Tactus™ is an interactive, multi-layered touch screen application which utilizes the proven foundation of the WebTAS framework, coupled with affordable display solutions, and multi-touch applications.
The Tactus Story
Tactus was conceived as the result of an earlier project that involved driving WebTAS middleware data into Google Earth for 3-D map visualization, on a touch-sensitive monitor. Even though this initial ISS effort was pioneering in terms of capabilities, the resulting solution was extremely expensive.
So, ISS knew it had a challenge: develop a completely new touch-enabled application at a fraction of the cost. ISS engineers knew that they had the expertise to develop a touch-sensitive, geospatially-focused Flex application, that Windows 7 supported multi-touch applications natively, and that the prices of touch-sensitive monitors were coming down to commodity, off-the-shelf levels. Within 30 days and for less than a third of the price of a single monitor used in the previously mentioned project, ISS was able to produce a prototype, lightweight, multi-touch-enabled application. The selected demonstration hardware was two, 23" multitouch monitors, and a single, 42" multitouch monitor, all purchased at low cost.
ISS successfully proved the concept that by combining the proven, foundational WebTAS framework with affordable display solutions, multitouch applications were not only possible, but completely practical and capable in today's environment.
TouchFiltering Creates a Tailored View of Data
In addition to the touch-sensitive geospatial navigation capabilities that smart phone users now take for granted, ISS engineers created the truly innovative concept of TouchFiltering™. TouchFiltering allows a user to influence the information presented in visualizations by simply touching certain filter elements. As the user touches these elements, the visualized data is isolated, making tailored data access incredibly simple.
Even more unique is the concept of multidimensional TouchFiltering. This feature allows users to touch two or more filter elements and isolate data on multiple levels. For example, one set of filter elements could be categorically-focused, while the second is temporally-focused. Touching one of each of these elements would isolate data based on categorical and temporal aspects simultaneously, providing a rich data filter mechanism that has never been engineered in such a simple, intuitive way. The Tactus prototype is an example of the human-machine interface at it's finest.
Whiteboarding with Tactus
Useful whiteboarding capabilities are almost completely non-existent within current government analytical systems. ISS engineers recognized this gap and its relevance to geo-temporal displays, and integrated a simple, yet powerful, whiteboarding capability directly into the map visualization of Tactus. The user simply chooses a color from a palate and draws free-form lines directly onto the map and associated data elements. The resolution of the whiteboard is high enough to provide the precision necessary for drawing legible text as well. Integrated into the whiteboard is a distance tool that provides a continually updating display of the distance between the position at the beginning of a line and the currently touched position. This distance can be presented in a variety of distance measurement systems including kilometers, nautical miles, and others.
The Tactus prototype application demonstrates expertise and breadth of knowledge with regard to advanced, Web 2.0 technologies. This ability to rapidly prototype and integrate innovative, yet cost effective solutions is a key differentiator for ISS.
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