Transparent Keyboard Overlay for HUD Key Alignment
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing user tactile input devices, such as keyboards and touch screens, are limited when used with heads-up displays (HUDs) as they require visual alignment and lack tactile feedback before key depression, leading to potential incorrect key presses.
Innovation Solution
A variable user tactile input device with display feedback that includes a virtual pad overlaid on the display, using capacitive sensors and switches to provide tactile and visual cues for key selection, allowing users to select keys without direct visual alignment and offering programmable input modes like keyboards, game controllers, and number pads.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Volume of moving object
If a standard QWERTY keyboard is made small to fit on mobile devices, then the device size is reduced, but the keyboard becomes awkward to use since the buttons are smaller than users' fingers
Solution Approach 1:
The patent uses a transparent physical keyboard overlay that copies the appearance and layout of a full-sized keyboard, allowing users to see and align with virtual keys on the display while pressing physical keys. This copying approach enables small device size while maintaining full keyboard usability through the transparent overlay layer.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent adds a third dimensional layer by placing a transparent physical keyboard overlay on top of the display screen. This creates a multi-layer structure where the physical overlay provides tactile feedback and visual alignment, while the display layer shows the virtual keyboard and output, resolving the contradiction between small size and usability.
2Volume of moving object
If a virtual keyboard is displayed on the screen, then the device can remain small, but the user cannot see the keyboard and align fingers without touching the display first
Solution Approach 1:
The transparent physical keyboard overlay copies the visual appearance and layout of the virtual keyboard displayed on the screen. This allows users to see both the virtual keys on the display and the corresponding physical keys on the overlay simultaneously, enabling accurate finger alignment without needing to touch the display first.
Solution Approach 2:
The transparent keyboard overlay acts as an intermediary between the user's fingers and the display screen. It provides physical reference points and tactile feedback that mediate the interaction, allowing users to locate and press the correct keys without direct visual contact with the display.
3Ease of operation
If mechanical switches are used for tactile feedback, then the keyboard provides clicking sound and motion feedback, but the device size increases and becomes difficult to use on mobile devices
Solution Approach 1:
The patent uses a transparent overlay that copies the visual and tactile characteristics of a full-sized mechanical keyboard without requiring actual mechanical switches. The overlay provides tactile feedback through its physical structure and visual feedback through transparency, maintaining tactile feedback quality while keeping the device compact.
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 accurate and intuitive key selection on HUDs by providing tactile and visual feedback before key depression, improving usability and reducing errors in typing on devices like smartphones and tablets.
Implementation Method 1
a capacitive sensor and a switch may be connected together in series
Implementation Method 2
When the pointer touches or hovers over the user input entry point, the capacitive sensor may detect the change in capacitance and close the switch circuit
Data Source
AI summary
Methods and systems are disclosed relating to variable user tactile input device with display feedback to guide the user to the keys that the user may want to depress. The display feedback may highlight the keys that are being hovered over but not yet selected for writing to the application window so that the user may ensure that the correct keys are selected to be written to the application window. The variable user tactile input device with display feedback may be a keyboard system with tactile feedback and a virtual keyboard display system that may provide a view of the user tactile input device to the user while using a heads up display (HUD). The invention may provide a user with an input system that may be programmable to be a virtual pad such as a virtual keyboard, a virtual game controller, a virtual number pad and any other user tactile input device that the user may intend to use.