No, we are not sensationalizing, this IS amazing.

So what’s the idea?

The concept of sixth-sense technology is to interact with the digital world the way we do with the physical one – and bring these two together. Rather than interacting with a computer using a keyboard and mouse, what if we could interact with it the way we do with everything in the real world – with natural gestures! Instead of restricting the power of information and processing to a small screen, what if the computer was everywhere? What if we could bring the interactivity, intuitiveness and “naturalness” of the real world into the digital one?  In other words, rather than going on the computer to do things, everything becomes a computer (without actually modifying the items themselves)!

What can you do with it, you ask?

With this kind of technology, you would be able to do the following things without changing the hardware item itself – you don’t have to add a screen to everything to make it a computer – by simply mashing digital information with the real world using a projector, the possibilities are endless.

You could:

• Read a newspaper, and watch related live news videos on ordinary paper!
• Find information about anything by simply holding it in your hands. Instead of firing up a laptop and Googling the item, you interact with real world items normally, and digital information is added and processed automatically.
• Look at your ticket or boarding pass, and see live updated information about your flight on normal paper.
• Grab information from a paper, and import it into a document to start working with it. Literally pinch some text on a paper and move it to a digital screen!
• Check the time by drawing a watch on your wrist. There is nothing on your wrist, just draw a circle on your bare wrist and the time appears.

How does it work?

The idea is to have a camera and projector attached to your helmet. The camera is the input device, and the projector is the output. The camera simply recognizes everything you are doing, everything you are holding, etc., and the projector outputs information onto that object or surface. So the camera interprets your actions and the related objects, the computer finds and processes related dynamic information, and then the projector displays that information in a natural, intuitive way. Thus the whole computing experience becomes natural and integrated with the real world. No need to spend hours in front of machines or typing away at smartphones and devices to interact with the digital world.

So how soon can I throw out my keyboard?

You probably won’t throw out your keyboard for some time, as we still need “workstations” to process information sometimes. Not everything we do on a computer relates the natural world. As for sixth-sense technology, Pranav Mistry states that the technology itself is not difficult to develop. Powerful gesture-recognizing cameras and good projectors are easy to make once companies start competing. The idea right now, is to popularize this concept and start developing software platforms and collaborative environments to start building this revolutionizing technology.

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And then came Windows 7. It’s supposed to be the operating system that fixed everything. It is, in a way. If you’ve ever used it, you’ll find a LOT of significant enhancements, fixes and features that we needed. But not virtual desktops – which have been coming with most Linus distros practically forever. The good thing about Windows is that if something doesn’t exist built-in, there’s always an add-on that will do what you need to do.

Herein we shall review and test some virtual desktop software for Windows 7. All tests were performed on Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit.

Vista/XP Virtual Desktop Manager

This software had most of the features of the other programs, plus two neat preview features, which puts this at the top our list.

Pros

• A quick little desktop switcher at the bottom right hand corner of your screen

• Ability to preview your desktops as thumbnails when you roll over the taskbar icon

This little desktop previewer shows up when you roll over the taskbar icon

• A quick display message (which disappears in a second) tells which desktop you switched to as soon as switch

Just moved from desktop 2 to desktop 1

Cons

• I didn’t see any window management features built into the shell. Meaning that you couldn’t simply right-click on a window and send the window to next desktop like with other software. However it does have some awesome hotkey functionality built in so you could send a window or move desktops pressing arrow keys or the number pad.

VirtuaWin 4.1

VirtuaWin 4.1 “just works” with Windows 7.

Pros

• Simple window management (middle-click on window to use)

Middle-click Menu on VirtuaWin 4.1

• Works with multiple screens

Cons

• Somewhat confusing interface (can you make sense of this? I couldn’t)

Confusing...

• Does not support window previews. I like the ability of having desktops viewable as thumbnails when you click on the icon.

Virtual Dimension 0.94

This is, by far, in my opinion, the best virtual desktop software we have reviewed for Windows 7.

Pros

• Extremely simple and easy to use interface
• Set rules for the desktops if you want some window always to be on some desktop.
• Allows you to see some windows on all desktops(e.g. IM Client).
• Supports desktop visual previews with icons

Desktop Thumbnail Preview

This little preview window sits at the corner of your screen. To bring it up, click the little Virtual Dimension icon to the far right of the taskbar. You may want to configure Windows to make the sure the Virtual Dimension taskbar icon is always visible by clicking the “Customize” button in the taskbar popup:

• Simple window management (right-click window to use)

Nice simple Virtual Dimension menu

• Simple and easy to understand interface

Nice and simple

Cons

• Not so fast window management (since switching windows between desktop requires 3 clicks instead of 1).

Crystal Desktop ($14.95)

Although we could not review this software, the company claims that it works with Windows 7

Crystal Desktop Interface

Pros

• Set rules for the desktops if you want some window always to be on some desktop. It’s very simple.
• Exception list allows you to see some windows on all desktops(e.g. IM Client).
• Every desktop may have its own wallpaper, shortcuts, resolutions.
• Convenient user-friendly interface
• Little resource consumption
• Set rules for the desktops if you want some window always to be on some desktop.
• Exception list allows you to see some windows on all desktops(e.g. IM Client).

Cons

• The pricetag
• The little switcher app some may find to be intrusive

Other software that didn’t work with Windows 7

Desktops 1.0 didn’t work properly, even though its an official Microsoft software and claims to work with Windows XP and higher.

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You can also customize the default icon for different file types, and set your default program to open a particular type of file. Could really come in handy.

Compatible with Windows 7, Vista, and XP (MS. NET 3.5 required)

The best thing that we love about this is that it’s free of unnecessary bells and whistles, is easy to use, and does exactly what it claims it can do. And it’s a standalone EXE – installation not needed! Can’t all software become like this?

Download (from http://defaultprogramseditor.com/)

For some reason, the program crashed unexpectedly when I tried to add a context item for PHP files on Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit. Please notify us in the comments if you notice more of this or find a fix. A lot of users reported it as working fine though…

Screenshot (from http://defaultprogramseditor.com/)

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