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Video of Apple ‘SmackBook’ in action
Wednesday, May 24, 2006 - 02:01 PM EST

A video entitled "SmackBook" is available via YouTube. In it, a 15-inch MacBook Pro user slaps the side of the Macbook Pro to switch windows via software that uses the Mac notebook's built-in motion sensor:



Direct link to the video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6uvQTTPr9Rw

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May 24, 06 - 02:09 pm Comment from: MacPana

Cool! But, why do you need windows again??

First!

May 24, 06 - 02:12 pm Comment from: andy

if i had windows on my mac im sure id be tempted to smack it to!

May 24, 06 - 02:14 pm Comment from: doubter

great...all we have to do now is figure out if it's real or not. Where's a link to the software?

May 24, 06 - 02:17 pm Comment from: Bonkers for Mac

There's going to be lot people talkin' smack on this forum. But that may lead to more hits for MDN.

Of course that could result in more Hertz for your CPU.

Not the funniest perhaps but I thought I'd take a whack at it.

May 24, 06 - 02:17 pm Comment from: offer

awesome.

and its the best thing for windows - a good slap.

May 24, 06 - 02:18 pm Comment from: Gambit

That is sweeet!

May 24, 06 - 02:18 pm Comment from: Outsourced

If Apple was selling enough ipods and imacs, they wouldnt be showing off their new york city store on their web site to get attention and they certainly wouldnt associate themselves to some shoe company named Nike.

Because high tech jobs can be linked through computers, they can be outsourced, which means America's economy can not grow any more. it can only go down.

I expect massive layoffs in the future as automated software will be able to get work done and replace 1000's of workers.

at the same time a lot of other jobs will be outsourced.


this can mean only 1 thing..

a) another ressesion
b) a 1987 style market crash.

http://moneycentral.msn.com/content/CNBCTV/Promos/P151355.asp

May 24, 06 - 02:21 pm Comment from: mudflapper

At first I thought he hwas running Virtue, but it must be Parallels. You can set it to show a few different transitions when switching from OSX to Windows.

May 24, 06 - 02:23 pm Comment from: Hank

2 things: outsourced hopefully you will be outsourced.

May 24, 06 - 02:23 pm Comment from: hammer

Outsourced,

You are an idiot. Offer some proof and use spell checker if you are going to predict a RECESSION.

May 24, 06 - 02:25 pm Comment from: Thorin

Outsourced:

Go take your meds before something really bad happens. gulp

May 24, 06 - 02:26 pm Comment from: obvious

Fake

Neat idea though

May 24, 06 - 02:26 pm Comment from: question???

When you get the BLUE SCREEN of DEATH on Windows, can you slap the living crap out of Windows?

May 24, 06 - 02:29 pm Comment from: Mike

Outsourced

In my opinion you should have referred to the 1957-58 recession versus 1987. !957-58 is more germane to the topic.

May 24, 06 - 02:31 pm Comment from: Pay Attention

The user isn't "switching to Windows;" the user is "switching windows." Both applications shown (as far as I can tell), are running in Mac OS X. This isn't about switching platforms with a smack, it's about shuffling through open windows. I think it's pretty cool!

May 24, 06 - 02:32 pm Comment from: RS

To 'Outsourced':
Why are you here?

May 24, 06 - 02:32 pm Comment from: Jooop

I wonder if he put the MacBook on that placemat so that it doesn't burn the table?

May 24, 06 - 02:33 pm Comment from: (not the OS)

it's not Windows, just windows!

May 24, 06 - 02:33 pm Comment from: j

holy shit thats awesome

May 24, 06 - 02:38 pm Comment from: matt

Thats absoltely genius!!!

May 24, 06 - 02:38 pm Comment from: Zach

Very Lame, The most stupid idea I have ever seen for computers! LAME. Uh, I would like to smack the side of my computer to change programs. Better name would be The Fonz Book. Very stupid and gay idea! (I'm from the 80's and gay had different meanings)

May 24, 06 - 02:48 pm Comment from: Tommy Boy

MacPana , it says windows not Windows™.

May 24, 06 - 02:49 pm Comment from: Jack

I did see a working voice control software, if you are working in OS X and want to switch to Windows, just say Windows. To switch back to OS X just say Mac.

May 24, 06 - 02:51 pm Comment from: iLuvMyiMac

How about a clapper - We'll call it the ClapBook

May 24, 06 - 02:56 pm Comment from: rasterbator

"Hi, my name is Outsourced, and I am a tool."

"Hi, Outsourced."

May 24, 06 - 02:56 pm Comment from: DJ

Someone please give me a real world example of how this will be useful.

May 24, 06 - 02:57 pm Comment from: Jon

There is a piece of software that will add a car alarm feature to the iBook-MacBook-PowerBook-MacBookPro, Available here

If your computer is picked up it will sound a car alarm and flash the screen, works by using the same sudden motion censor fitted within these computers as the above switching demonstration.

May 24, 06 - 02:59 pm Comment from: rasterbator

NOt really a SmackBook, more like a LightTapBook.

May 24, 06 - 03:01 pm Comment from: Thorin

DJ,

It's not.

May 24, 06 - 03:03 pm Comment from: MacMan

The icing on the cake for XP users to get Mac. Work in both at the same time. What if that's a new feature in Leopard?

May 24, 06 - 03:06 pm Comment from: Real IT guy

I think it's switching desktops using an OS X program Desktop Manager:

http://desktopmanager.berlios.de/

which lets you have multiple 'virtual desktops'.

It's my most "cannot live without this" bit of software, and is the second thing I install on my Macs after Firefox.

The programmer's probably taken Amit Singh's stuff and applied it to DM.

http://www.kernelthread.com/software/ams2hid/ams2hid.html

May 24, 06 - 03:20 pm Comment from: deedubya

Just spank it

May 24, 06 - 03:20 pm Comment from: coolfactor

Cool, a slaptop.

May 24, 06 - 03:34 pm Comment from: Grifterus

Actually, it would be cool to have Expose work on slap. Is that sensor motion a PowerBook feature, or can an iBook do the same?

In Linux and UNIX (for those who never used it), there's a virtual desktop feature. I always wanted to see it in Mac OS (I know there's a 3rd party app to do that), and that slap/swith desktop would be the ultimate!

May 24, 06 - 04:00 pm Comment from: DistantThunder

I would love to see this used to do a CR/LF in a word processor. It would be like the old typewriter days. Type, type, type... wack the side of your Mac... type, type, type.

May 24, 06 - 04:15 pm Comment from: Macaday

That's the funniest video I've seen.

It would be only marginally more funny to see Ballmers head there instead of the screen...

Oh and 'outsourced', I assume you've just lost your job and you think it's gone abroad. Bad luck, but don't go spreading your gloom like that round here, as they say laugh and the world laughs with you, cry, and you cry alone..

And here on MDN we have Ballmer, Dvorak, Thurrott and a few Windows trolls so we've got loads of laughs most days...
smile

May 24, 06 - 04:29 pm Comment from: Woweeeeeee!

Outsourced:

The fact that the 5th Avenue store has a 32 foot glass cube may grant it a little more attention than say you're local Wal-Mart's grand opening.

Wal-Mart - Putting Ma & Pa Corner store out of business since 1962.

Apple - Putting great products in hand since 1984

May 24, 06 - 04:30 pm Comment from: justified

So, Zach,

Just what WAS the meaning of "gay" in the 80s? This had better be good, because I was around in the 80s, too.

May 24, 06 - 05:25 pm Comment from: Zack

http://blog.medallia.com/2006/05/smacbook_pro.html

May 24, 06 - 06:21 pm Comment from: IsmacMactards

Beautiful---

I test my websites on multiple browsers. As opposed to spinning around to my dell or restarting in windows on my intel/mac... I just slap it.

Great time saver if it's real.

You closet tards need to grow up.

stupid f**ks

May 24, 06 - 06:26 pm Comment from: Ampar

Well, smack my butt and call me Judy. That's cool! Strange, but cool!

Ty Webb: I like you Betty.
Danny Noonan: It's Danny, sir.
Ty Webb: Danny.

May 24, 06 - 06:28 pm Comment from: Ampar

"I'm from the 80's and gay had different meanings"

Like in the Flintstones theme song? Ahhh, now I get it.

May 24, 06 - 07:50 pm Comment from: Mr. Reeee

Tres cool!

I'd love to use that to switch applications, or maybe use the virtual desktop software for swapping different work environments like this guy is doing.

This looks like fantastic shareware waiting to happen!

May 24, 06 - 08:29 pm Comment from: Ampar

The American Kennel Club has commissioned a vertical app to be developed using this amazing technology to track dogs in heat. The project code name is "Bitch Slap." It still has some rough spots.

May 24, 06 - 08:59 pm Comment from: davida

I was reading some of the reactions at youtube, and some of the posters thought it was faked, they know not the power of Apple products. With the motion detectors they can also be used as levels. check this: http://www.tuaw.com/2006/01/23/widget-watch-carpenters-level/

May 24, 06 - 10:25 pm Comment from: CaMeL tOad

It would be cool if the various Mac voices would let out sassy explicatives like...
Vicky: 'Isn't it nice to have a computer that let's you spank it!'
Fred: 'I sure like the way you slap this fancy computer!'

May 25, 06 - 01:22 am Comment from: tekgi

DistantThunder:

That's the funniest thing I have read here. Thanks. I would love to see something like that in action.

May 25, 06 - 08:31 am Comment from: Tom Cruise

You don't know the history of smackin' it, I do.

May 25, 06 - 09:34 am Comment from: BuriedCaesar

tekgi and DistantThunder:

Don't forget to include the "ding!" at the end of each line wink

May 25, 06 - 10:07 am Comment from: Mac Daddy

I think it's a clever idea as it saves fumbling around to click on a switch icon with the trackpad. I noticed that the user tapped one edge of the screen to go to Windows and the other side to switch back to OSX. My question is this: What happens if you smack the wrong edge of the screen when you are in Windows? Does it crash?

May 26, 06 - 03:07 am Comment from: Stuart

Actually Zach,

The word "gay" to mean "homosexual" started to be used in the early 20th Century and probably ealier still. A word, I might add, which was transfored by Heterosexuals to describe queers.

And I'm not particularly fond of any of those labels. Human is ok.

On Topic:

Yeah, that's actually quite a cool utility. That would be quite useful.

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