Marc Orchant: “Ink Gestures has increased my ‘Tablet Time’ significantly. I’ve remarked on any number of occasions that I continue to favor the convertible form factor for Tablet PCs because of the amount of writing and editing I do every day. In the short time I’ve had to experiment with Ink Gestures, I’ve found that I can now spend a much greater amount of time in slate mode using the pen than has ever been possible before.”
My experience is similar. Case in point: I used to never use the built-in ink features in Word. I don’t know why. I just never did. Then I stared using InkGestures while working in Word. And my mindset started changing. Word’s built-in ink support didn’t seem so far removed from how I was working. So I started using it more. I can’t imagine going back and only typing in Word.
Yep, one application or one feature can change the way you use another.
Has you tried this with the Office 12 beta?
Any word on whether this might eventually work with Open Office too?
We’re planning to release a version for Office 12. Not sure on the date yet.
In terms of InkGestures in OpenOffice, that would be very, very interesting. I’ll check into what this might take. Plain and simple: More apps can benefit from ink support.
If this was universal, like say working in Final Draft or MMS, I’d be in heaven. This is what I always wanted, thinking what OneNote was supposed to be, which just became an annoying note-taking virtual island application. But the idea is deadly sound, and would bring me back to using Tablets (that and a decent non-adandonware eBook system).
I work with words for a living, and yes, artists have the Tablet as a perfect outlet, but with the right tools to copy-edit, craft and reorder words and paragraphs on-the-fly, then Tablet is once again useful (to me). But this far in and nothing from any majors, and just a sharewareish, beta-buggy Word plug-in, doesn’t exactly boost my confidence in the platform. Maybe OneNote 12 will have some of these features, or Vista will or Final Draft will make good on promises. Shrug, wake me up, when something happens.
Ideally, too, I’d like a pen-based Sony Vegas or Avid, video-editing made easy with the pen. And I can think of tons more applicational uses, but as stands now, pen is just a third-class citizen, another input-device, another mouse.