actually a Silverlight control :-)

Regardless of your views on politics, here’s an implementation of Surface that MSNBC is starting to use in their newsroom. I think this is a great use of the device and SDK…it shows a great use-case scenario (and the guy seems to be having fun with it)

Anyhow, I thought these were some great examples of the SDK and a non-entertainment/media) app in use.

tags: xaml, surface, wpf, msnbc, silverlight, stackpanel, scatterview

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution By license.

Comments

Ian Blackburn

9/9/2008 9:28 AM | # re: Some cool Surface examples

Wow - that's is really impressive. I too would like that ScatterView in Silverlight - it would be cool for mouse or stylus input as well as surface I think.
Laurent Kempé

9/9/2008 11:19 AM | # re: Some cool Surface examples

If I download the SDK, can I get one of those table :) ?
timheuer

9/9/2008 11:21 AM | # re: Some cool Surface examples

Laurent: Hah! the SDK might be free...the "hardware kit" -- that will cost you...
Laurent Kempé

9/9/2008 12:36 PM | # re: Some cool Surface examples

Tim: I tried it! ;)
shaggygi

9/9/2008 5:06 PM | # re: Some cool Surface examples

Pretty cool! When will we start to see Surface devices to buy??? I can see some really neat data applications developed from this for my department's weekly meetings.
Jonas Follesø

9/9/2008 8:36 PM | # re: Some cool Surface examples

Well, there is really no good reason for the surface to be _that_ expensive. It's all standard PC hardware running Vista, with a big LCD screen and some camera driven touch stuff on-top. I expect these to drop to consumer friendly prices within few years.

Also, with all the cool stuff the community is doing around touch (cheap camera touch, Wii remote touch etc), the Surface SDK could be useful for heaps of stuff. Also expect allot of the touch stuff in Windows 7 to be based on lessons learned from Surface.

As for hardware kit I've heard rumors that you can use a USB-hub and connect multiple mice's - one for each finger, to test your stuff. :)

Anyway, now time to watch the video! :D
shaggygi

9/11/2008 11:00 AM | # re: Some cool Surface examples

I know this is new technology but what is the size of Surface devices? I keep hearing "Table". Would this be something in a size of a large laptop you could transport easily?
timheuer

9/11/2008 11:14 AM | # re: Some cool Surface examples

shaggygi: it's pretty big, not something easily transportable right now. check out microsoft.com/surface
dsweb329

9/11/2008 6:03 PM | # re: Some cool Surface examples

This is a taking presentation to another level. Fantastic..
liam

9/20/2008 3:32 PM | # re: Some cool Surface examples

This is amazing – anyone know what a system like this will cost to setup?
Cheers
Liam
Ernesto

11/20/2008 1:31 PM | # re: Some cool Surface examples

Can you share with us the surface SDK?

Regards
Deepak

12/1/2008 4:20 AM | # Scatter View

Hi All,

This is Deepak. I want to know how can i place elippse in Scatter view.
When i place ellipse it shows square background. How i can remove this?

Regards
Rick

11/4/2009 3:03 AM | # re: Some cool Surface examples

Hello guys,

I want to download the surface SDK for school, but I can't find it on the internet.

I saw you talking about the SDK, so I thought maybe you know where to download it.

So, where can I download it?

Regards
timheuer

11/4/2009 7:53 AM | # re: Some cool Surface examples

Rick see FAQ here: www.microsoft.com/.../faqs.aspx#cat4