Intuitive UIs Featured During UIST 2012. From Oct. 7 to 10 in Cambridge, Mass., Microsoft researchers attending UIST 2012—the 25th Association for Computing Machinery Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology—will be sharing projects and ideas with an international gathering of scientists and practitioners focused on human-computer interaction (HCI).
The event is a key forum for HCI software and technology, providing an opportunity for researchers to share and learn about the latest advances in the field, from traditional and web interfaces to wearable computing, virtual and augmented reality, and computer-supported collaboration. Researchers at Microsoft traditionally are active contributors to UIST, and this year is no exception, with 10 of the 62 technical papers being presented having been written by researchers from Microsoft. Digits: Freehand 3D Interactions Anywhere Using a Wrist-Worn Gloveless Sensor describes technology that recovers the full 3-D pose of the user's hand. Leap 3D motion control system is 100 times more accurate than Kinect, will cost $69.99. Motion control startup Leap Motion has demoed its Leap 3D motion control system, which can track motion to around 0.01mm accuracy — 100 times more accurate than the Kinect.
Rather than taking Microsoft's approach, Leap Motion creates a personal 3D workspace of about four cubic feet. The Leap consists of a small USB device with industry-standard sensors and cameras that, in tandem with the company's software, can track multiple objects and recognize gestures. In a demo given to CNET, Leap's designers showed off OS navigation and web browsing using a single finger, writing, pinch-to-zoom, precision drawing, 3D modeling, and gaming. Researchers use ambient WiFi radio waves to see through walls. Seeing through walls hasn't been a super hero-exclusive activity for a while now.
According to Popular Science, however, University College London researchers Karl Woodbridge and Kevin Chetty have created the first device that can detect movement through walls using existing WiFi signals. While similar tech has required a bevy of wireless nodes, the duo has pulled off the feat with a contraption roughly the size of a suit case. Much like radar, the device relies on the Doppler effect -- radio waves changing frequencies as they reflect off of moving objects -- to identify motion. Using a radio receiver with two antennas and a signal-processing unit, the system monitors the baseline WiFi frequency in an area for changes that would indicate movement. In tests, the gadget was able to determine a person's location, speed and direction through a foot-thick brick wall.