Patent Application
20090091543
This invention relates to handheld electronic devices, such as mobile terminals, productivity and entertainment devices and, more particularly, to applications for such devices.
Handheld electronic devices, such as cellular telephones, personal digital assistants (PDAs) and multimedia devices (e.g., iPod® and MP3 players), are now ubiquitous. Such devices are commonly used for a wide variety of personal applications, including, but not limited to, voice communications, instant messaging, email, productivity tools, web browsing, electronic gaming, digital photography and audio and video entertainment. Some devices, such as “smartphones,” provide several of these capabilities in a single device.
According to some embodiments of the present invention, an electronic device, such as a mobile terminal, a personal digital assistant, an ultraportable computer and/or a media player, includes a case configured to be supported in a user's hand while the device is in use. A touch sensor, such as a sensor used for fingerprint sensing, is mounted on the case. A control circuit is supported by the case and configured to provide a user interface and to support user applications via the user interface. The control circuit is further configured to support user operation of the handheld electronic device as a musical instrument that uses the touch sensor as a control input of the musical instrument. For example, the control circuit may be configured to dynamically alter an audio signal produced by the musical instrument responsive to contact with the touch sensor, e.g., to control a tone and/or a volume of the audio signal. For example, the control circuit may be configured to cause the handheld electronic device to emulate a stringed instrument wherein contact with the touch sensor corresponds to contact with the strings of the emulated stringed instrument.
In further embodiments, the device further includes a touch-sensitive display electrically coupled to the control circuit. The control circuit is further configured to support user operation of the handheld electronic device as a musical instrument that uses the touch sensor and the touch-sensitive display as control inputs for the musical instrument. For example, the control circuit may be configured to generate a graphical emulation of a control interface of a musical instrument on the touch-sensitive display and to generate an audio signal responsive to contact with the touch-sensitive display in relation to the graphical representation.
Further embodiments of the present invention provide methods of operating a handheld electronic device that provides user applications via a user interface that includes a touch sensor, wherein the handheld electronic device is operated as a musical instrument that uses the touch sensor as a control input of the musical instrument. Additional embodiments provide computer program products for operating a handheld electronic device, the computer program product including program code configured to support user applications via a user interface that includes a touch sensor of the handheld electronic device and program code configured to support operation of the handheld electronic device as a musical instrument that uses the touch sensor as a control input of the musical instrument.
The present invention now will be described more fully hereinafter with reference to the accompanying figures, in which embodiments of the invention are shown. This invention may, however, be embodied in many alternate forms and should not be construed as limited to the embodiments set forth herein.
Accordingly, while the invention is susceptible to various modifications and alternative forms, specific embodiments thereof are shown by way of example in the drawings and will herein be described in detail. It should be understood, however, that there is no intent to limit the invention to the particular forms disclosed, but on the contrary, the invention is to cover all modifications, equivalents, and alternatives falling within the spirit and scope of the invention as defined by the claims. Like numbers refer to like elements throughout the description of the figures.
The terminology used herein is for the purpose of describing particular embodiments only and is not intended to be limiting of the invention. As used herein, the singular forms “a”, “an” and “the” are intended to include the plural forms as well, unless the context clearly indicates otherwise. It will be further understood that the terms “comprises”, “comprising,” “includes” and/or “including” (and variants thereof) when used in this specification, specify the presence of stated features, integers, steps, operations, elements, and/or components, but do not preclude the presence or addition of one or more other features, integers, steps, operations, elements, components, and/or groups thereof. Moreover, when an element is referred to as being “responsive” to another element/step (and variants thereof), it can be directly responsive to the other element/step, or intervening elements/steps may be present. In contrast, when an element/step is referred to as being “directly responsive” to another element/step (and variants thereof), there are no intervening elements/steps present. As used herein the term “and/or” includes any and all combinations of one or more of the associated listed items and may be abbreviated as “/”.
It will be understood that, although the terms first, second, etc. may be used herein to describe various elements, these elements should not be limited by these terms. These terms are only used to distinguish one element from another.
The present invention is described below with reference to schematic diagrams illustrating methods, apparatus (systems and/or devices) and/or computer program products according to embodiments of the invention. It is understood that a block of the diagrams, and combinations of blocks in the diagrams can be implemented by computer program instructions. These computer program instructions may be provided to a processor of a general purpose computer, special purpose computer, and/or other programmable data processing apparatus to produce a machine, such that the instructions, which execute via the processor of the computer and/or other programmable data processing apparatus, create means (functionality) and/or structure for implementing the functions/acts specified in the diagrams. These computer program instructions may also be stored in a computer-readable memory that can direct a computer or other programmable data processing apparatus to function in a particular manner, such that the instructions stored in the computer-readable memory produce an article of manufacture including instructions which implement the function/act as specified in the diagrams. The computer program instructions may also be loaded onto a computer or other programmable data processing apparatus to cause a series of operational steps to be performed on the computer or other programmable apparatus to produce a computer-implemented process such that the instructions which execute on the computer or other programmable apparatus provide steps for implementing the functions/acts specified in the diagrams.
Accordingly, the present invention may be embodied in hardware and/or in software (including firmware, resident software, micro-code, etc.). Furthermore, the present invention may take the form of a computer program product on a computer-usable or computer-readable storage medium having computer-usable or computer-readable program code embodied in the medium for use by or in connection with an instruction execution system. In the context of this document, a computer-usable or computer-readable medium may be any medium that can contain, store, communicate or transport the program for use by or in connection with the instruction execution system, apparatus, or device.
The computer-usable or computer-readable medium may be, for example, an electronic, magnetic, optical, electromagnetic or semiconductor system, apparatus or device. More specific examples (a non-exhaustive list) of the computer-readable medium would include the following: a portable computer diskette, a random access memory (RAM), a read-only memory (ROM), an erasable programmable read-only memory (EPROM or Flash memory), and a portable optical and/or magnetic media, such as a flash disk or CD-ROM.
Some embodiments of the present invention arise from a realization a handheld electronic device, for example, a mobile terminal, personal digital assistant (PDA), multimedia device (e.g. iPod® or MP3 player) or ultraportable computer, may be configured to operate as a musical instrument, and that a touch sensor, such as a fingerprint transducer, of the device may be used to provide control inputs to the musical instrument. For example, in some embodiments, contact with the touch sensor may be used to control volume and/or tone. Various types of contact with the touch sensor may be used to emulate inputs to a musical instrument, such as plucking or strumming of a string, and/or to provide musical effects, such as warping or vibrato.
Referring to
The processor 142 is further configured to execute program instructions to provide a musical instrument application 148 that operate responsive to control inputs provided from the touch sensor 130. For example, the musical instrument application 148 may be operative to cause the processor 142 to generate an audio signal responsive to a sense signal generated by the touch sensor 130. The audio signal may, for example, be a digital audio signal that may be converted to an analog signal, amplified and output via speaker 160 of the terminal and/or communicated to an external device, such as an amplifier, recording device, computer, sound system or the like, via the radio transceiver 150 or other external interface.
The contact detection component 310 may map information content in the sense signal 135 to various parameters of the audio signal, such as frequency, tone, volume and the like. The contact detection component 310 may, for example, map features of the sense signal 135 that correspond to various geometric characteristics of the contact, such as the spatial arrangement of areas of contact that may be associated with particular shapes and/or surface features, to various characteristics of the audio signal 325. The contact detection component 310 may also, for example, map particular features of the sense signal 135 associated with dynamic characteristics of the contact, such as duration and/or frequency of contact, to various features of the audio signal 325. It will be appreciated that these mappings may be adaptive and/or user-selectable, e.g., a user may select particular mappings that support various instrument paradigms, such as “piano,” “organ,” “vibes,” and the like.
It will be appreciated that the implementations illustrated in
According to further embodiments of the present invention, inputs from a touch sensor may be used in conjunction with other control inputs of a handheld electronic device to provide additional control of a musical instrument. For example, referring to
It will be appreciated that the examples illustrated in
In the drawings and specification, there have been disclosed embodiments of the invention and, although specific terms are employed, they are used in a generic and descriptive sense only and not for purposes of limitation, the scope of the invention being set forth in the following claims.
This application claims priority to U.S. Provisional Application No. 60/978,202, filed Oct. 8, 2007, the disclosure of which is hereby incorporated herein by reference.
| Number | Date | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 60978202 | Oct 2007 | US |
