Touchscreen Revolution
Posted by on 03/03/2010
There have been few characters in our lives that demand our full attention like Steve Jobs. When the guy walks on stage for a keynote address, dressed in his standard black half-mock turtleneck and old man jeans, the masses stop, face forward, and listen. The message is magical. A product is unveiled. The world is bestowed yet another seemingly revolutionary gift. On January 27th, 2010, it was the iPad.
The iPad is a thin slab of aluminum, about half an inch thick, sporting a 9.7-inch touchscreen. It’s got bluetooth, wifi, and 3G connectivity. Running on Apple’s latest version of the iPod OS, the iPad at first glance appears to be a glorified iPod touch. People are skeptical of its practical uses, and in my experience, have not imagined the device’s possible impact on the world in which we operate today, which is why I am inspired to offer a few of my own personal ideas on Apple’s shiny new gem’s potential.
Here’s why it’s so much more.
Imagine this scenario. Inside a busy metropolitan hospital, a doctor walks into a patient’s room. Numerous beeps, voices, and sounds of wheels on stretchers whir in the background. Typically, you would see the doctor flip open a patient’s file and read the conditions collected previously in order to make a diagnosis, but in this scene something is different, the doctor is holding an iPad. The device is connected to the hospital’s main patient database via an encrypted wifi signal. The doctor scans the barcode on the patient’s wrist with a bluetooth scanner linked to the device, and he now has access to all of the patient’s previous records, synced with multiple hospitals and clinics (federal law requires that patient records be held for a minimum of seven years). While the doctor reviews the patient’s current conditions on the main screen, a notification appears, alerting the doctor to an allergic reaction that the patient had to a certain medication eight months previous. This particular medication is standard practice in the situation, but because of the instantaneous access to broader amounts of information, an alternate treatment method is recommended and approved, all inside of one simple touchscreen interface. The doctor places an alternate treatment inside the patient’s treatment timeline, and a nurse, down the hall, receives the order on another device, averting potential complications down the line. This could effectively streamline the hospital’s workflow, free up beds for people who need them, and pay for the devices by avoiding some malpractice suits. I’d go so far as to say that insurance companies would gladly pay for the infrastructure and devices if they knew how much money it could save them.
This is only one of many potential uses for the iPad. Imagine instead of rolled up paper blueprints on a construction site, a real-time blueprint application, synced with the architectural company’s specifications. Imagine a tabbed interface, separating rooms, floors, electrical diagrams, and plumbing diagrams, with an option to overlay all or some of these options visually. Add a checklist for jobs and the ability to measure progress in real-time, and you’ve got a great application for increasing productivity in the construction sector.
As a photographer, I’d love to have the ability to control studio lighting setups and camera settings wirelessly with one device, and then preview the image onscreen after the shutter clicks. Once the image is on my iPad, I could employ quick photo edits and present the image for the client’s review, either in person or wirelessly via the
3G connection. Photographers would leap at the ability to do all of these things quickly and effectively in one place.
How about at an advertising agency such as the one where I’m employed, AREA203? We’ve attracted some of the most talented, capable creatives, strategists, and analysts under one roof, intending to take the world of advertising by storm. With all of these positives going for the agency, it would be advantageous to presume an Achilles heel hiding somewhere deep within our workflow. It could be as simple a problem as common human error. In my position as a designer, I see continual updates and changes to my concepts, and I must be in constant communication with developers, account executives, and fellow designers. When you factor in stresses from daily life and the responsibility to adhere strictly to a predetermined timeline, all of these requirements can produce a heavy impedance on a creative’s ability to sink into his or her own artistic wavelength—enter an agency workflow application.
Imagine for a second an application for the iPad that manages jobs and allows you to watch a project move through a workflow process visually. From sketching concepts using a stylus to final approval via a real-time notification system, the entire process could be laid out in an intelligent and easy to use interface. Think of it as a professional, touchscreen version of the board game Chutes and Ladders. If a project requires changes, it is reverted back to the respective department for review. Once the changes are made, the interface intelligently notifies the department head for approval and then moves on. Once the project arrives at client approval, the application packages the concepts into a readable file and emails the respective client. All of the project files would be located on the agency’s centralized server; the same server that manages and syncs each member’s touchscreen device, guaranteeing a streamlined and efficient workflow.
I guess the greatest thing about the iPad is not so much the iPad itself, but what we as users and developers can do with it. The device is merely a base for our imaginations. Apple provides all of the necessary tools to translate the ideas mentioned in this piece into working, marketable applications to develop world-changing products via it’s Developer SDK Toolkit.
We are at the beginning of the era of large-scale touchscreen interactivity. There will be a market for comprehensive, powerful, robust applications, and the opportunity is better than ever to begin developing such interfaces. With the iPad’s multi-touch technology, we can begin to implement more organic movements into digital commands; the next step in a more harmonious interaction between humanity and the tools we use each and every day. Eventually, we will operate within a completely three-dimensional, touch-based operating system, but that’s an entirely different blog altogether.