Hierarchical Touch Region Selection for Small UI Objects
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Solution Overview
Problem
Touch-sensitive surfaces face challenges in accurately recognizing and processing inputs due to finger size limitations and difficulties for users with disabilities, as well as handling contacts outside intended user interface objects.
Innovation Solution
A method is implemented on an electronic device with a touch-sensitive display that arranges user interfaces in multiple hierarchical levels, allowing detection of contacts and determining whether to process them with the respective region or its child regions based on their configuration and position, ensuring accurate input recognition and handling.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Area of stationary object
If user interface objects are sized small to provide more screen real estate, then more information can be displayed in a single view, but it becomes more difficult to accurately select these objects with finger contacts
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements a hierarchical region structure where parent regions contain child regions, allowing multiple levels of nesting. When a touch contact is detected, the system searches through nested child regions to find the most specific matching UI object, enabling accurate selection even when objects are small and densely packed on the screen.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent introduces an intermediary region hierarchy between the touch contact and the final UI object selection. This intermediary structure allows the system to map a potentially imprecise finger contact to the correct small UI object by evaluating which region (parent or child) the contact corresponds to, thereby improving selection accuracy without changing object sizes.
2Ease of operation
If traditional touch-based selection methods are used, then the interface is simple to implement, but users with disabilities or reduced motor skills have difficulty precisely selecting user interface objects
Solution Approach 1:
The hierarchical region structure enables progressive refinement of touch target selection. The system first checks if a contact corresponds to a parent region, and if not, it searches through child regions. This nested approach provides multiple opportunities for successful selection, making the interface more accessible to users with reduced precision while maintaining the same simple touch interaction model.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent segments the user interface into hierarchical regions with different selection criteria. By dividing the interface into parent and child regions, the system creates multiple selection opportunities at different levels of the hierarchy, allowing users with disabilities to successfully select objects even with less precise touches, while preserving the original simple touch-based interaction paradigm.
3Measurement precision
If a hierarchical region structure is implemented to improve touch input accuracy, then selection precision improves, but the processing complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The system performs preliminary checks to determine if a touch contact corresponds to a parent region before searching through child regions. This preliminary action reduces the average processing complexity by quickly resolving many touches at the parent level, only requiring more complex child region searches when necessary, thereby balancing accuracy improvement with processing efficiency.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent applies different processing logic to different parts of the region hierarchy. Parent regions use one selection criterion while child regions use another, allowing the system to optimize processing for each level. This local differentiation enables accurate touch input recognition while managing complexity by applying appropriate processing strategies to appropriate regions rather than using a single complex algorithm throughout.
Data Source
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AI summary
A method includes displaying a user interface of an application on a device's touch-sensitive display. The user interface includes a plurality of regions, including a respective region at a respective hierarchy level. The respective region has two or more child regions at a hierarchy level below the respective hierarchy level. The method includes detecting a first contact at a location that corresponds to the respective region and that does not correspond to any of the two or more child regions. When the application is configured to process the first contact, not in conjunction with the respective region, but in conjunction with at least one child region of the two or more child regions, the method includes identifying a respective child region in accordance with positions of the child regions relative to the location, and processing the first contact in conjunction with the identified respective child region using the application.