| Developer(s) | Smart Technologies |
|---|---|
| Initial release | 1991 |
| Stable release | SB685ix / 2010 |
| Operating system | Microsoft Windows, Mac OS, limited Linux |
| Website | http://www.smarttech.com/smartboard |
Smart Board is a series of interactive whiteboards developed by Smart Technologies and includes the 600 series, the 800 series and the 400 series (only available in Europe, the Middle East, Africa, Asia Pacific, Latin America and Mexico). The first Smart Board interactive whiteboard was introduced in 1991. Often used as a genericized trademark for other interactive whiteboards, "Smart Board" is owned and used as a trademark by Smart Technologies.
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The Smart Board is an interactive whiteboard that uses touch detection for user input – e.g. scrolling, right mouse-click – in the same way normal PC input devices, such as a mouse or keyboard, detect input. A projector is used to display a computer's video output on the interactive whiteboard, which then acts as a large touch screen. The Smart Board interactive whiteboard typically comes with four pens, which use digital ink and replace traditional whiteboard markers. Most Smart Board interactive whiteboards register only one touch at a time however, in June 2009, Smart Technologies introduced their first dual-touch interactive whiteboard.[1] The dual-touch Smart Board interactive whiteboard accepts two simultaneous touches; however, the touches only register on two separate sides of the interactive whiteboard surface.
In October 2010, Smart Technologies introduced the Smart Board 800 series interactive whiteboard,[2] a line of multitouch, multiuser interactive whiteboards. The 800 series, which includes the 880 and the 885, supports multitouch and multiwrite anywhere on the interactive whiteboard surface, unlike the dual-touch interactive whiteboard, which can only support two simultaneous touches on different halves of the interactive surface. Unlike the previous generations, the Smart Board 800 series interactive whiteboard comes with only two pens. Users can select the ink color they want to use - red, blue, green or black - by pressing the corresponding button on the pen tray. Multiple users cannot write in different colored ink at the same time. The 800 series also supports common multitouch gestures, like those found on the Apple iPod Touch or iPad, including pinch, toss, flick and scroll.[2]
In December 2010, Smart introduced the lower cost Smart Board 400 series interactive whiteboard[3] which only available in Europe, the Middle East, Africa, Asia Pacific, Latin America, Mexico and parts of North America.
The Smart Board interactive whiteboard operates as part of a system that includes the interactive whiteboard, a computer, a projector and white boarding software called Smart Notebook collaborative learning software. The components are connected wirelessly, via USB or serial cables. A projector connected to the computer displays the computer's desktop image on the interactive whiteboard. The interactive whiteboard accepts touch input from a finger, pen or other solid object. Each contact with the Smart Board interactive whiteboard is interpreted as a left-click from the mouse. Smart Board interactive whiteboards are also available as a front-projection flat-panel display – interactive surfaces that fit over plasma or LCD display panels.[4]
The Smart Board interactive whiteboard uses DViT (Digital Vision Touch) technology[5][6][7] to detect and respond to touch interactions on the interactive whiteboard surface. This camera-based touch technology for interactive whiteboards and interactive displays uses digital cameras and proprietary software and firmware to detect finger or pen contact with the screen. That contact is then interpreted as finger or pen activity. Smart has been using DViT technology in its interactive whiteboards since they developed the technology in 2003[8] and has continued to use DViT in many products since, including Smart Board interactive whiteboards, Smart Board interactive displays and the Smart Table interactive learning center.
Smart's digital ink operates by using an active digitizer that controls the PC input for writing capabilities such as drawing or handwriting. The Smart Board interactive whiteboard uses passive pen tools, which means that no technology is housed in the pen tool to use digital ink or determine color. All digital ink options can be selected from the Smart Board Pen Tray.
Most models of Smart Board include a pen tray on the front of the interactive whiteboard that holds two to four plastic pen tools and an eraser. The pen tools have neither electronic components nor ink - the technology is in the pen tray. When a pen tool is removed from its slot in the tray, an optical sensor recognizes its absence. Smart Board software processes the next contact with the interactive whiteboard surface as a pen action from the pen tool that resides in the corresponding slot. Older models of the Smart Board interactive whiteboard features slots for black, blue, red and green pen tools, although a control panel can be used to change the color of the digital ink or change the pen tools to colored highlighters.
Once a pen tool is removed from its slot, users can write in the selected color with that pen tool, a finger or any other object. Similarly, when the eraser is removed from its position in the pen tray, the software processes the next contact with the screen as an erasing action, whether the contact is from the eraser, the user’s finger or another object. As such, the potential exists that using a particular pen, such as the blue pen, may not result in blue digital ink if all objects – colored pens and eraser tool – have not been replaced in their corresponding locations on the pen tray. The Smart Board also registers the last pen tray tool picked up as the active tool. This means that when a user picks up the black pen and then picks up the red pen before putting the black pen down, the interactive whiteboard will register red ink, rather than black. In order to write in black digital ink, a pen needs to be put back in the red slot.
The Smart Board 800 series interactive whiteboard has only two pens and the color is determined by pressing a black, blue, red or green button found on the pen tray.
Below the pen tray are two buttons that, when pressed, allow the user to do right click functions such as copy, cut, paste, select all, etc., or bring-up a traditional on-screen QWERTY keyboard, which allows the user to type in letters, words or numbers. These keys also, when pressed, allow you to calibrate the touch screen. Other models, such as the Smart Board interactive display, include a black pencil tool which incorporates a digital ink eraser. Unlike the Smart Board, the interactive display models use active pen technology.
The earlier Smart Board 600 series interactive whiteboards use resistive technology. A flexible plastic front sheet and hard backboard are coated with a thin resistive film. The resistive sides of each are separated by an air gap of two-thousandths of an inch, or about the width of two human hairs. Pressure applied to the surface of the front sheet closes the gap and is registered as a contact point. This contact point is then converted from an analog signal to a serial data stream which is sent to a computer for further processing. This technology can process contact from a finger, pen tool or any device – such as a pointer.
Smart Notebook collaborative learning software is included with all Smart Board interactive whiteboards and all other Smart hardware products. The software is available for the Windows, Mac and Linux operating systems.[9] Smart Notebook software is a content delivery platform, similar in style to Microsoft PowerPoint, that includes images, animations, templates, manipulatives and other tools for building lesson activities and presentations. Some combinations of operating systems and Notebook does not work well and the supplier advice to downgrade to XP. Also some combinations of Notebook versions and OpenOffice will make the PC unstable.
Other Smart software that is designed to work on the Smart Board includes:
The interactive nature of the Smart Board provides many practical uses for the classroom. Using Smart Notebook software, teachers can record each step of a lesson activity for students to review at a later time.
In Datacloud: Toward a New Theory of Online Work, Johndan Johnson-Eilola describes a specific computer-supported space for collaboration: the Smart Board. According to Johnson-Eilola, a “Smart Board [interactive whiteboard] system provides an... intelligent whiteboard surface for work” (79). Johnson-Eilola asserts that “[w]e are attempting to understand how users move within information spaces, how users can exist within information spaces rather than merely gaze at them, and how information spaces must be shared with others rather than being private, lived within rather than simply visited” (82). He explains how the Smart Board interactive whiteboard system offers an information space that allows his students to engage in active collaboration. He makes three distinct claims regarding the functionality of the technology: 1) the Smart Board allows users to work with large amounts of information, 2) it offers an information space that invites active collaboration, and 3) the work produced is often “dynamic and contingent” (82).[10]
Users have the opportunity to engage with the technology by direct manipulation. Moreover, this space allows for more than one user; essentially, it invites multiple users.[10]
The Smart Board interactive whiteboard works with any program loaded or available on the host computer. Some applications commonly used with the Smart Board are Microsoft PowerPoint, Excel, Word, and AutoCAD.
Uses for the Smart Board include teaching,[11] training, conducting meetings, and delivering presentations. It has also been used on the Discovery Channel television show MythBusters.
Many companies have since developed products that either support Smart Boards or compete with Smart Boards using similar technologies. As with any famous product, a brand name can be mis-applied to its competitors. An example of a company that has developed supporting products for Smart Boards is Copernicus Educational Products. Examples of companies that have developed similar products are Promethean and Mimio.