Yesterday's method only set a cookie in your browser, asking Google to serve a different page layout to you. However, this will affect other Google pages in the wrong way. Googlepedia, for example, renders a very narrow search results page.

To go back, go to your browser preferences and look for the Cookies section—this is generally under Privacy or Security. Now you have three options.

• The brute way: Delete all the cookies.
• The less-brute way: Search for your Google cookies, and delete them all.
• The picky way: Search for your Google cookies and look for this

javascript:void(document.cookie="PREF=ID=20b6e4c2f44943bb:U=4bf292d46faad806:TM=1249677602:LM=1257919388:S=odm0Ys-53ZueXfZG;path=/; domain=.google.com");

and delete it.

Once you are done, go back to Google Search and enjoy the old. [How to Try the New Google Search]

1. Go to Google.com.
2. Once it loads, enter this code into your web browser's URL address field:

javascript:void(document.cookie="PREF=ID=20b6e4c2f44943bb:U=4bf292d46faad806:TM=1249677602:LM=1257919388:S=odm0Ys-53ZueXfZG;path=/; domain=.google.com");

There shouldn't be any http://google.com in front of that. Just that code.

3. Hit enter.
4. Reload or open a new Google.com page and you will have access to the new user interface.

It's fast and sweet, although the changes don't affect all the available sections. [Thanks Matt Karolian]

Like the Google Wave-inspired interface for Gmail, the new user interface is cleaner and bolder than the current version, offering more options to the user. It may still be far from deployment, however, but it's good to see some changes after so many years of same all same all.

It takes all open webpages, applications, and widgets and organizes them in a way that you can easily flick to leaf through the selections. Actually, the more I think about it, the more it seems almost exactly like the card system. With fancy page-flip transitions in between.

Each page of the virtual book is the UI of a service or function of the handheld electronic device. Flipping the pages of the virtual book means browsing and selecting the services and functions provided by the handheld electronic device. This book-like UI enables the user to use and manage these applications, widgets, and web pages in an easy and intuitive way like browsing a conventional printed book. The book-like UI hides the differences among applications, widgets, and web pages so that the handheld electronic device can be accessed through a uniform and convenient UI.

The patent also describes a really cool rolodex-style method of browsing, where the UI collapses apps and pages towards the top and bottom of the screen while expanding the item you're looking at in the middle. Imagine (again with the Palm comparisons) the Pre's calendar, and you'll get the idea.

The Pre might already have a lot of what's described here, but I'm totally cool with HTC ripping it off. Because if anyone can knock this interface out of the park, it's HTC. [UnwiredView via Slashgear]

Offered by Hammacher Schlemmer:

This is the first voice-interactive coffee maker that asks, "Would you like to set the clock or set the coffee brewing time?" and operates in response to your verbal commands. Simply saying, "Set the coffee brewing time," or "Set the clock," will prompt the machine to reply, "Please say the time, including AM or PM." It uses an advanced voice recognition system to identify any time of day you speak, eliminating the hassle of fussing with buttons.

Sure, the one instance that you ever have to program the time on your coffee maker is a tad inconvenient, and I can appreciate the UI improvement of any gadget. But as long as we're using voice commands and $100 coffee makers, we might as well open the door for new functionality. "Brew 4 cups of coffee" or "tea earl grey hot" would both be welcome commands that could save you time and prodding on a daily basis.

Imagine if you could only tell the Enterprise to "set the clock." [Hammacher Schlemmer via CrunchGear]

* To be fair, maybe Hammacher Schlemmer just failed to mention the "make coffee" command. Even if so, the fact that you'd need to press a button to issue the order sort of negates the convenience.

Look beyond the cheesiness of the music, smug actor and his Oakley Thumps for a moment and actually examine the incredible practicality at work—highlighting/identifying parts of an engine and offering step by step instructions for completing complicated procedures. Give me a world UI like this, and I won't just change my own air filter. I'll be able to remove my own appendix.

Oh, and my brain will never memorize how to do anything ever again, but let's forget that part... [BMW via MediaIte via Jalopnik]

The Mega is based on Windows Mobile 6.5 and looks somewhat average, especially when compared to the upcoming Omnia II and its AMOLED screen (also based on Win Mobile 6.5). As BGR notes, however, the Mega is only a mid-range phone, and the UI could see things kicked up a bit when applied to higher end models in the future.

The Sense UI is represented here as well. Just in case you missed it, Sense is the Android interface overhaul that HTC debuted on the Hero back in June. True to their word, the UI—sorry, "design philosophy"—is being deployed on each of its phones going forward. [ai.rs via BGR]

The homescreen looks pretty good, with HTC's trademark flipping clock (although the skinned clock doesn't actuall flip), weather, and three customizable apps, with the icon for the sliding app tray just to the right. The dialer is also skinned, with the fat-finger-friendly Android number keys, but that's mostly it—the apps themselves aren't skinned, and neither is the list of apps. But it'll definitely give a fresh coat of paint to the iPhone if you're tired of the homescreen, as long as you don't expect the iPhone UI to be as totally changed by Sense as Android's was. [Redmond Pie via Engadget]

As we all know by now, the browser got some good press on Friday, when CNET gushed over how well it did what browsers do. Our own Zune HD hands on a while back was impressive too.

Microsoft's Very Big Deal for the holiday season, indeed. [YouTube - Thanks, Alf]

We all know Snow Leopard was designed for speed and stability rather than a UI upgrade, but that doesn't mean Apple won't include a whole bunch of tweaks at the same time. Ars Technica has spotted a few in a new test build of the OS. For one, the right-click menus in dock items is changed to a white text on black background, as in Stacks, rather than the staid black-on-white it is now. It's not a big deal, for sure, but we wonder if it means there'll be a bunch more tweaks for the sake of consistency. There are three months left until Snow Leopard's September release date, so who knows what Apple can bang out before then. [Ars Technica]

The idea, of course, is to use wearable electronics to control the UI across a range of gadgets—but I'll be dammed if I need to wear a glove or some sort of band aid to control my devices. It's just not practical. On the other hand, glasses or a ring might be ok, because these are things you might wear all the time. [Unwired View]

[Meizu via Meizu Me via Engadget

The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.
The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.
The image associated with this post is best viewed using a browser.

Billed as an "intelligent, multi-user Touchwall" the kit, made by Schematic, uses their previous multitouch panels to create a surface which can be used by multiple people.

It is being used for the first time at an advertising festival in Cannes, where it can recognize attendees by their RFID badges and offers them a personalized workspace wherever they happen to be standing. It also displays relevant info, such as 3D maps of where they need to go and features a built in social network element for users to leave each other messages.

But the special thing about the Touchwall is its multi-user capabilities where people can work side by side and even share information. [BoingBoingGadgets]

Is it a matter of preference and practice? Yes, but no.

Think about it. The distance it takes to move your hand from the QWERTY to the trackpad, usually below the spacebar, is much closer than the distance it takes to drop your hand on a mouse, reorientate your arm/wrist and fingers into place. And a trackpad's control scheme uses a finger, which has a lot more dexterity than an arm/wrist you use when handling a mouse. Also, the future is multitouch trackpads. No other control scheme can match the potential of pinching/scrolling with multiple fingers, zooming, etc.

The touchpad is also a really natural movement, practiced by everyone since childhood days of drawing in the sand on the beach, or fingerpainting. The only more natural movement is to trace movement on an actual screen, but any screen we use in a non mobile environment is too big and vertical to do this easily on, for extended periods of time. Besides, the touchpad itself would work great with a secondary LCD display under it, making it essentially, a touchpad.

So, here's to a future where the trackpad is everywhere. I look forward to it.

[SanwaNexus404, AdessoNexus404, Adesso2Nexus404, DinovoGiz, KeysonicKustomPC, SandbergTechhook, Adesso3Pcrush, MCEallproducts, McsaiteGeekalaert, TruFormProKeyboardco, ToshibaOverclockers, iKeyGadgetadvisor, iKey2Geekwithlaptop, FentexMiniGeekwithlaptop, EeeKeyboardDeviceDaily, LogitechHomeTheaterDialectical, special thanks to Quinton Ma for researching the models in this gallery.]

I'll keep the spoilery bits to the minimum.

The two shots here with Marcus are snagged from the trailer. They're from the most ludicrous scene in the movie—which is ludicrous for many, many reasons—where Marcus strolls into the central Skynet control center. The white, glossy room—the standard motif for the heart of the machine—hosts a computer system with an advanced user interface (a lot like Iron Man's) displayed on massive glass monitors. Which makes no sense whatsoever.

Why the hell would Skynet's control room be designed with an ultra-polished user interface for people to use? Or have a comfy chair for Marcus to hurl at the computer? They're machines! Even though some of them are built to mimic poeple, they don't need multi-touch, superslick graphics, floating heads to explain the entire plot or monitors the size of a wall like meatbag people do. They can just plug in, or as seen in the movie, sync via the optical terminal Marcus and other terminators use, which actually makes sense. Or communicate wirelessly. In binary. Or whatever.

You could argue, I suppose, that the entire setup was constructed just for Marcus—it has to have been built after Judgment Day, since the rest of the city is ruins—but even the prison blocks are designed with interfaces for humans to interact with. Wouldn't Skynet want to make it as hard as possible for people to figure out how talk to machines, so John Connor can't hack them in 30 seconds with his Sony Vaio?

Skynet's not as advanced as The Matrix, sure, but you'd think it'd realize designing and building things around people paradigms is pointless and inefficient, since um, there shouldn't be any people around. That's one thing The Matrix gets more right than Salvation: The machine world, architected and built by machines—who are slavishly devoted to logic and efficiency—would be just for machines. Not people.

I know on one level it's stupid to complain about things that don't make sense in a science fiction movie, but added on top of everything else going on in Terminator: Salvation, it's one of the major points that shit all over my suspension of disbelief. [Giz's Terminator: Salavation Review]

From his mouth:

The reason why we couldn't complete the interface on Windows Mobile 6.5 is because of time. We only spend what, eight months, nine months, to build 6.5 from ground up and it's actually an amazing engineering feat. But, in order to do that, we had to do some prioritization and we had to cut certain features. Eventually, we will make sure that the UI capabilities are carried out throughout the whole platform.

It's a revealing, slightly embarrassing mea culpa, and an honest one. Wherever new interface features have been implemented in 6.5, they work fairly well, but massive parts of the OS still looks and operate like they did in 6.1, such that 6.5 feels more like an interface add-on than an actual OS upgrade.

But hey, points for honesty! And maybe, just maybe, Tan's "eventually" means "before 6.5 ships."

UPDATED: The WinMo dev team has responded in the comments. Basically, 6.5 is "finished" in the sense that interface changes won't reach much deeper than we've already seen. One thing: the above screenshots show an early build of the OS, and the Honeycomb looks a bit different now. The response:

You guys never seize to surprise us with your titles! :)

The WM6.5 UI that we planned to build is complete, not half-assed as reported. The original question was why we couldn't persist our new "chrome"/UI across all UI elements like settings etc. Because of time, we decided to prioritize the more important UI elements first and made sure they were revamped like the home screen, today screen and start menu. We also have more finger friendly controls that persists throughout all applications.

The screenshots you posted above are from an older beta build anyway, I'm sure there are screenshots of the RTM build floating on the net somewhere that you can look at. Just looking at screenshots also doesn't do it justice as it has fluid animations that elevates the experience.

[ArsTechnica]

A team from RWTH Aachen University in Germany and UC San Diego have been working together to develop Silicone Illuminated Active Peripherals, or "SLAP Widgets" to bring physical controls to multitouch in the form of plastic and silicone objects. It's kind of a middle ground between physical and virtual devices.

SLAP widgets are transparent. This means we can always show the current labeling using the table's rear projection underneath the widget. For example, we can change the labels on our keyboard from normal characters to shortcut commands when the modifier key is held down. This makes it easier to use command shortcuts and other special keyboard mappings.

Each SLAP widget, like a keypad for example, has visual markers on its bottom side. When put onto a table, the markers are registered by the table using a technique called Diffuse Illumination, or DI.

When SLAP widgets are pressed like for example the keypad, keyboard, and knob, however, there is no additional marker to detect. Instead, a different technique called FTIR, or frustrated total internal reflection, is used: IR light fed sideways into the tabletop stays inside the acrylic surface until disturbed by touch. The camera beneath the table detects the point of touch from the scattered IR light.

As you will see in the video from the project webpage, the technology is pretty damn cool—although, to me, having actual, physical peripherals in any form still seems like a step backwards. [Project Page via Core77]

There were apparently over 400 concept sketches shown off at the MIX conference, an event for developers where Microsoft spoke on the development process for Windows 7.

Bat Signal was a taskbar thumbnail preview that projected the window you mouse-hovered over up onto the desktop like a spotlight. Aero Peek, as you may know, now just pops up directly above the taskbar, with a much smaller thumbnail.Another feature, Aladdin, was the inspiration for Aero Shake, and essentially let you preview a background window by rubbing it with the mouse cursor.

There were other tweaks made as well, like scrapping thumbnails in the taskbar how they finally decided to make Jump Lists a right click function (they conducted user testing). It's a pretty neat article, all in all, and you should check it out at [TechRadar via Neowin]

Here's a sampling of user interfaces across compact cameras from every major digital camera maker: Canon, Nikon, Sony, Panasonic, Casio, Olympus and Fujifilm. User interfaces matter in these cameras more than ever because they're increasingly the major way you drill down to change settings or switch modes—rather than manually cranking a dial, like on a pro DSLR. Some are pretty good (Canon, Samsung) while some are pretty bad (Casio).

The better ones tend to use a list or grid style, where everything is clearly laid out and easy to access, and more UIs seem to be trending toward the branching list model—when you highlight something, you can see its parameters underneath it. Fonts are rough on some but clearly polished on others. This is a make-or-break issue, since quick visibility is key when you shift from a button UI, or a visual one that only relies on icons.

Canon actually now has two sets of user interfaces: The old one you're used to if you've used Canon lately, and a totally new one that they're rolling out on two of their new cameras. It's slicker, with pop out animations and a more modern font, but I think a bit more confusing since it doesn't show you everything at once. It uses a list style for displaying settings. Once you get the hang of it, though, it's a solid UI.

Nikon has a few different UIs, but the style isn't even consistent within one camera. Oddly, its touchscreen camera shares its ugly UI with some of their other cameras, with few, if any tweaks to make it touch-friendly. It's only Nikon's second-gen touch camera, but its meh UI stands in contrast to the pretty capable one on their DSLRs.

Sony, too, uses the same UI on their touchscreens as they do on their non-touchscreen cameras. It works about as well in touch as it does on non-touch cameras—which is better than Nikon's I feel, since it uses a cross bar type of GUI that Sony's good at. Maybe slightly bigger buttons would help. Overall, Sony's is one of the nicer camera UIs—not terribly confusing.

Too much stuff happens on the back of their cameras, but Panasonic's touch UI seems 'specially designed for fingers, with big, finger-friendly options. (I didn't notice it on their other cams, so I think it was just for the touch FX580, but I could be wrong.) Their standard non-touch UI isn't too bad—I'd put it in the middle of the pack.

Olympus goes with a unique icon style, but it's pretty confusing in terms of trying to get to stuff quickly or navigate backwards and forwards, since you don't know what becomes before or after something in the hierarchy, conceptually speaking. That said, it looks better than the messy menu on the back of their latest DSLR.

Casio has the worst UI out of any camera I checked out. It's cluttered, tiny, ugly and every other sin in the book.

Basic, boring, not particularly helpful.

I mentioned how much I liked Samsung's list UI on the TL320 earlier. It's straightforward, easy to navigate and looks pretty good. When you highlight something, its sub-settings pop up as a list on the right, so you know what you'll be adjusting when you drill down a level. Their other UI isn't quite as good, but it's also fairly straightforward, if slightly more cluttered.

Here are all the touch UIs together. You'd think Panasonic's was the best, except it's wildly inconsistent about when you can touch a menu item and when you can't. So Sony wins by a nose. Weird, Sony winning a UI battle, I know. Nikon's touch interface is just too grotesque to be considered.

Camera UIs can definitely get better, and really need to, because it's clear that the feature-bloat train isn't going to slow down anytime soon. But it's a tricky balance: How do you simplify a user interface for quick, easy access to functions while containing the smorgasbord of new features crammed into every generation of cameras? Can you even make a truly usable touch camera? Uneasy questions without easy answers.

PMA is an annual show where we get to see tomorrow's digital cameras—the ones that'll be populating pockets and purses for the rest of the year.

The concept, which gives traditionally flat interface elements a very convincing sense of depth and layering, relies on eyetracking and TAT's in-house 3D engine, which renders in real time in the video. This isn't your dad's eyetracking, which analyzes your eyeballs for control cues—no, it really just uses your eyes' locations, along with the orientation of the device, as part of the perspective equation that creates a convincing 3D effect.

We most often recognize TAT for wild concepts that will probably never come to pass—their rejected Android interfaces, their amazingly cool 3D cellphone interface—but this one, or something like it, could look fantastic while actually improving user experiences, not impeding them. [TAT]