The Apple iPhone is certianly grabbing the headlines and wide market interest, and a key factor in that is its multi-touch screen technology.
But how far does really close the gap between smartphones and mobile computers. Can it enable handsets to perform most daily tasks as easily as a laptop computer, asks Guillaume Largillier, co-founder and chief strategy officer of French company Stantum Technologies.
Speaking 
at the recent SID Mobile Displays Conference in San Diego, Largillier said, "Zooming in and out with two fingers is definitely smart. But what's beyond the smartness?”
Largillier said the iPhone has definitely promoted touch-display technologies by showing how much more they offer than a 10-digit keypad. But he believes the challenge now is to develop a more efficient user interface for mobile computers.
"With smartphones, you can organise your calendar 
or your address book, but not as easily as you can on your laptop. Smartphone interfaces are still not suited for the more complex operations, such as taking notes in real-time, editing documents, or gaming,” said Largillier.
Also, moving from one application to the other is not always simple on a handset.
According to Largillier, multi-touch opens up a wide field of possibilities if it leverages the user's capacity to split tasks between the two hands.
"To enable this, touch-panels must allow true unlimited multi-touch, with accurate coordinates of each contact point; be able to detect fingers and styli; and offer a resolution as high as 0.2mm and a time response as fast as 10 milliseconds," said Largillier.