• Our software update is now concluded. You will need to reset your password to log in. In order to do this, you will have to click "Log in" in the top right corner and then "Forgot your password?".
  • Welcome to PokéCommunity! Register now and join one of the best fan communities on the 'net to talk Pokémon and more! We are not affiliated with The Pokémon Company or Nintendo.

Everything is done with a simple touch(screen).

Starry Windy

Everything will be Daijoubu.
9,307
Posts
11
Years
Touchscreen is the technology which we can input commands to anything (PC, gadgets, or even some game systems) by just touching the screen (hence the name) by your finger or even your stylus. Any thoughts of this popular technology?
 

Legendary Silke

[I][B]You like dragons?[/B][/I]
5,925
Posts
13
Years
  • Age 30
  • Seen Dec 23, 2021
I thoroughly enjoy well-implemented touchscreen interfaces, which would be things like Windows 8/RT and Windows Phone. One of the most important thing about touchscreen interfaces is that they have to react promptly to user input, and getting no visual feedback is a very bad thing and is very jarring. I actually like how every single object in Windows 8 and Windows Phone is actually on a 3D space, and when you press anything, the object immediately pushes inwards. When you release, it also bounces back, and the action takes place - with a lot of visual feedback.

Some people don't like these kinds of visual feedback, claiming that they waste time, but it's actually an integral part of the user experience. If there's no such feedback, you'll feel a disconnect between input and action. If you have good visual feedback, even if you take a long time to actually process something due to your slower processor, nobody will notice.

I really like using my finger for anything with capacitive touchscreens. However, I do still believe in the precision of the stylus...

Speaking of touchscreens, I can't help but mention multi-touch-capable trackpads and clickpads. The latter does an especially good job in simulating a touch screen, especially with spacious Synaptics hardware with no interference, and slightly frictional surface. Swipe, swipe, swipe, scroll, scroll, scroll... tap, tap, click, click, anywhere, anyplace, any app. It only gets better if your drivers and OS can work together well - think Windows 8 and Synaptics drivers, or OS X and Mac hardware.
 
7,741
Posts
17
Years
  • Seen Sep 18, 2020
It's horrible... that's the meagre extent of my thoughts. Messy too, fingerprints and whatnot.
By far, I prefer real buttons; far more difficult to miscommand and provide the physical feedback of being depressed.
 

Legendary Silke

[I][B]You like dragons?[/B][/I]
5,925
Posts
13
Years
  • Age 30
  • Seen Dec 23, 2021
It's horrible... that's the meagre extent of my thoughts. Messy too, fingerprints and whatnot.
By far, I prefer real buttons; far more difficult to miscommand and provide the physical feedback of being depressed.

They're getting there with regard to visual feedback for most modern touch-enabled operating systems. If buttons on a touchscreen interface are large enough, it's actually very hard to accidentally miss a hit target.

Take Windows Phone, for example. They have UI design rules for this kind of stuff. Touch targets should be at least 7 mm in visible size and 9 mm in hit-target size (which would be pretty easy to hit by itself), with sufficient spacing between touch targets. No matter what, the touch target should never be less than 5 mm. It's actually very easy to specify this in terms on WVGA pixels as it's all standardized in the world of Windows Phone - even if your application targets only WVGA, barring odd code issues, they should render at the native resolution at 720p and higher handsets. It's all up to the programmer and how well the underlying OS works with it. Windows Phone actually can and will fudge touch input if it feels it needs to do so, like with the keyboard.

And it's been doing it since 2010.

Many newer touchscreens also come equipped with oleophobic coating, which helps to reduce the visibility of smudges. And even if they do get smudged up, a light wipe with a clean microfiber cloth will fix things up real quick. There's also the option of applying a matte (anti-glare) screen protector.
 

pokemasta92

3rd Gen. Enthusiast
322
Posts
10
Years
  • Age 31
  • USA
  • Seen Dec 28, 2021
I love using a touchscreen for playing mobile games and navigating webpages, but when it comes to typing I cannot stand it. That's why I have a slider phone. Even the biggest smartphones on-screen keyboards are too small for me and I always end up pressing the wrong button which makes texts much more time consuming than they should be. Even if I was typing on a tablet where the keys are the same size as a keyboard, I still prefer physical buttons. Another problem with on-screen keyboards is that since they're on the screen they take up space. I like being able to type and see the entire screen at the same time. As much as I like the iPhone, I just can't use a phone that doesn't have a PHYSICAL keyboard, which is why I have my basic slider phone for calling and texting, and my iPod Touch for games and music.
 
27,741
Posts
14
Years
I also enjoy the usage of touch screen technology, and I can really remember being jealous about not having any of my own when I saw television personalities using it back in the day. I'm very glad today though that I have my iPod Touch, my Nexus 7 and my Nintendo DSi XL/Nintendo 3DS XL as it's just very interactive to use if you ask me.
 

Kylie-chan

[span="background:#000; padding: 2px 10px;"][color
14,979
Posts
19
Years
I'm not a particularly big fan of it, but well-executed touch interfaces have a lot going for them. They're fluid and intuitive, and provide feelings of interactiveness and speed. They eliminate the need for peripherals like mouse and keyboard, making them perfect for certain devices and enhancing portability and convenience. They do come with a lot of design challenges, though, in terms of hardware and in terms of interface (providing adequate feedback, response time, keyboards taking space up on the screen, the ergonomic problem of reaching up to touch vertical touch devices, etc. etc.). They also solve a lot of accessibility problems but come with a lot of other ones (being unfriendly to blind people and people with certain other disabilities, and again, feedback -- keyboards provide tactile feedback as well as auditory and visual feedback).

On some devices I find it works very well; I have an iPhone and plan to buy another phone with a touch screen as it just makes sense for tiny devices like that and gives you a lot of flexibility. However I find a lot of the 'commands' on the screen (zooming, etc.) awkward and unintuitive compared to, say, a mouse wheel. I have shaky fingers and poor fine motor skills resulting in terrible accuracy and that's why I'm not particularly enthusiastic about the technology as it is now, but I'm a lot better with a stylus (I have one for my iPhone and my other touch devices uses a stylus ordinarily) and I prefer that barrier between me and the screen. It's worth noting that a lot of these problems (small buttons, keyboard taking up too much room, etc.) are exacerbated by the small sizes of the devices, which is what makes the touch screen so ideal for them in the first place. I draw with a tablet that also accepts touch input and I always keep it turned off obviously.

I play a lot of handheld games and have come to love it as a feature of the 3/DS, even if it hasn't been utilised by that many games that well. Play The World Ends with You on the DS and master the combat system (the combat system has a huge learning curve but I assure you it's because of the combat system itself) and you'll see the full potential of touch screen gaming. I play that game over and over again just for the love of the freeflowing combat, which stems from the ability to pull off all kinds of actions (slashing, tapping, rotating in circles, pressing, and so on) and in sequence. It's really nice on even things that don't heavily utilise it like, say, Animal Crossing or insert (S)RPG here, to speed things up and give you less carpal.

On things like ATMs it's a lot nicer than those little buttons on both sides of the machine...

Right now I cannot see myself using a stationary touch computer though.
 

Dreg

Done after the GT.
1,496
Posts
12
Years
  • Seen Jul 11, 2016
I'd probably only use if I was drawing something. At least you can just rub it off without any trouble. But like Cassino said, fingermarks is the trouble with touchscreens.

But, like the DS which uses a Stylus, I'd say it's great for some games, but not all. I remember playing Zelda: Spirit Tracks, and didn't like the fact that I had to use a stylus for nearly every thing.
 
989
Posts
14
Years
I don't mind touch screens for gaming (but it has to be used properly); the DS and 3DS are two of my favourite systems. However, I'm not a fan of it for phones, and I don't particularly like the look of touch screen computers and the like.
 

Cordelia

Banned
9,523
Posts
12
Years
  • Age 37
  • Seen Nov 21, 2014
I love touchscreens and I use them all the time. I have a Nexus 7 and my phone (Note II), both of which I use a LOT so I'm pretty accustomed to their screens.
 

Starry Windy

Everything will be Daijoubu.
9,307
Posts
11
Years
I have seen touchscreen as early as when I'm 12, I think, but I have no idea this feature becomes a booming that almost every gadget have it. I'm starting to getting used to it after I buy Galaxy Pro years ago, and I enjoy it.
 
108
Posts
10
Years
  • Seen Jan 21, 2017
I have been using touchscreens for about half of my life. I remember when most touchscreen phones had to be used like a DS with skinny scroll bars and tiny icons that you couldn't imagine using with a finger.

I will say that Stylus > Finger due to fingerprints on screen and the unbeatable precision of a stylus.
 

KittenKoder

I Am No One Else
311
Posts
10
Years
As long as there is a second screen to see visuals on, like the DS family. I have a thing about fingerprints ruining what I am looking at, be it video games, or videos, or even photos of someone's pets. Until the DS I had zero interest in any touch screen technology, though I do like touch keyboards.
 
Back
Top