Interoperability Mapping for Touch and Non-Touch Device Control
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Solution Overview
Problem
Interoperability between mobile computing devices with touch screens and non-touch remote environments, such as vehicle head units, is hindered due to differences in user input devices, leading to difficulties in interpreting and responding to user inputs.
Innovation Solution
A method and apparatus that maintain a terminal session between a server and client device, simulating the display of the server on the client, and mapping touch events to actuations of input mechanisms on the client, allowing for the generation of appropriate responses despite differing user input types, including buttons, knobs, and touch screens.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Adaptability or versatility
If a mobile computing device with a touch screen interfaces with a remote environment that has non-touch input devices (buttons, knobs), then interoperability between devices is achieved, but difficulties arise in interpreting and responding to user inputs due to different input types
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces a mapping mechanism as an intermediary layer between the touch screen device and non-touch remote environment. This mapping translates touch events from the mobile device into equivalent actuations of non-touch input mechanisms (buttons, knobs) at the remote environment, enabling seamless interoperability without requiring the remote environment to have touch capabilities.
Solution Approach 2:
The system dynamically changes the parameter representation of user inputs by converting touch event coordinates and gestures into discrete button presses, knob rotations, or other non-touch input parameters. This parameter transformation allows the remote environment to interpret and respond to inputs as if they originated from its native input devices.
2Adaptability or versatility
If the remote environment uses non-touch input devices, then it maintains traditional user interface design, but it cannot directly receive or interpret touch-based user inputs from mobile devices
Solution Approach 1:
The mapping mechanism provides universal functionality by enabling the remote environment's non-touch input devices to respond to touch-based inputs from mobile devices. The system achieves multi-functionality where buttons can represent both physical button presses and virtual touch events, and knobs can represent both physical rotations and touch-based directional gestures, eliminating the need for separate touch input handling.
3Ease of operation
If touch events are mapped to non-touch input mechanisms, then user input interpretation becomes feasible, but additional complexity is introduced in establishing and maintaining the mapping between different input types
Solution Approach 1:
The system creates a virtual copy of the remote environment's input mechanism layout on the touch screen device. This copied representation allows the mapping to be established by correlating touch events on the virtual layout with corresponding physical input mechanisms, simplifying the mapping configuration process while maintaining accurate input interpretation.
Data Source
AI summary
Methods and apparatus are provided to promote interoperability between devices having different user input devices by correlating user input that is provided via one or more input mechanisms of a client device to touch events on the server device. The method may maintain a terminal session between a server device and a client device in which the client device simulates at least a portion of a display generated at the server device. The method may access a mapping between touch events on the server device and actuation of respective input mechanisms of the client device. The method may also interpret one or more control signals provided in response to actuation of an input mechanism based upon the mapping and may then cause a user interface state of the server device to updated based on the actuation of the input mechanism of the client device.