Tablet Pc

Again, MicrosoftCorporation has the largest share of the market for TabletPc operating system.

But other options exist, see for example a mid05 LinuxOs alternative by Nokia at http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1895,1835275,00.asp

Nov05 The above WiFi equipped TabletPc without cellular connectivity is out. See http://www.brighthand.com/articles/print.php?urlName=Nokia_770_Released_in_Europe

The company has listed amongst the ten main benefits, the ability to use all features of WindowsXp (see http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/tabletpc/evaluation/toptenbenefits.asp).

One of the newer interaction methods made possible by the tablet PC is the ComComponent called DigitalInk?, which provides handwriting recognition. It also separately identifies handwriting ink from drawing ink. Ink can be used as annotation to regular documents via OLE.

Also it has gestures, which include speech recognition modules with support for Chinese and Japanese languages. Gestures can be custom constructed. See http://msdn.microsoft.com/msdnmag/issues/04/12/TabletPC/default.aspx.

Any body has recent news (e.g. 2004) on additional merits of a convertible TabletPC (one that can function as a laptop as well). Or is it going to remain a novelty item due to lack of killer applications that attract the laptop buyer?

TabletPc support multiple display rotation and reorientation, and its digitizer picks up pen movements but not other physical pressure (e.g. palm).

I also have a concern regarding the ability for the TabletPC os to keep up with the monthly critical service packs issued for WindowsXp.

http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1759,1590939,00.asp seems to confirm the notion that the strengths of the TabletPc platform will be absorbed into notebooks, and what is left would be specialized cases. And WindowsLonghorn is not expected to have a version for the mobile market.

Later in the same month another eweek article, "Reports of Tablet PC's Death Have Been Greatly Exaggerated", provided a different perspective at analysing the facts. See http://www.eweek.com/print_article/0,1761,a=127990,00.asp.
In May05 Engadget Interview (http://www.engadget.com/entry/1234000400042080/) B Gates said there will be a WindowsLonghorn version of TabletPc, but that he is not going to speculate the time it would take for the market share to increase from the 1.3% to the 30% mark as he expected.

UltraMobilePC - UMPC

According to WikiPedia, this 2006 created category of hardware runs TabletPc operating system, and supposed to run some WindowsVista version when it evenuates. The product was codenamed Origami before its official release.

Instead of having an electromagnetic screens allowing interaction with a specialized pen, a lower cost touch sensitive screen is provided.

UMPCs have form factors between a PDA and a TabletPc and is priced between these ranges too.

PowerUsage is said to be a key shortcoming of UMPC, as users try to compare their experiences with a SmartPhone or PocketPc which typically do not have a spinning harddisk and myriad of applications.

Resources

MicrosoftChannelNine has a wiki page on TabletPc that has many links at http://channel9.msdn.com/wiki/default.aspx/Channel9.TabletPCs

Microsoft sponsored whitepaper on Business Case for Tablet PC at http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=abcf98ff-c1d0-4b83-a6c0-202a060c0073&displaylang=en

Development in managed and/or unmanaged code at http://msdn.microsoft.com/msdnmag/issues/04/12/TabletPC/default.aspx?side=true#a

User story on Vaio above http://jkontherun.blogs.com/jkontherun/2004/08/a_typical_day_w.html

For an insider's view on the current state of Tablet PC developement http://download.microsoft.com/download/0/f/7/0f7cc82e-df70-4ca0-a74d-5692c10e6c40/bill_gates_2005.wmv

...Optimizing UMPC Applications at http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/dntablet/html/tbconsudokusamplefinal.asp

CategoryMicrosoft