Apple is yet to introduce touchscreen displays into its PCs and seem to be undeterred that other manufacturers have been making touchscreen laptops for years. Although if Apple integrates its iOS apps to its Mac lineup its stance that touch panels are for phone and tablets alone might change.
But prior to the time Apple decides to have a change of heart, you can hack touch screen functionality onto a MacBook. The Project Sistine method saves you $98 you'd spend on getting a third party gadget like the $99 AirBar. You could add a touch functionality to a MacBook with just about $1 worth of hardware with the Project Sistine method.
The technology used to achieve the touch screen is based on a simple physical principle — By mounting a mirror over a laptop’s webcam, you view it from a sharp angle and then you’re able to see objects close to the screen, along with their reflections.
When you put your finger close to the screen, both your finger and its reflection can be seen. When your finger touches the screen, it is registered as a click. The software utilised is classical computer vision algorithms and a tool called ShinyTouch which uses a 2D camera to capture 3D touch input. The software sends touch events to the computer’s operating system as if it were a mouse.