Some people approach a keyboard like a Ming vase and some approach it like a punching bag. Now, Microsoft is going to be able to tell the difference. A new prototype from MS’s hardware division is capable of measuring the pressure applied to each key on the keyboard and relaying that information to your computer. Allowing for a whole new degree of freedom in the way you type, Microsoft sees the new keyboard as changing how you spell check, play games, and chat online. They’ve even got a contest to see which students can develop the best applications for the new hardware. Check out the demonstration video after the break.
On the outside it looks like a regular keyboard, but inside it knows how hard you're typing.
While this keyboard doesn’t provide any feedback to the user’s fingers, it does grant you a whole new way to interact with your software. It’s somewhere, but not quite, on the level of haptics we’ve discussed before. Even with just visual feedback, however, the keyboard would allow a more immersive experience
Where will we see this experience? Well first, most of us make errors when typing, hitting one stray key or double pressing others. By measuring differences in pressure, Microsoft can inform your spell checking software which letters are least likely to be intended by the user. Backspace/delete and arrow keys can have variable meaning depending on pressure. Want to delete a whole row of text? Jam down on the delete key. I can imagine the next generation of MS Office will have a whole series of variable responses based on pressure sensitive keys.
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