SMARTBoard

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The SMARTBoard is an interactive whiteboard. It has a touch sensitive surface that controls a computer. An individual's finger becomes a mouse that controls the computer's desktop. There is a physical button on the board for a popup keyboard or a right mouse click. This product was first introduced in 1991.

1 Technology
2 Company Attitude
3 Usage
4 External link

[edit] Technology

This board is connected to a computer via a serial connection or a USB port, which allows the board to interact with the computer as both a mouse and a keyboard. The computer is then connected to either a front or rear projector and displayed on the appropriate board. The interactivity of the board is found in its touch-sensitive surface. Most come with four electronic color "markers" and an electronic eraser on a tray. Removing an object from the tray position tells the touch sensitive screen which device to use. Some people remove the device and use their fingers.

[edit] Company Attitude

The company provides several free programs. One contains a tool to synchronize the board with the computer. There is also a program to create page presentations in advance, with pictures, text and links. It allows users to have multiple pages in each document, which can be exported in many formats. This program recognizes lines in close proximity as a block/box. It can also translate a block with handwritten text via OCR to text block/box. Many other programs are compatible with SMARTBoards, including MIMIO Notebook, and Easiteach. The latter has all of the abilities of the bundled software as well as the ability of Text-to-speech recognition, while the former has an innate marker program where the user simply chooses a marker style and color, and writes with their finger. Users may also choose to write with the conventional markers that come with the SMARTBoard.

[edit] Usage

Most interactive boards will control any program loaded or available on the host computer, including marking up. These boards are used for demonstrations, meetings, classes and other places where a traditional whiteboard or flip chart information needs to be saved and/or manipulated.

This company supplies other hardware and software for sale that is geared for the classroom or presentations.