To most of us, the mouse and the keyboard are integral to the overall operation of a computer system. In fact, as I sit here typing this entry, I couldn’t think of another way of doing it that would seem natural. However, with new technologies hitting the market every single day and with computer manufacturers the world over becoming enamoured with those technologies, we could very well be heading into an era where the mouse and keyboard become irrelevant to our everyday use of a computer.

Case in point of this phenomenon is the Microsoft Surface computer. As the name might imply, rather than being something that sits on a desk and is in multiple parts for you to put together and use, the Microsoft Surface computer is rather just a surface. You put it on your desk and you use it much in the same way that you would use a surface table. You can draw on it with pens, manipulate it with your fingers or simply have multiple people interact with it directly through the use of their digits in order to make the same things happen that you can do today with the computer you currently have.

Of course, this is all made possible through the Multitouch technology that allows a level of direct interaction with a particular piece of technology that has not been experienced before and very likely is just the starting point to more and more interaction that will put things like separate computer towers, keyboards, mice and speakers in museums as relics of an older time not too far in the future!