Lab+7

Lab 7

Write four paragraphs to define the term 'physical computing'

Physical computing can be defined as a means of building systems that can sense and respond the world. It can be used to understand human beings in relation to the digital world. Physical computing use tangible bits with the use of sensors to carry out a variety of tasks.

The first video displays this as the user has sensors on his finger tips. He can then move his hand in any direction and on the screen he can see what the results of his actions are. He has the ability of drawing a smiley face in mid air and seeing it appear on this screen.

Physical computing also helps in the visualization of data. Hiroshi Ishii illustrates this as he manipulated bottles to report the weather. Physical computing can be used in a variety of fields with the use of tangible bits.

Physical computing can be used a wide variety of places such as musems, science research and product design (Dan O'Sullivan, Physical Computing). A lot of products we use today were designed using physical computing such as dance dance revolution and the sony eyetoy.