PCs with Kinect for Windows device respond to your every move
- From: The Australian
- February 28, 2012
The Kinect motion sensor is now available for Windows desktop PCs and brings gesturing to home computers. Source: The Australian
GESTURING, previously the province of Microsoft's popular Xbox 360 gaming console, is coming to a PC near you.
Kinect has been used for controlling cars in fast action games and simulating actions in sports such as tennis and golf but it can also be used as another way of controlling your PC, just as you do with a keyboard and mouse.But if you think Microsoft's new Kinect for Windows device will have you thumping the table to choose bold typeface in Word and leaning sideways for italics, or crossing your fingers to depict a "plus" sign to add numbers in Excel -- well, that's not the point.
Microsoft has indicated it is likely to update its Office suite to incorporate gesturing and voice commands, and that PowerPoint is a natural vehicle.
But Microsoft's main thrust is to get application developers enthused about incorporating Kinect in their software, and Microsoft's Software Development Kit tries to make this as simple as possible.
When you boot up the SDK it offers a lot of information on how to get started with Kinect for Windows, so savvy users may be in luck. There are sites where Kinect enthusiasts showcase and share their Kinect for Windows projects, which they originally developed for the beta SDK last year.
You can download code to use your Kinect with Windows Media Centre installations that are not on Xbox 360 consoles or see proposed projects to use Kinect to teach CPR, make use of 3D printers or study asteroids and glaciers. The site http://channel9.msdn.com/coding4fun has examples.
Australian developers are already getting applications ready for market.
Perth-based Adapptor plans to have a system where shoppers can try clothes on virtually using Kinect gestures as soon as April. Adapptor has developed software that enables consumers at billboards or their own PCs to scroll through shopping catalogues using gestures to flip through pages or enlarge the print.
Queensland University of Technology's Computer Human Interaction Discipline has developed a virtual floor controlled by two Kinect devices used for children's play.
Intended initially to assist intellectually disabled children, the Kinect set-up there enables children to play virtual soccer and games such as hopscotch with embellishments like pop-up turtles, and even to virtually herd sheep into pens.
The Endeavour Foundation and Disability Queensland are among bodies interested in these floor applications, which the university hopes to spin off commercially.
Soul Solutions is brewing some so-far confidential enterprise applications that relate to Kinect.
The company, which is involved in the gas and mining industries, sees health and safety as a big beneficiary of Kinect for Windows, for teaching, training and monitoring.
Already there are projects that incorporate Kinect as a hands-free way of interacting with computers. Doctors in operating theatres can select and examine X-rays using gestures, without having to touch a computer keyboard and then having to scrub up again.
Kinect's apparent ability to detect age will make it possible to change the images on an electronic billboard according to who is walking towards it.
The ability to monitor movements means Kinect can locate people who seem stuck with deciding what to buy in shops and even to detect fighting in public places.
One person we talked to is intent on developing a small Kinect application that will let him know if his children are biffing each other. The application for automatic monitoring of school playgrounds seems a spin-off of this, as do general security uses.
So for now, Kinect for Windows may be more for developers, but expect to see it coming not only to a PC near you, but to a store, billboard and surveillance camera as well.
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