Read the article in the NY Times at
http://www.nytimes.com/…

and a report in Yahoo
http://news.yahoo.com/…

or the details at Microsoft

Find out more at … http://www.microsoft.com/surface/

Another good report is available at arstechnica.com http://arstechnica.com/….

Popular Mechanics has an article due to appear in the July edition of thier magazine read more at http://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/…. Here’s a snippet

1. Screen: A diffuser turns the Surface’s acrylic tabletop into a large horizontal “multitouch” screen, capable of processing multiple inputs from multiple users. The Surface can also recognize objects by their shapes or by reading coded “domino” tags.
2. Infrared: Surface’s “machine vision” operates in the near-infrared spectrum, using an 850-nanometer-wavelength LED light source aimed at the screen. When objects touch the tabletop, the light reflects back and is picked up by multiple infrared cameras with a net resolution of 1280 x 960.
3. CPU: Surface uses many of the same components found in everyday desktop computers — a Core 2 Duo processor, 2GB of RAM and a 256MB graphics card. Wireless communication with devices on the surface is handled using WiFi and Bluetooth antennas (future versions may incorporate RFID or Near Field Communications). The underlying operating system is a modified version of Microsoft Vista.
4. Projector: Microsoft’s Surface uses the same DLP light engine found in many rear-projection HDTVs. The footprint of the visible light screen, at 1024 x 768 pixels, is actually smaller than the invisible overlapping infrared projection to allow for better recognition at the edges of the screen.

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Street View is a new feature of Google Maps that allows you to quickly and easily view and navigate high-resolution, 360 degree street level images of various cities in the US.

Digidesk is a touch-desk concept from Microsoft, demonstrated at the Convergence 2007 conference.

and take a virtual tour of the Microsoft Center for Information Work

Located on Microsoft Corp.’s Redmond, Wash., campus, the Microsoft Center for Information Work (CIW) showcases the company’s evolving vision for the future of information work by demonstrating innovative productivity software that will make this vision real for customers and organizations in five to seven years. It features future software developments that solve real customer problems and improve productivity. In this immersive setting of the CIW, visitors become part of a fictitious company and work individually as well as collaboratively to resolve business process challenges. Through the experience of using prototype technologies demonstrated in the CIW, customers emerge with an in-depth sense of how future software could help empower information workers in areas such as individual productivity, business intelligence, team collaboration and workflows.

at http://www.microsoft.com/….Tour.wax

I obtained a copy of Inventor LT recently announced by Autodesk on their labs web site http://labs.autodesk.com .

LT is a version of Inventor (based on Inventor 2008) which contains full Part Modelling capabilities, currently available for free download and with a licence vaild until May 2008.

In brief, features available in the LT version include:

• 3D Part Modelling
• Automated 2D Drawing Views
• Automated 2D Drawing Updates
• Copy and paste from AutoCAD
• DWG TrueConnect
• Inventor Studio (photorealistic rendering)
• Design Review

I had no problem running this version and was even able to take the part I created, (saved as SAT v4.0 format) through CosmosXpress NOW (at http://labs.solidworks.com) , to perform a simple stress analysis.

This version includes Inventor Studio, inherited in part from the Alias acquisition.

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3DLive delivers a breakthrough lightweight 3D paradigm for on-line collaborative intelligence, leveraging enterprise 3D and PLM information. It provides a single immersive user interface where everyone across your enterprise can search, navigate, work and collaborate on any aspect of your PLM intellectual property (IP) to optimize decision making and accelerate business execution. It fully leverages existing DS applications and data, and is downloadable online.

All the details are available here … http://www.3ds.com/…/3dlive/overview/

3 configurations are available:

1. ENOVIA 3DLive (LIV)
2. CATIA 3DLive (LIC)
3. DELMIA 3DLive (LID)

Find out more detail from the attached brochure: 3dlive_brochure.pdf

Related links

• Watch videos and images galleries
• Experience 3DLive!
• Customers and analysts speak about 3DLive!

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