

In case you haven't seen it before: Star Trek's PADD - swernli
http://memory-alpha.org/en/wiki/PADD

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philwelch
My girlfriend and I watch Deep Space Nine DVD's from Netflix with dinner every
night. Wednesday, after the iPad announcement, I remember watching them use
their PADD's on DS9 and thinking, "yes, I get it now".

What I really want is for the iPad to get cheap enough that you can leave
three or four laying around the house or carry them around with you. You can
leave one in the kitchen and use it for recipes, browse on the couch, and so
forth.

Also, a long forgotten comment of mine becomes suddenly relevant!
<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=726950>

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rgrieselhuber
The cool thing is that the real ones now look better than the fictional ones
ever did.

~~~
electromagnetic
Oh come on now, it's Star Trek. Besides the low budgets, the fans expected it
to be cheesy!

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arturventura
Why the hell do you think i want one so badly?

~~~
swernli
Ditto. I posted this mostly because I was suprised the comparison hasn't come
up more in discussion, so I figured maybe not as many people were familiar
with it as I assumed. Discussion of the various benefits and short-comings
aside, I am so ready to pretend like I'm on the bridge of the Enterprise...

~~~
noonespecial
It wasn't lost on me. I did, however get some quizzical glaces when I brought
it up in less geeky settings.

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1081099>

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tl
This just enforces that I'm going to wait for an "iPad Mini", (7"-ish screen
possibly smaller when you factor in the border used on the iPad). Star Trek
didn't really have to think about user interface, but they needed actors to be
able comfortable holding and operating the devices.

Offtopic: Look at the rectangle shown here <http://tinyurl.com/yduybaf> The
size shown is an iPod Touch; I wanted to add one of the smaller newtons and
the iPad. When you add multiple sets of measurements it drops the rectangles
and just compares areas. Anyone know how to fix this?

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ratsbane
I'd like to see a real-word implementation of a sonic screwdriver:
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sonic_screwdriver>

~~~
swernli
Or the digital multi-tool, from the old show ReBoot:
<http://reboot.wikia.com/wiki/Glitch>

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Mystitat
The best part of that page is definitely the appropriate advertisers.
<http://imgur.com/EdH8L.png>

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zyb09
Does it have multitasking?

~~~
jsz0
I don't think so. We always see the PAD running the same application/GUI which
seems to be an all-in-one reader supporting video, photos, and text. I can't
remember any instances of the PAD being used for much more. Not even
audio/video chat which was reserved for the personal communicators and
wall/desk consoles. At one point we see Picard's desk covered with multiple
pads further suggesting they were uni-taskers. Multi-tasking certainly existed
in the 80's so the vision of future technology in Star Trek TNG seems to be
one of mainframe computing, data in the cloud, and multiple specialized task-
centric devices (personal communicator, tricorder, PADS) and good ole' fashion
desktops (consoles) being used for more advanced tasks.

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thechangelog
No Flash? Phht...

~~~
electromagnetic
No, but it was easy to jail brake!

<http://memory-alpha.org/en/wiki/Borderland_(episode)>

