Commented on:
Bill Hamilton, Jacob Faires
Summary:
The focus of this paper was on using a ferromagnetic hardware device that could sense changes in magnetic fields that could be used to interpret input. Another key feature is that the device is ‘reconfigurable’ in that once set you are not stuck with that input method. The main setup presented in this paper was using a set of sensor coils that surrounded permanent magnets, with a deformable ferromagnetic bladder laid on top of the coils to be used as input. Once the bladder received pressure on it, it would in turn displace the magnetic field of a permanent magnet causing a small voltage in the sensing coil which could be used to measure input. In addition to this design two possible applications were discussed including a virtual sculpting application and a musical synthesizer. Below are a couple of pictures showing the device with a ferromagnetic bladder above it, and the other depicts using the device for a sculpting program.
Discussion:
The reconfigurable quality of the ferromagnetic input device stood out in this paper above all else. Instead of having only a set application of the device, the user could adjust and modify it to fit any situation they wanted. If this became a common household product I imagine that as time progressed there would be many different products that would use this device, but would require the user to reconfigure it. It made me think of a Swiss army knife that has all of those different tools in it, so that no matter the situation all you need is the Swiss army knife and you can get it done. I see the same thing for a device like this, where no matter what software comes out you can still use the ferromagnetic device to operate and use it.
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