Reverse Keyboard Assembly with Transparent Keys
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Solution Overview
Problem
Conventional keyboards lack tactile feedback and comfort, while virtual keyboards suffer from reduced typing speed and accuracy due to the absence of physical key pressing, and existing hybrid solutions fail to provide clear visibility of displayed content under keys.
Innovation Solution
A reverse keyboard assembly featuring a display, touch screen, and transparent keys that allow viewing of images displayed on the screen, enabling changeable icons on display zones and providing tactile feedback through a top cover with transparent keys that press onto the touch screen.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Adaptability or versatility
If a conventional keyboard with permanent keycaps is used, then tactile feedback is provided, but the display content cannot be dynamically changed
Solution Approach 1:
The patent inverts the conventional keyboard structure by placing the display layer below the transparent keycaps instead of above. This allows the display content to be visible through the transparent keys, enabling dynamic content changes while maintaining the physical tactile feedback of traditional keycaps. The inversion resolves the contradiction by allowing both adaptability and tactile feedback to coexist.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent uses transparent keycaps made of transparent material that allow light to pass through, enabling the display content below to be visible. These flexible transparent shells serve as both the key structure and the window for displaying dynamic content, resolving the contradiction between permanent physical keys and changeable display content.
2Adaptability or versatility
If a virtual keyboard is used, then display content can be dynamically changed, but tactile feedback is lost
Solution Approach 1:
By inverting the structure to place physical transparent keycaps over the display, the patent restores tactile feedback that was lost in virtual keyboards. Users can feel the physical press of the keys while the display content remains dynamically changeable, improving both reliability and typing accuracy without sacrificing adaptability.
3Stability of the object's composition
If keys are connected to base structure, then structural stability is improved, but typing comfort is reduced
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments the keyboard into separate components: the base structure, the display layer, and the transparent keycaps. This segmentation allows each component to be optimized independently - the base provides structural stability while the keycaps can be designed for optimal typing comfort with appropriate height, curvature, and tactile properties.
4Illumination intensity
If display content is shown under keys, then visibility is improved, but key press confirmation is reduced
Solution Approach 1:
The transparent keycaps act as optical windows that allow display content to be visible through them. At the same time, when a user presses a key, the physical deformation of the transparent keycap provides tactile confirmation that the key was pressed, preventing loss of key press information while maintaining display visibility.
Data Source
AI summary
A method for use with a reverse keyboard assembly to display a second set of icons on a second set of display zones of the reverse keyboard assembly based on an input corresponding to a first set of icons placed on a first set of display zones, the method comprising: identifying a first computer program executing on a computer to which the reverse keyboard assembly is communicatively connected to; displaying a first set of icons on the first set of display zones; receiving an input corresponding to one or more icons of the first set of icons; analyzing the input with respect of a set of rules associated with the first computer program; and, displaying a second set of icons on the second set of display zones using a second configuration, the display corresponding to results of the analysis.