Lecture Series

New Directions in Humanities Research, 05-06

1:00 p.m. Wednesday January 25 - Board Room

Julian Lombardi Office of Information Technology, Duke University
presenting
Croquet
A new operating system and user interface supporting deep collaboration

Croquet is an integrated 2D and 3D interface that allows for co-creativity, knowledge sharing, and deep social presence among large numbers of people. Croquet poses the question, "What if we could go back twenty years and re-work the user interface to match the technology that we have today?" Technologies have advanced rapidly since then and yet our user interfaces are still based on the metaphor of the desktop and the page. They are nothing more than document viewers--documents that are shuffled around on a desktop. Croquet proposes a collaborative environment that uses the classroom and the laboratory and the campus as metaphors instead.

Dr. Julian Lombardi is a former biology professor, author, and award-winning software designer. In 1999, he founded ViOS, Inc. where he served first as CEO and then Chief Creative Officer/Chief Software Architect. In 2000, Dr. Lombardi was the subject of a feature article in Success Magazine, was identified as one of the nation's "Thought Leaders" in information technology by Access Magazine Online and the ViOS product won Best of Show at the Upside Magazine's prestigious Launch! event. At Duke, Lombardi is responsible for leading the university's academic and research computing efforts.
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