Rollable Display Edge Touch Controls for Buttonless Input
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Solution Overview
Problem
Conventional portable electronic devices with rigid displays lack efficient mechanisms for extending or retracting flexible displays while providing intuitive user input options, limiting the usability and functionality of extendable display devices.
Innovation Solution
Implementing a flexible display support structure with edge touch control functionality, where touch sensors detect forces applied to the edges of an extended display portion, allowing emulation of hardware buttons and enabling intuitive user interactions through edge touch locations.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Area of moving object
If flexible display support structure is extended, then display area is increased, but device complexity is increased
Solution Approach 1:
The flexible display support structure is segmented into multiple edge portions, with touch sensors distributed across different edges. This segmentation allows the extended display to be controlled through distributed edge touch inputs rather than requiring a single complex control mechanism, resolving the contradiction between increased display area and device complexity.
Solution Approach 2:
The edge portions of the extended display serve multiple functions: they act as both the display boundary and as input control zones. Touch sensors integrated along the edges enable the display structure itself to provide both viewing area and control functionality, reducing overall device complexity while maintaining large display area.
2Ease of operation
If touch sensors are distributed along edges, then ease of operation is improved, but manufacturing precision is increased
Solution Approach 1:
Instead of concentrating control elements at corners or centers, touch sensors are distributed along the one-dimensional edge portions of the display. This dimensional redistribution along the perimeter provides multiple accessible control zones that improve ease of operation while allowing more relaxed manufacturing tolerances compared to precise point-location sensors.
Solution Approach 2:
Different edge portions are assigned different control functions based on their location. This local differentiation allows each edge segment to be optimized for its specific control purpose, improving overall ease of operation while enabling modular manufacturing approaches that reduce precision requirements across the entire sensor array.
Data Source
AI summary
An electronic device, method and computer program product enable additional touch function for rollable or scrollable display device. The electronic device presents a function on a flexible display coupled across at least a front of a flexible display support structure and a base housing. The function has interactive feature(s) that can be manually modified by a user input. The electronic device segments non-display portion(s) of at least a distal edge of a flexible display support structure that is extendable and retractable relative to a base housing that may be held. The segments emulate hardware buttons at edge touch location(s) corresponding to the interactive feature(s). A control input of the interactive feature(s) detected by touch sensor(s) is associated to a touch at a particular edge touch location. The electronic device triggers a corresponding response of the presented function in response to receipt of the control input.