As you've been able to see up until now, the topic of the Microsoft's Kinect for Xbox 360 motion controller being hacked only a couple of days after its official market release has been a pretty hot one, not necessarily for its current practical applications, but mostly due to the fact that it opens up a whole new world filled with exciting possibilities.
And now, it would seem that things are going to get even hotter, at least for a certain specific category of users, since the open-source driver (called libfreenect and developed by Hector Martin) has also been ported to the Mac OS X operating system by a intrepid fellow called Theo Watson.
Mr. Watson has also posted a quick video (that you'll be able to watch at the end of the article) describing his exploits with Microsoft's motion controller, and actually showing the Kinect working fairly OK when connected to the MacBook portable computing system.
Of course, the level of functionality is not perfect, with some flickering going on due to some problems with the transfer rate caused by a certain incompatibility between the USB port on the Mac and the driver (nothing Mr. Watson can't handle, though).
In terms of usability, we can't say that there's anything particular special or spectacular about this port, the multi-touch hack we've talked about earlier being a lot more impressive.
In fact, much as in the case of the Windows and Linux hacks, we're talking mostly about a proof of concept here, somebody that wanted to show that it can be done.
Of course, only time will tell what the possible applications the Kinect (locked or hacked) might have in the real world, even when paired with Apple computers, but we certainly hope that we'll get to find out more on this topic as soon as possible.
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