TAI-CHI is an interesting project some colleagues of mine work on together with a few interesting partners. The guys are turning various surfaces into touch, probably better described as tap sensitive, interfaces.
In it's basic form it is a few pieso-sensors, some low cost chips and lightweight software to grab the coordinates on a pre-calibrated surface. The calibration process is not too different from what you would do to calibrate a PDA's screen. Essentially it is not really high-tech, as in multi-million, cluster driven, intelligent multi-mobile-agent networks over-engineered gizmo.
The tech was tested not only on flat surfaces, but on staircase railings and other not so usual places.
We were dreaming about, gesture recognition and other cool derivatives of the technology. But that's hopefully the future
haha
well, kinda true. For some reason there is a fashoin to do wacky homophonic(ish) abbreviations . tangible acoustic interfaces for computer human interaction. says it all really.
yes, i know about this. i found it when looking for tai-chi courses in and around cardiff. i thought it was a bit strange that people in our buildings were doing tai-chi. stupid, stupid name for a project. wah.