REDMOND, Wash. – Feb. 27, 2012 – Amazing possibilities for the future of personal computing were on display this week at TechForum, an event hosted by Microsoft Chief Research and Strategy Officer Craig Mundie. Mundie was joined by Interactive Entertainment Business President Don Mattrick, Online Services Division President Qi Lu, Business Platform Division Corporate Vice President Ted Kummert and Chief Research Officer Rick Rashid and others in discussing and demonstrating how the company is investing in research and exploration of a number of important technologies. See highlights of TechForum in the slide show below, and watch videos of some of the demos in Craig Mundie on the Future of Computing newsroom.
New Possibilities for Personal Computing
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Holoflector
With Holoflector, a project by Microsoft Research's Andy Wilson (shown here with Craig Mundie), graphics are superimposed on your reflection to enable an augmented-reality experience.
Jinha Lee, an intern for Microsoft Research from MIT Media Lab, demonstrates the Behind-the-Screen Interaction, which utilizes a transparent organic light-emitting diode (OLED) display with view-dependent and depth-corrected gaze to manipulate virtual objects on screen.
Demonstrated by Microsoft Applied Science Lab's Steve Bathiche, the Seeing Display uses flat lenses to see through a semi-transparent organic light-emitting diode (OLED) to enable novel above-screen gesture and scanning interactions.
Lifebrowser leverages machine learning and reasoning to help people navigate through large stores of their appointments, photos and computing activities to infer "memory landmarks" - events and activities that people would find important. The system builds a timeline around these landmarks and enables people to search and retrieve associated content.
Microsoft Translator Hub enables language communities and others to create automatic translation systems. By enabling translation to languages that aren’t supported by today’s mainstream translation engines, this keeps less widely spoken languages vibrant and in use for future generations.
IllumiShare, a Microsoft Research project, enables people to remotely share any physical or digital object on any surface. People can sketch together using real ink and paper, remote meeting attendees can interact with conference room whiteboards, and children can have remote play dates in which they play with real toys. Illumishare also integrates Skype video chatting.
Craig Mundie tests the Microsoft Applied Science Lab's Telepresence Using Wedge Technology, a glassless 3D display that enables correct camera pose and view pose for a live view-dependent 3D Window Telepresence experience.
A big problem for history teachers is conveying the vast stretches of time. ChronoZoom will enable transitioning effortlessly between scales of one year to billions of years, putting historical episodes in context, comparing vast amounts of time-related data across different fields and disciplines, and more.
Showcasing a futuristic prototype, Craig Mundie uses a large-scale display to overlay multiple sources of data and information to help him decide the best location to open a new retail shop.
