response to pressure on graphics tablets in onenote

[Julian Haeger]

Hi all.
Im looking at getting a graphics tablet for marking up, sketching and the
like in onenote. The tablet I am looking at (Aiptek) has a pressure sensitve
stylus, as I beleive they all do, but I was wondering whether onenote will be
able to use the pressure data. I know there is an option in the menu about
recording the pressure of pen strokes, but I was wondering if this will work
with an external tablet, or only a tablet pc one. I guess basically my
question boils down into the more fundamental question 'to what extent does
onenote see an external graphics tablet as a graphics tablet? Does it
recognise it has pressure and the like, or just see it as a mouse?'
Incidentally I know it doesnt see it exactly the same as a tablet pc screen
digitizer due to sample rates and what not. Ive also read enough to know that
those who you graphics tablets will probably read this and tell me I NEED a
wacom - I know there better, but im a student, I dont have the money for a
pro graphics tablet just for use in onenote and the occasional dabble in
graphics.

Any help appreciated.

Julian.

 

[Erik Sojka (MVP)]

If there are windows drivers for an external tablet, OneNote will
recognize it as a mouse.

Any data input using an external tablet will only be treated by OneNote
as a picture. You will not be able to do handwriting recognition nor
have what you "write" indexed or searcheable.

Those features are only available when used on a Tablet PC.

 

[James Gockel]

So basically Julian yes you can draw into one note but you wont get text.
I will recommend a wacom tablet also they aren't too expensive. but as a
student myself I suggest a Tablet pc!Good luck!

 

[Julian Haeger]

Thats a pity. I understand that onenote cannot do the handwriting recognition
on the ink becuase the sample rate on the external hardware is insufficient -
thats fair enough. But it would be nice if onenote could accept the pressure
data as a graphics aplication would. That said, im asking this on an
assumption... Ive seen some peoples ink which is kind of uniform thickness,
and others which tails off at the end of each character, my assumption is
that this is the effect of having the pressure sensitivity enabled, which is
why I am asking if it could be done with an external tab, as ink looks much
nicer when it tails off. If thats not anything to do with pressure
sensitivity, then Im not fussed whether onenote can receive pressure data
from external tablets.

Not really understanding how drivers work, I assume that if graphics
programs can use pressure data from an external graphics tab, then the data
is available, and if onenote doesnt use it, presumably thats the developers
decision rather than the drivers limitations right?

Thanks for your quick reply btw.

Julian

 

[Erik Sojka (MVP)]

I don't have an external tablet on which to test, but IIRC, the pressure
sensitivity data is among the huge boatloads of metadata which the Ink
API (again, only available on a Tablet) provides to a developer. If a
normal mouse driver doesn't know about pressure sensitivity, then I can't
imagine that OneNote will know about this metadata. Sorry.

Having said that, hopefully someone here who has an external tablet can
test and confirm either way.

 

[Chris H.]

As Erik has said, there's a great deal of difference in quality between a
writing pad (normally at regular mouse speed) and the digitizer system on a
Tablet PC (three or more times as fast than a mouse input). The digitizer
samples up to 130 "pen events" - units of motion that correspond to data
points - per second. The user experience on a Tablet PC is much enhanced,
which is why OneNote was designed to take advantage of the digital Ink.
--
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/expertzone/meetexperts/nichol.mspx
In memory of a true friend, Windows MVP Alex Nichol

Chris H.
Microsoft Windows MVP/Tablet PC
Tablet Creations - http://nicecreations.us/
Associate Expert
Expert Zone -