There is no shortage of iPhone dialers. Most work by voice, some by tapping a picture of your contact. Now we get Sensi Dial, [App Store link] an iPhone program that uses gestures to dial your contacts. Gestures? Yep. The idea is with gestures you don't have to look at your phone to reach a contact. Gestures can be taps on the screen or swipes, or a combination of both. You open Sensi Dial, and add the contacts from your address book that you want to assign gestures to. Then save them, and tap the dial button. Use the gesture you assigned to a particular contact, and it gets dialed. You can program in a pause so you have time to bail out of a mistake. If the program isn't sure which contact you mean, it will display multiple contacts and let you tap on the right one.

It's an interesting idea, and the program selling point is that you don't have to look at your screen, which is nice for driving. The reality is that you may have to look at the screen to pick the correct contact if there are multiples, and at least take a glance to see if your phone is calling the right person. As you feel more secure with the program, you may not have to look as much.

I gave Sensi Dial a try, and it pretty much worked as advertised. The tricky part is remembering the gestures you assigned to a person. I wouldn't think you would want a big list of contacts assigned to this app, or you may be swiping when you mean to tap or the other way around. On the screen shot you can see that the third number on the list is composed of two taps, two swipes, and a tap. You can either remember that combination, or just make 2 taps and see all the contacts that start that way. To clear the contacts and start over you shake your phone.

Reviews of the program from users are generally enthusiastic, although the developer is offering a free copy to buyers who write a review for the app store. That might be putting the old thumb on the scale a bit.

Sensi Dial is certainly an alternative way to make a call. It's $1.99US at the App Store. Think about if this kind of method works for you, and be sure to investigate the other dialers available. I think there are at least ten, most using voice. If gestures seems the way to go for your particular use, tap and swipe away.

Oh, the one-button mouse. You either love it or you hate it. Veteran Mac users adore the elegance and simplicity; switchers bemoan the loss of a second (or third) mouse button. Of course, the problem is easily fixed by either holding down the Control button or -- wait for it -- buying a two-button mouse.

On a laptop, you've got another option. MacSupport points out this simple method of using a "two-finger tap" in place of a right click. To set things up, follow these steps.

In the Keyboard & Mouse preference pane, select "Trackpad Gestures" under the Trackpad section. From there, select "Tap trackpad using two fingers for secondary click" and you're all set. Now, tapping the trackpad with two fingers will execute a right click.

I'm not a trackpad fan, but I will admit that gestures are cool. Ivan at Creative Bits has identified the gestures available in Photoshop, including

• Alt (Option) key + double finger track to zoom and out within a document
• Hold the Apple (Cmd) key to zoom the whole screen

There's more, of course, and you can read the full list here. We recently wrote about some fun you can have using trackpad gestures to zoom and pan images in a Quick Look window.

Ivan also wishes for user-defined gestures, something that only seems logical for Apple to implement.

What's on your "Gestures Wish List?"

Gus Mueller of Flying Meat software, maker of popular apps like VoodooPad and FlySketch, has decided to reduce FlyGesture's price to free. For those who haven't seen it: FlyGesture enables your Mac with the power to open files, run Automator apps/AppleScripts, type text and more - all with the gesture of your mouse over FlyGesture's guide layer that you can toggle like Exposé and Dashboard.

For anyone who made a FlyGesture purchase within the last 60 days, Mueller has issued a refund.

Maybe the tech of CSI isn't so ridiculous after all. With the rumors of an Apple tablet and "gestures" in mind, check out this video. It's a demo of what appears to be a gesture and touch-based UI that is impressive to say the least. Don't miss the manipulation of photos (they appear to be spread out on a table, and the user easily enlarges the photo he's interested it) and the navigation of the map of Boston. This is really cool stuff. Incidentally, the software that is used to manipulate the flat rabbit and cactus characters can be found here.

So, who wants an Apple tablet that does this? I do.

Note: The server originally linked has been brought to its knees. Scroll down a bit in the comments of this Digg post and you'll find a mirror.

Here's the rumor that won't go away. Unites States Patent Application #20060026536 (which features the signature of Jonathan Ive) concerns "...Methods and systems for processing touch inputs are disclosed. The invention in one respect includes reading data from a multipoint sensing device such as a multipoint touch screen..." Is an Apple tablet in the works (yes, I'm bringing that up again)? Hrmph! even has a very nice round-up of images related to using "gestures" with a touchscreen-based user interface. Note the iPod-like scroll wheel in Fig. 27D.

Seriously, though, who would you trust to deliver a tablet PC that's both beautiful and useful? Mr. Ive and Apple, that's who. I'm keeping my fingers crossed for this one.

[Via Engadget]