Microsoft’s Techfest conference is happening this week, providing the company with an opportunity to present its view of the future and showcase some of the innovations that its researchers have come up with. Each year, Microsoft Research scientists from across the globe gather to display and discuss their latest projects.
Topics on the agenda at this year’s event include Big Data and more
natural interfaces. One project that looks particularly interesting from an AV perspective is Telling
Stories with Data via Freeform Sketching.
SketchInsight, a tool that is the centrepiece of
the project, was developed at Microsoft Research Redmond by a team led by Bongshin
Lee, a researcher in the Computational User Experiences Group.
SketchInsight takes advantage of
advances in input technologies such as text recognition, gesture recognition, and pen-and-touch displays to
create a “smart†whiteboard. When a team member starts to sketch something such as
a chart or a diagram, SketchInsight pulls information from an existing data set, such
as an Excel spreadsheet, determines what the goal is, and retrieves real data to complete the drawing.