
Capstone, a Tablet for Thinking - andymatuschak
https://www.inkandswitch.com/capstone-manuscript.html
======
angleofrepose
Ink&Switch have 6 papers out on their site in the last 9 months. Each is a
thorough review of an interaction style through a product they develop. Since
they are an independent research lab their papers are much more approachable
and fun than other, say, CHI or UIST papers I've read. These papers come off
the back of 2+ years of research. Each of the individuals on the team have
awesome backgrounds and Ink&Switch serves as a great starting point to do some
backwards internet research if you want to see some wonderful design work. I
look forward to anything else they will put out, I've skimmed each paper and
thoroughly read 2.

As to Capstone itself, it seems to me a wonderfully simple tablet interface.
After rolling it around my head for a while I can't believe we ever ended up
with grids of icons and widgets as the "desktop" of modern touch based
devices. This nestable 2D canvas scheme (don't miss the jump links, no you
aren't "trapped" by this scheme) feels intuitive and affords much power to the
user that they can be fine to ignore or learn at their own pace. I find that
reading these papers has influenced my desire for breadcrumbs on my tiling wm
laptop setup in a way I can't currently figure out but I am making small
progress.

I've long been interested in OneNote. None of the other major note software
systems have seemed as good. I still, however, use vim and paper. This seems
like a tool that could blow OneNote out of the water. A user could build
OneNote's UI in Capstone in what looks like a little bit of minor fiddling. If
OneNote is a modern take on paper, Capstone is a modern take on screens.

~~~
angleofrepose
By "screens" over "paper" I mean dynamism, transformation and computing power.
Paper cannot execute, and paper simulation on computers takes no advantage of
their digital environment. "Screens" however know where they live and open up
capabilities to their users that reflect the device's actual power. I have
shells on my desktop, I do not have shells on my OneNote. Capstone gives me a
shell again. Why would I ever give it away, and use OneNote without the power
and ability I expect everywhere else on my computer?

I would like a better word to sum up this idea than "screen" vs "paper" so
please drop me some recommendations.

~~~
derefr
Paper = “spatial interface” in the original/most literal way the term was
intended. The data is materialized into one point in space, and can only be
accessed by going to that point in space. This was the original idea behind
the early unification between saving files in a file-manager, and “iconifying”
document-displaying windows: a file was just a hibernated window, and a window
was a 1:1 representation of some particular file.

Screens = “views” or “data bindings” in the SQL or MVC sense, or “projections”
in relational algebra. There’s data somewhere, and then, separately, you have
a _view_ into that data: a distinct, live object through which you interact
with the data, which can have a UX optimized for a given use-case, distinct
from the “objective” UX suited to directly displaying the data.

Capstone is sort of a spatial interface _of_ view objects (rather than a
spacial interface of literal documents, or a database-representation of view
objects), which is novel.

~~~
angleofrepose
Dang, I like your perspective. Thanks for sharing.

I want to explain digital displays in a name that exposes the idea of dynamic
use. Of reading/writing/drawing while simultaneously affording computational
ability, execution and simulation.

------
walterbell
Previously, from Ink & Switch:

 _Local-first software: You own your data, in spite of the cloud_ (190
comments),
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19804478](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19804478)

 _Slow software_ (260 comments),
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18506170](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18506170)

 _Muse: designing a studio for ideas_ (18 comments),
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19816189](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19816189)

------
essem
I've struggled for years to articulate my ideas and express things clearly,
'specially when it comes to challenging technical problems. One day, I
randomly bought a tiny 12" x 5" whiteboard while I was at the dollar store,
with the intention of using it to keep a physical todo list.

I eventually reached for it while in the heat of a challenging debugging
session with some colleagues, and was surprised with how much it helped me
solve the problem at hand. It quickly stopped being a todo-list after this
incident. Turned out my inability to articulate things effectively was not
because I was stupid, but because I am a predominantly visual thinker.

The fact people are working on tools like this excites the hell out of me!

~~~
walterbell
Could you share a little about the difference between the small whiteboard and
a letter-sized paper notebook?

~~~
essem
Paper in my experience can get messy real quick. Example - When drawing a
diagram of some process it is common for me to want to tweak and reconfigure
things to arrive at a solution. With paper, it requires you either erase,
scratch out, or re draw the diagram with your desired changes on another page.

What I love about marker boards is the ability to freely draft and modify on
the fly without worry. When I want to commit ideas to "storage", paper works
best :)

~~~
noobly
I agree 100%! Though I prefer to store things digitally. I feel so liberated
no longer having so many scratch pieces of paper around that may contain an
important note or solution to a problem. I remember working through a calculus
book and having about half a foot's worth of paper (notes, attempts at solving
problems, rewritten solutions to problems, etc) that eventually fell victim to
entropy and was absolutely useless for anything but that I kept around out of
fear of forgetting all of it. At least now it's all in one box. Maybe I'll
burn it this winter as kindling - or would that be too derivative? :^)

These days, anything short term -> whiteboard, anything refined and meaningful
enough for reusing later -> PC.

------
brandonmenc
Still not as good as Microsoft's "Courier" concept from a decade ago:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UmIgNfp-
MdI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UmIgNfp-MdI)

~~~
J_cst
Interesting, thanks for sharing. Did this project reach a dead end?

~~~
JackFaker
according to a 2011 cnet (1) article it was months away from release but
"Courier was cancelled because the product didn't clearly align with the
company's Windows and Office franchises"

1: [https://www.cnet.com/news/the-inside-story-of-how-
microsoft-...](https://www.cnet.com/news/the-inside-story-of-how-microsoft-
killed-its-courier-tablet/)

------
TheArcane
Nothing has come close to Microsoft's One Note for me when it comes to note
taking apps. The combination of One Note and an iPad with the pencil is
particularly powerful.

~~~
Something1234
I could never pick up the fundamentals concept of OneNote. What's the deal
with it?

~~~
vmurthy
Depends on how you use it. 1. OCD level organisation required? One note has
got you covered. Books and tabs and what not. With tagging. 2. Want to toss
everything in and forget about it? OneNote does the job. Windows and iOS
supported. Plays well with my handwriting. Rest of platforms haven’t checked.

~~~
reitanqild
> With tagging.

Actually, tagging is one of the things OneNote should do better.

It doesn't support hashtags out of the box so tagging means selecting from a
list of predefined tags.

One of the things that really annoys me about OneNote (I'm a big fan of it
though.)

~~~
BlueDingo
Yes! When I first got into OneNote (2007 version?) I put a lot of effort into
using and customising tags but quickly hit limits. Even if other features
never updated, an overhaul of the tags system could drastically increase
OneNote's usability.

It always felt odd that the same app that reliably converted my handwriting to
text a decade ago had a small, fixed number of tag slots and no ability to
import icons. I remember thinking "well surely this was a v1, they'll improve
it in later versions" but no, not even the tiniest change.

~~~
reitanqild
I'll add two more things:

\- internal links doesn't work on mobile.

\- local shared folder mode doesn't work in later versions. This was brilliant
for places that has restrictions on what they can upload to the cloud. OneNote
could often replace internal wikis for smaller companies (in some areas it was
even better) but now that becomes less viable as OneNote for desktop gets
older.

------
mncharity
Muse[1] is their[2] more recent similar effort.

[1] [https://www.inkandswitch.com/muse-studio-for-
ideas.html](https://www.inkandswitch.com/muse-studio-for-ideas.html) [2]
[https://www.inkandswitch.com/](https://www.inkandswitch.com/)

------
cheez
I have been using a Boogie Board Sync for a couple of years (the original,
haven't tried the latest).

It syncs with dropbox and allows automated filing into one of four types with
a stroke of the stylus.

Best note taking implement I've ever used - and I used paper for years. This
replaced it. I use it to teach my children new ideas, note everything down,
test theories. Give it a shot.

------
fwip
My workplace uses Bluescape [1] in a similar way, with a focus on multi-user
collaboration. We mainly use it on dedicated touch-TVs (like a digital
posterboard + whiteboard), rather than on tablets, but the thinking is the
same.

[1] [https://www.bluescape.com/](https://www.bluescape.com/)

------
dredmorbius
Conspicuously missing from the "existing tools" section, and (as I read
through the page) a troubling indicator of outcomes: index cards, well beyond
"spread on a dessktop" scale.

Denis Diderot, Linnaeus, Dewey, John McFee, and numerous others have used this
method.

Niklaus Luhmann's Zettelkasten ([https://zettelkasten.de/posts/zettelkasten-
improves-thinking...](https://zettelkasten.de/posts/zettelkasten-improves-
thinking-writing/)) and POIC -- pile of index cards
([http://pileofindexcards.org/blog/cluster/](http://pileofindexcards.org/blog/cluster/)
and [https://unclutterer.com/2014/06/17/the-pile-of-index-
cards-p...](https://unclutterer.com/2014/06/17/the-pile-of-index-cards-poic-
system/)) -- are two models that help impose a structure on chaos. Hypercard
was an attemp to map index cards to computeers, and influenced both the World
Wide Web and Wiki, though digitisation both adds to and subtracts from the
original physical manifestation.

My own card collection is approaching 10,000 cards, at roughly 1,500 per box,
and where a card can hold about 500 characters, roughly 100 words (some do,
many have fewer).

(Having read, _and_ viewed the demo.)

... what's incredibly frustrating for me is trying to convey the _scale_ of
information gathering for research, as well as types.

I'm working with my own thoughts, experiences, Web references, and published
works (both books and papers, as well as other forms). The quantities I'm
working with are typical of academic researchers and writers whom I admire,
whose bibliographies and notes may run 100 pages or more (and are often a
substantial part of a book's real value).

Some earlier descriptions:

PoIC: Pile of Index Cards
[https://ello.co/dredmorbius/post/u4dgr0tkxk4tk9npuvex5a](https://ello.co/dredmorbius/post/u4dgr0tkxk4tk9npuvex5a)

Organising and planning research
[https://ello.co/dredmorbius/post/fj5rzi8zmouyrmvg8yzzva](https://ello.co/dredmorbius/post/fj5rzi8zmouyrmvg8yzzva)

What I keep seeing are systems that work at toy levels (a handful of items,
occasionally a few dozen, rarely hundreds of items). And nothing in Capstone's
collateral communicates anything differently. My console file and email tools
can (and do) work with thousands and tens of thousands of items, though
providing sufficient context, both static and dynamic metadata, is a
challenge.

Email does slightly better by way of (searchable) headers -- From, To, Date,
and Subject, but cruicially; In-reply-to and References. These are elements
email inherited from early-20th-century office communications filing systems,
with the referrence chain actually _predating_ most other fields. _Where a
message fits_ within a discussion stream is often far more important than
_what it says_. "We kill people based on metadata" as former CIA and NSA
director General Michael Hayden said
([https://www.nybooks.com/daily/2014/05/10/we-kill-people-
base...](https://www.nybooks.com/daily/2014/05/10/we-kill-people-based-
metadata/)).

(JoAnne Yates and James Beniger are among the few who've studied this field, a
surprisingly interesting (to me) exploration of group communications and
decisionmaking.)

A simple tool to view documents (in various formats; PDF, ePub, Mobi, djview,
and sanitised, standardised HTML), look up metadata, and add this
conveniently, would be a huge win. I suspect copyright concerns are a major
hinderance.

For both thoughts and published works, context matters, though it's very
poorly supported by existing tools, and is almost always tedious to add and
verify. Dublin Core metadata is a good start
([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dublin_Core](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dublin_Core)).
My principle Android eDoc reader, Pocketbook Reader, lacks even an 'author"
field, and requires multiple steps and clicks to edit, correct, or verify
information. (I've ... tried reporting this -- it also lacks a useful issues-
reporting mechanism.) Another tool, Pocket Reader (entirely different, now
owned by Mozilla) has ben a hot mess for years, though there's been a recent
update I need to explore. My observation that it gets worse the more you use
it remains distressingly accurate
([https://old.reddit.com/r/dredmorbius/comments/5x2sfx/pocket_...](https://old.reddit.com/r/dredmorbius/comments/5x2sfx/pocket_it_gets_worse_the_more_you_use_it/)).

(Reddit itself was something of a tool, though it's ultimately failed the
test.)

What Capstone most lacks is a keyboard. I'm pecking this comment out with a
stylus on an Android tablet for which I'd prchased a defective-from-the-start
Logitech keyboard. Though compromised, operating near my 90 WPM typing speed,
_when needed_ is ten times faster than touch input (and increases screen space
by a third to half). There is no available similar replacement keyboard -- the
field apparently believes in constraining peripherals not only by mamufacturer
and form factor, but to specific models and variants. A small bit of
standardisation would go far.

See: Tablets and Keyboards
[https://ello.co/dredmorbius/post/lqgtwy_rhsfbdh5cdxb1rq](https://ello.co/dredmorbius/post/lqgtwy_rhsfbdh5cdxb1rq)

Tablets are useful for their portability and consumption. After four years of
constant use, and for almost wholly self-imposed limitations by vendors, litle
else.

Capstone seems to follow this trend.

~~~
noobly
Just to be clear, you actively maintain a collection (database?) of 10,000
index cards, spread throughout various boxes? Out of curiosity, why do you not
store these digitally instead?

~~~
dredmorbius
Yes.

Largely addressed in text and links above.

Index cards are close at hand, flexible, and low friction.

~~~
dredmorbius
... and substantially future-proofed.

~~~
noobly
This is only slightly more future-proof than keeping text files on a computer.
So slight, I'd argue the difference doesn't even matter. I don't see the
advantages to this behavior over storing them digitally.

------
dharma1
I love this line of questioning existing computer interface paradigms, it's
not done enough.

There is a lot of good stuff about this prototype (except it being built on
the web stack - what??), I'm sure some people will find a minimal UI version
of Prezi useful.

For me, I wish iPad had more control (customisable keyboard shortcuts for
nearly everything) - not less. I am also really interested new physical
devices for interacting with computers. I bought a Bluetooth footpedal for
instance - I find it really useful to do certain simple things while freeing
up my hands to do others (play guitar, draw, type, whatever)

Has anyone tried [https://www.tapwithus.com/](https://www.tapwithus.com/) ?
Looks awesome

------
mncharity
I liked, but also not. Here is some not.

Suffix all my comments with "But yes, this was understandable in a research
prototype".

Novice vs expert. The design seemed more oriented towards novice use, than the
stated audience of creative professionals.

Short-term use vs ergonomics. Long-term intensive expert use prioritizes
ergonomics. So while "toss off edge" to delete is useful fun, adding a
"scribble out"-like alternative that avoids giant arm motion would be nice.
And traversing to "toggle ink/erase" was ick. This felt an impoverished UI
vocabulary, compared to what many creative professionals are familiar with.

User|content vs user|tooling|content. Experts "wear" tooling to interact with
content, so tooling information is a legitimate use of UI display. There
seemed a story here of user interacting directly with content, which combined
with UI minimalism, degraded the tooling experience.

Content vs representation|content. Similar argument.

Hierarchy vs graph. I do realize some people like hierarchical organization -
mind maps and such. I find it crippling. But it does avoid the challenge of
doing dynamic graph layout while preserving user spatial orientation.

A metaphor of a zoomable static pin-board with almost no tooling... might be a
sweetspot for some. But it seems limiting. Prezi with web capture and minimal
tablet UI, seems still Prezi, and niche.

Tablet tech. Note the severe constraints of using current tablet tech. Cue
"understandable in a research prototype". They mention exploring dials and
buttons and pressure. But there's also tilt, and rotation, and 3D position
from optical tracking. They mention tablet being distinct from phone and
keyboard, and deemphasize text, when a keyboard could simultaneously be a
multitouch/stylus tablet (with optical tracking, and a "slice of a ping-pong
ball" to slide over keys).

Research vs future. This was UX research, and may well have been useful for
the community of which it was part. But... just don't confuse this with what
the future looks like. AR is coming.

And there seemed some unfamiliarity with related work and current tech (yes,
pen holders are a thing; yes, OCR is a thing; ...). Which for research can be
fine, or not, but is something for you to bear in mind.

I enjoyed the appendices page: [https://www.inkandswitch.com/capstone-
manuscript-appendices....](https://www.inkandswitch.com/capstone-manuscript-
appendices.html) My takeaway is they got burned by the painful state of
web/ink/gestures on android, and the degree of domain experience needed to
not-entirely-lose there. Which truncated their intended exploration. The
concept of an android tablet as a node/electron machine for inking... sigh.
For non-trivial multitouch and inking, I regrettably don't know of _any_
hardware/OS/drivers/apis/libraries stack where "it just works" isn't a joke.
Maybe some native iOS?

------
jsilence
Emacs org-mode because.

------
qrbLPHiKpiux
So it's a specialized iPad.

------
gavinpc
An inspiring team doing interesting work. But see previous

[https://hn.algolia.com/?query=Capstone,+a+Tablet+for+Thinkin...](https://hn.algolia.com/?query=Capstone,+a+Tablet+for+Thinking)

~~~
Gracana
"See previous" is only really helpful if there's previous discussion.

