Unified Gesture Manager for Touchpad and Touchscreen Input
Find Innovative SolutionsGenerate Solutions
Solution Overview
Problem
Users face a steep learning curve due to the need to learn different gestures for touchpads and touchscreens, even on devices that combine both, leading to inefficiencies in interacting with computer systems.
Innovation Solution
Implementing a system where touchscreen gestures have the same or similar conditions of execution as their touchpad counterparts, allowing a unified set of gestures across both input methods, with a touchscreen gesture manager and touchpad gesture manager that recognize and execute corresponding operations based on digit input and movement.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Ease of operation
If different gestures are implemented for touchpads and touchscreens, then each input method can have optimized gesture control, but users must learn multiple gesture sets increasing operational complexity
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements a unified gesture system where the same gesture conditions (e.g., two-finger swipe) trigger corresponding operations on both touchpads and touchscreens. The gesture manager maps touchscreen gestures to equivalent touchpad gestures, allowing one gesture set to serve multiple input methods, thereby reducing learning complexity while maintaining optimized control for each device type.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent merges the gesture recognition systems of touchpads and touchscreens into a unified framework. By combining the gesture managers and sharing gesture condition definitions, the system eliminates redundancy and allows users to learn a single gesture vocabulary that works across both input methods, directly addressing the contradiction between operational simplicity and learning complexity.
2Reliability
If separate gesture management systems are maintained for touchpads and touchscreens, then each can be optimized independently, but memory and computing resources are consumed duplicating gesture data
Solution Approach 1:
The gesture manager is designed to serve dual purposes: managing both touchpad and touchscreen gestures through a unified data structure. By defining gesture conditions once and mapping them to multiple input methods, the system maintains reliable gesture recognition without duplicating gesture definitions in memory, thus reducing resource consumption while preserving recognition accuracy.
Solution Approach 2:
Instead of maintaining separate complete gesture databases for touchpads and touchscreens, the system creates lightweight mappings from a single source of truth. The touchscreen gesture manager references the same gesture condition definitions as the touchpad manager, copying only the necessary execution context rather than duplicating entire gesture datasets, thereby reducing memory usage while maintaining recognition reliability.
3Adaptability or versatility
If traditional separate gesture systems are used for touchpads and touchscreens, then each input method maintains its established behavior, but users experience inefficiency due to learning different mechanisms
Solution Approach 1:
The unified gesture system allows users to leverage familiar touchpad gesture patterns when using the touchscreen, creating a transferable skill set across input methods. This universality maintains the adaptability to use different input methods while improving productivity by eliminating the need to learn separate gesture vocabularies, directly resolving the contradiction between flexibility and efficiency.
Data Source
AI summary
In non-limiting examples of the present disclosure, systems, methods and devices for executing gesture operations are provided. A touchpad gesture manager and a touchscreen gesture manager may be maintained. Both managers may comprise the identities of gesture operations and conditions for executing the gesture operations. The conditions for one or more touchscreen gesture operations may be the same as the conditions for one or more corresponding touchpad gesture operations. The gestures that have same conditions for the touchscreen and the touchpad may comprise application window operations and virtual desktop transition operations. In some examples, one or more display elements, animations, or intermediate operations may be different in executing the touchscreen operations than for executing the touchpad operations.