Dynamic Onscreen Keyboard With Haptic Feedback
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Solution Overview
Problem
Current touch-based computing devices lack an efficient method for ten-finger typing on larger screens, as they require substantial display space, lack tactile feedback, and do not allow users to rest their fingers on the 'home-row' position like conventional keyboards.
Innovation Solution
A system that dynamically adjusts the location, orientation, and size of an onscreen keyboard based on the user's finger placement, allowing users to define a 'home-row' position by resting their fingers on the touch-sensitive surface, and provides visual, audible, and haptic feedback to facilitate typing without looking at the keys.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Productivity
If a conventional physical keyboard is integrated into a portable computer, then typing efficiency and tactile feedback are improved, but the device size increases significantly
Solution Approach 1:
The patent creates a virtual copy of a physical keyboard on the touch screen display. This virtual keyboard replica provides visual guidance and spatial orientation similar to a physical keyboard, allowing users to type without looking while maintaining the benefits of a compact device. The virtual keyboard is displayed in a transparent or semi-transparent manner, allowing users to see through it to the content being edited.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent introduces a transparent keyboard overlay as an intermediary layer between the user and the content. This overlay provides tactile-like feedback through vibration motors positioned at key locations, mediating the interaction between finger contact and character input. The transparent nature of the overlay allows visual access to content while providing keyboard functionality.
2Area of stationary object
If an onscreen keyboard is displayed on a touch screen, then device size is reduced, but typing accuracy and speed decrease due to lack of tactile feedback
Solution Approach 1:
The patent incorporates vibration motors at specific key locations within the transparent keyboard overlay. When a key is pressed, the corresponding vibration motor activates, providing localized tactile feedback that mimics the mechanical response of a physical keyboard. This enables users to locate and press keys accurately without visual assistance, significantly improving typing speed and accuracy.
Solution Approach 2:
The system provides immediate tactile feedback through vibrations when keys are pressed, creating a closed-loop interaction. The vibration feedback confirms key registration and helps users maintain proper finger positioning, enabling touch typing without visual reference. The feedback mechanism compensates for the lack of inherent tactile resistance in touch screen interfaces.
3Illumination intensity
If a transparent keyboard overlay is used, then visual access to content is maintained, but distinguishing key boundaries becomes difficult
Solution Approach 1:
The patent employs color or luminance changes in the transparent keyboard overlay to delineate key boundaries. Keys may be highlighted with different colors, borders, or luminance levels to make their boundaries visually distinct while maintaining overall transparency. This allows users to easily identify key locations and boundaries without compromising visual access to the content beneath.
Solution Approach 2:
The vibration motors are positioned at specific key locations and activate only when their corresponding key is pressed. This localized vibration creates a tactile map that helps users distinguish key boundaries and locations through touch, complementing the visual information provided by the transparent display. The tactile cues reinforce the visual boundaries, making key identification more reliable.
4Area of stationary object
If the keyboard is made invisible to save screen space, then more display area is available for content, but users cannot locate keys without visual reference
Solution Approach 1:
The vibration motors provide tactile feedback that serves as a dynamic guide for key locations. When users place their fingers on the keyboard area, they can detect which keys are active through vibration patterns, allowing them to locate and press the correct keys without visual reference. This enables the keyboard to remain visually minimal or transparent while maintaining ease of operation through tactile cues.
Solution Approach 2:
The system allows users to self-orient to the keyboard layout through tactile exploration. By pressing different key locations and feeling the vibration feedback, users can independently learn and memorize the keyboard layout without requiring visual aids. The tactile feedback system serves itself by providing the necessary information for users to locate keys autonomously.
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
Enables fast and accurate ten-finger typing on touch screens by adapting the keyboard layout to the user's finger placement, reducing the need for constant visual attention and minimizing screen space usage, while providing tactile-like feedback through vibrations and visual cues.
Implementation Method 1
a touch-sensitive display having a touch-sensitive surface
Implementation Method 2
generate vibrations that are imperceptible to a user resting their fingers on the touch-sensitive display surface
Data Source
AI summary
A touch-sensitive display surface having touch-capacitive and vibration sensors. This surface allows the user to rest their fingers on the keys of an onscreen keyboard and type as they would on a regular keyboard. As the user places their fingers on the touch screen, the system relocates the onscreen keyboard to the location where the fingers are resting. The touch sensors report the signal strength level of each key touched to a processor, but no keystroke is issued by the processor until a corresponding “tap” (i.e., vibration) is detected. When a tap is detected, the processor references the status of the touch capacitance sensors before, during, and/or immediately after the moment in time the tap occurred. The size, position, and orientation of the onscreen keyboard keys are dynamically set as determined by the user initiating a home-row definition event by resting their fingers momentarily on a virtual home-row.