Enhancing the Experience
Here are some examples of the object manipulation concept and its possibilities:
Lisa is a software developer. She decides to write an image editing program for the operating system. She downloads the software developer kit and reads the manuals where she is told the following:
Programs are never stand alone. They can only be enhancements to the existing four panel interface.
There are no traditional menus or toolbars; items are first selected and then the properties panel reflects the current state of the item.
Lisa's program would add the capability to adjust various properties of the selection. When writing the elements of her program, Lisa would list the performance requirements for each function. If the block was in the PDA which has less performance than the desktop, certain properties of the image selection may not be visible for editing.
Mac is a software developer as well. He wants to write a budgeting application. He would be required to create a new type of stationery for use in the document panel to represent deposit and withdrawal slips and the results or projections would show up in the database and timeline panels. His program could enhance the selection properties of any number or currency displayed, no matter what type of stationery it was originated from.
Wherever possible, applications would pull data from that already in storage. So Mac's budgeting program would show banking details from your existing bank account info, and get foreign currency rates from your bank. As mentioned before, there would only ever be one master object physically located in the block for each file or piece of information. All instances of each object would be pointers to the original so that if the original is changed then all instances would reflect the change; if you changed banks then that would be reflected everywhere.
If you decided to buy Mac and Lisa's programs then they would be purchased using your bank via your block and downloaded to your block; you would not be able to transfer them to another block. If you sent some output from a purchased program to someone who didn't have the program required to view it then the recipient would be prompted to purchase the program using a form in the Properties panel, already including the recipient's banking details; a portion of the proceeds would be forwarded to you as a commission.
Using Mac's addon, you decide to budget for an overseas vacation a year from now. First you click on your bank account in your database panel. In your properties panel you see your current balance in bar graph form. You slice $200 from your bar and drop it on a new account. Then you choose to repeat this process every week. Next time you connect your bank will open your new account and start transferring your money.
You drop your account on your timeline and, using your properties panel, you create a new viewing filter. Your filter makes a wedge in your timeline, starting $200 thick and expanding into the future. A year into your future you create a new object; it's your vacation and in its property sheet you enter its cost. This places another wedge within your wedge. At any point between now and a year from now you can see how much is put aside for your vacation and how much is in surplus.
You decide you want a new camera between now and then; dropping your camera object in your vacation wedge shrinks your surplus wedge -- if your vacation date is locked then your camera will snap to when it will be affordable. If you drag your camera towards the future then your surplus wedge will re-appear; if you drag towards today then your vacation object will either contract in value or move away, further into the future.
Adding money to your account could fatten your wedge, causing your camera to slide closer to today. A bar could be extended from your camera towards today, creating a lead time in which comparison shopping could start; your camera could be linked to the contact details of a dealer to request brochures at that time as well.
With enough surplus, you decide to buy the camera. You drop your camera on the supplier and your money is transferred from your new account to your supplier who delivers the camera. The shiny new camera now appears in your regular timeline at the projected delivery date; clicking on the camera displays its shipping progress in the properties panel. When it arrives you can choose to leave it in the timeline with a warranty bar extending onto the future.
It's getting close to vacation time now so you select points on your vacation's lead time bar and assign vacation related tasks; your vacation object now doubles as a financed project...
The timeline includes a clock. When you click and drag the clock it becomes a countdown timer. The more you drag down the longer the time - the further to the right, the greater the sensitivity of the timer setting scale. Releasing starts the timer and produces a bar from the Now terminator on the timeline, into the future. As Now passes the end point an alarm sounds and the end point is now dragged by Now to become a count up timer. Clicking the bar causes the clock to show the bar's current value. Later, the bar can be dropped in the database panel to produce a preset timer for later use.
All objects that have values that can be varied have target points on them. Clicking and dragging an object may move the actual object, but clicking and dragging an object's target point pops up magnified scales of values that can be changed. Any movement left or right would switch scales and any movement up or down would scroll through the available values.
Expanding on that -- registered value types within documents could have their own target points; the phrase, "A temperature of 180° Celsius" could be clicked to show a scale centered on that value and its Fahrenheit equivalent.
There would be a standardization of object properties. If Dick Jones Electronics wanted you and others to use their services they would build an object and place it on their website where it could be dragged and dropped into your database. As well as the usual contact details, such features as "I am a vendor," "I deliver" and "I use cash transfers" could be enabled.
The Dick Jones online catalog would use standardized product objects. Because they use common retail product specification fields and image spaces you will be able to show competing products in tabular form to help you compare features and comparison shop.
Corporate, Retail or Public hardware would have a guest slot where you could plug in your block to retrieve product brochures, catalogs, local maps and contact details. All of these objects would strictly comply with standards or be rejected by the block. Multiple addresses in the Dick Jones object would tie in with your "I am here, what's nearby" feature.