20 ms·

Yes, it's an important distinction. Still, there are valid reasons for preferring physical buttons that virtual buttons or other on-screen controls do not addre

• masklinn 15y ago
  I only know of two, do you have more? 1. Feedback. This turns out to not be important for most people for most tasks. Still physical feedback (of layout and of action) important tool of physical interaction and required for eyes-free operation. I fully expect this problem to be solved within two years. 2. Software bypass. This is mostly useful in case of complete software lockup (low level/OS crash), but while most phones are built to be "always on" you can't always avoid low-level lock-up. And in that case you need to reset all transient device state. I expect the final fail-safe to remain a physical button, although some kind of watchdog running alongside the OS itself may be able to take care of 99% of the lockups.
  • Zak 15y ago
    I was going to say tactile positioning, but you seem to be rolling that in to feedback/layout. I would also add the distinction between putting your finger on a control and actually activating it. Capacitive technology doesn't provide a good way to handle that[0]. For an extreme example of the type of control you'd like to make such a distinction, consider the trigger of a gun. It may be important to be very ready to activate the control, and even more important to not activate it prematurely. [0] I don't consider press and hold, double-tap or similar to be good general-purpose solutions to this