Panorama Search: it's the keyboard

by javier on 15/09/2010

Aza Raskin just posted the latest proof of concept on search for Mozilla Firefox: Panorama Search. Check the video:

It looks like instead of focusing on touch manipulation or voice interaction they are clearly into productivity derived from keyboard interaction. You know, those thenths of a second you grasp when avoiding moving your hands from the keyboard to the mouse and back to the keyboard.

It kind of reminds me of Ubiquity (remember?), which was released two years ago.

What do you think? Are you convinced by this keyboard approach?

There are 5 comments in this article:

  1. 16/09/2010Juan Lupión says:

    It’s pure awesome. Being a developer by trade, I’m a keyboard guy and everything seemed so natural after 2 minutes, I even made the FF4 beta be my default browser. Still needs some optimization or a good video card for the transition effect, but everything else seems fine.

    Can’t wait for the next movement coming from Chrome’s camp! These are exciting times.

  2. 16/09/2010Agustín Jiménez says:

    It looks great.

    I can’t avoid to think about Archy*, his father utopian dream about navigation by incremental keyboard search. Raskin (Jef), was always a big defender of keyboard efficiency. It’s all about the old debate: training cost vs. efficient use.

    * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archy

  3. 16/09/2010Maximo Castagno says:

    A mí me recuerda a Enso (http://www.humanized.com/enso_demo.php) que también lleva bastante tiempo “out there” pero no tiene pinta de haber triunfado… Es cierto que este tema de los segundos que perdemos en pasar del teclado al ratón es fascinate.

    PD: Saludos Javier! Como ve te sigo en la sombra desde BCN.

    Maximo

  4. 16/09/2010Javier says:

    I agree with what you say. I find it very useful but I don’t see the keyboard as the future of input devices. I miss a good set of voice commands to use the browser so I can use it while in the shower for email, for instance. Also, direct manipulation through touch is more of a natural thing to do.

    @Maximo welcome! El seguimiento es mútuo :)

  5. 17/09/2010Maximo says:

    Ups, sorry about the spanish ;-) I’ve just realized…

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