Patent Application
20130093688
The present disclosure relates generally to touch-based user interfaces, and more particularly to, implementing virtual soft keys for a computing device having a side-mounted touchpad.
A touchpad is an input device including a surface that detects touch-based inputs of users. A touch screen is an electronic visual display that detects the presence and location of user touch inputs. Mobile devices such as a mobile phone, a tablet computer, and a laptop computer often incorporate a touch screen or a touchpad to facilitate user interactions with application programs running on the mobile device.
Particular embodiments relate to implementing virtual soft keys for a computing device having a touchpad disposed on a lateral edge of the computing device. These and other features, aspects, and advantages of the disclosure are described in more detail below in the detailed description and in conjunction with the following figures.
The invention is now described in detail with reference to a few embodiments thereof as illustrated in the accompanying drawings. In the following description, numerous specific details are set forth in order to provide a thorough understanding of the present disclosure. It is apparent, however, to one skilled in the art, that the present disclosure may be practiced without some or all of these specific details. In other instances, well known process steps and/or structures have not been described in detail in order not to unnecessarily obscure the present disclosure. In addition, while the disclosure is described in conjunction with the particular embodiments, it should be understood that this description is not intended to limit the disclosure to the described embodiments. To the contrary, the description is intended to cover alternatives, modifications, and equivalents as may be included within the spirit and scope of the disclosure as defined by the appended claims.
A touchpad is an input device including a surface that detects touch-based inputs of users. Similarly, a touch screen is an electronic visual display that detects the presence and location of user touch inputs. So-called dual touch or multi-touch displays or touchpads refer to devices that can identify the presence, location and movement of more than one touch input, such as two or three finger touches. A system incorporating one or more touch-based input devices may monitor one or more touch-sensitive surfaces for one or more touch or near touch inputs from a user. When one or more such user inputs occur, the system may determine the distinct area(s) of contact and identify the nature of the touch or near touch input(s) via geometric features and geometric arrangements (e.g., location, movement), and determine if they correspond to various touch events (e.g., tap, drag, swipe, pinch). These touch events may then be processed by handler functions that register or subscribe as listeners to such events, as illustrated in
As a user taps on the text string “Tap on this text.” (102), a touch event listener “onTouchEvent” can trigger an action of changing the text string from “Tap on this text.” to “Boo!” (103).
Recognition of touch events by a system with one or more touch-based input devices—i.e., identifying one or more touch inputs by a user and determining corresponding touch event(s)—may be implemented by a combination of hardware, software, and/or firmware (or device drivers).
A soft key is a hardware button that is programmable to invoke one or more functions. For example, each of a computer keyboard's function keys can have different functions for different application programs. For example, a computer keyboard can have LED displays disposed adjacent to function keys. Soft keys are often located adjacent a visual display, as often found on mobile phones, MP3 players and automatic teller machines, and the visual display can display a corresponding icon or function for each of the soft keys.
Particular embodiments herein relate to a computing device (such as a mobile phone, netbook, smartphone, tablet, or other portable device) with a touch screen and one or more side-mounted touchpads and methods of allowing users to use the one or more side-mounted touchpads as virtual soft keys. Particular embodiments can improve user experience associated with mobile devices as the virtual soft keys can offload user interaction to the side-mounted touchpad(s), and can be more flexible than traditional soft keys with a fixed number of hardware buttons.
Mobile device 300 may recognize touch inputs, and determine one or more corresponding touch events or gestures. One or more applications hosted on mobile device 300 may be configured to register a handler function that responds to the one or more touch events. As
In other embodiments, mobile device 300 may identify touch events associated with back-mounted touch surface 305, as illustrated in
In contrast to using hardware buttons as soft keys,
In particular embodiments, the application may display the one or more icons as overlays to the application's user interface. In other embodiments, the application may display the one or more icons associated with a first application as overlaying a user interface of another application. For example, a user may edit a document with a word processor application on the computing device and play an MP3 song using a media player application at the same time, the media player application can display icons (e.g., for functions of the media player application such as Play, Pause, or Mute) adjacent to the side-mounted touchpad, overlaying the user interface of the word processor application. In one embodiment, the application may display the one or more icons only when an object (e.g., a user's finger) is in the proximity of the side-mounted touchpad. In another embodiment, a first tap, swipe or other gesture of the touchpad 302 may cause the icons to appear on the display adjacent to the touchpad. In another embodiment, the icons are displayed after a user invokes a separate command or control, such as pressing button 303, which may cause an operating system shell or a music player (for example) to display the icons.
By registering a handler function for touch events, the handler function can, responsive to a touch event, cause the application to initiate an action corresponding to an icon adjacent to the touch event. In particular embodiments, when a touch event occurs, the handler function may determine if the touch event is a tap event associated with a side-mounted touchpad. In particular embodiments, if the touch event is a tap event associated with a side-mounted touchpad, the handler function may determine a location of the tap event on the side-mounted touchpad (402). In particular embodiments, the handler function may cause the application to determine a particular icon of the one or more icons adjacent to the tap event location (403). For example, the application can determine the third icon from the top (Phone icon) is adjacent to the tap event (as indicated by arrow 330) in
In particular embodiments, the application may launch an action corresponding to the particular icon (404). With the example method of
Additionally, a user may configure one or more settings of virtual soft keys implemented by the example method of
The application and functionality described above can be implemented as a series of instructions stored on a computer-readable storage medium that, when executed, cause a programmable processor to implement the operations described above. While the mobile device 300 may be implemented in a variety of different hardware and computing systems,
Controller 704 together with a suitable operating system may operate to execute instructions in the form of computer code and produce and use data. By way of example and not by way of limitation, the operating system may be Windows-based, Mac-based, or Unix or Linux-based, Android-based, or Symbian-based, among other suitable operating systems. The operating system, other computer code and/or data may be physically stored within memory 706 that is operatively coupled to controller 704.
Memory 706 may encompass one or more storage media and generally provide a place to store computer code (e.g., software and/or firmware) and data that are used by computing platform 702. By way of example, memory 706 may include various tangible computer-readable storage media including Read-Only Memory (ROM) and/or Random-Access Memory (RAM). As is well known in the art, ROM acts to transfer data and instructions uni-directionally to controller 704, and RAM is used typically to transfer data and instructions in a bi-directional manner. Memory 706 may also include one or more fixed storage devices in the form of, by way of example, hard disk drives (HDDs), solid-state drives (SSDs), flash-memory cards (e.g., Secured Digital or SD cards, embedded MultiMediaCard or eMMD cards), among other suitable forms of memory coupled bi-directionally to controller 704. Information may also reside on one or more removable storage media loaded into or installed in computing platform 702 when needed. By way of example, any of a number of suitable memory cards (e.g., SD cards) may be loaded into computing platform 702 on a temporary or permanent basis.
Input output subsystem 710 may comprise one or more input and output devices operably connected to controller 704. For example, input-output subsystem may include keyboard, mouse, one or more buttons, thumb wheel, and/or display (e.g., liquid crystal display (LCD), light emitting diode (LED), Interferometric modulator display (IMOD), or any other suitable display technology). Generally, input devices are configured to transfer data, commands and responses from the outside world into computing platform 702. The display is generally configured to display a graphical user interface (GUI) that provides an easy to use visual interface between a user of the computing platform 702 and the operating system or application(s) running on the mobile device. Generally, the GUI presents programs, files and operational options with graphical images. During operation, the user may select and activate various graphical images displayed on the display in order to initiate functions and tasks associated therewith. Input output subsystem 710 may also include touch based devices such as touchpad and touch screen. A touchpad is an input device including a surface that detects touch-based inputs of users. Similarly, a touch screen is a display that detects the presence and location of user touch inputs. Input output system 710 may also include dual touch or multi-touch displays or touchpads that can identify the presence, location and movement of more than one touch inputs, such as two or three finger touches.
In particular embodiments, computing platform 702 may additionally comprise audio subsystem 712, camera subsystem 712, wireless communication subsystem 716, sensor subsystems 718, and/or wired communication subsystem 720, operably connected to controller 704 to facilitate various functions of computing platform 702. For example, Audio subsystem 712, including a speaker, a microphone, and a codec module configured to process audio signals, can be utilized to facilitate voice-enabled functions, such as voice recognition, voice replication, digital recording, and telephony functions. For example, camera subsystem 712, including an optical sensor (e.g., a charged coupled device (CCD), or a complementary metal-oxide semiconductor (CMOS) image sensor), can be utilized to facilitate camera functions, such as recording photographs and video clips. For example, wired communication subsystem 720 can include a Universal Serial Bus (USB) port for file transferring, or a Ethernet port for connection to a local area network (LAN). Additionally, computing platform 702 may be powered by power source 732.
Wireless communication subsystem 716 can be designed to operate over one or more wireless networks, for example, a wireless PAN (WPAN) (such as, for example, a BLUETOOTH WPAN, an infrared PAN), a WI-FI network (such as, for example, an 802.11a/b/g/n WI-FI network, an 802.11s mesh network), a WI-MAX network, a cellular telephone network (such as, for example, a Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM) network, an Enhanced Data Rates for GSM Evolution (EDGE) network, a Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS) network, and/or a Long Term Evolution (LTE) network). Additionally, wireless communication subsystem 716 may include hosting protocols such that computing platform 702 may be configured as a base station for other wireless devices.
Sensor subsystem 718 may include one or more sensor devices to provide additional input and facilitate multiple functionalities of computing platform 702. For example, sensor subsystems 718 may include GPS sensor for location positioning, altimeter for altitude positioning, motion sensor for determining orientation of a mobile device, light sensor for photographing function with camera subsystem 714, temperature sensor for measuring ambient temperature, and/or biometric sensor for security application (e.g., fingerprint reader). Other input/output devices may include an accelerometer that can be used to detect the orientation of the device.
In particular embodiments, various components of computing platform 702 may be operably connected together by one or more buses (including hardware and/or software). As an example and not by way of limitation, the one or more buses may include an Accelerated Graphics Port (AGP) or other graphics bus, an Enhanced Industry Standard Architecture (EISA) bus, a front-side bus (FSB), a HYPERTRANSPORT (HT) interconnect, an Industry Standard Architecture (ISA) bus, an INFINIBAND interconnect, a low-pin-count (LPC) bus, a memory bus, a Micro Channel Architecture (MCA) bus, a Peripheral Component Interconnect (PCI) bus, a PCI-Express (PCI-X) bus, a serial advanced technology attachment (SATA) bus, a Video Electronics Standards Association local (VLB) bus, a Universal Asynchronous Receiver/Transmitter (UART) interface, a Inter-Integrated Circuit (I2C) bus, a Serial Peripheral Interface (SPI) bus, a Secure Digital (SD) memory interface, a MultiMediaCard (MMC) memory interface, a Memory Stick (MS) memory interface, a Secure Digital Input Output (SDIO) interface, a Multi-channel Buffered Serial Port (McBSP) bus, a Universal Serial Bus (USB) bus, a General Purpose Memory Controller (GPMC) bus, a SDRAM Controller (SDRC) bus, a General Purpose Input/Output (GPIO) bus, a Separate Video (S-Video) bus, a Display Serial Interface (DSI) bus, an Advanced Microcontroller Bus Architecture (AMBA) bus, or another suitable bus or a combination of two or more of these.
Herein, reference to a computer-readable storage medium encompasses one or more non-transitory, tangible computer-readable storage media possessing structure. As an example and not by way of limitation, a computer-readable storage medium may include a semiconductor-based or other integrated circuit (IC) (such, as for example, a field-programmable gate array (FPGA) or an application-specific IC (ASIC)), a hard disk, an HDD, a hybrid hard drive (HHD), an optical disc, an optical disc drive (ODD), a magneto-optical disc, a magneto-optical drive, a floppy disk, a floppy disk drive (FDD), magnetic tape, a holographic storage medium, a solid-state drive (SSD), a RAM-drive, a SECURE DIGITAL card, a SECURE DIGITAL drive, a MultiMediaCard (MMC) card, an embedded MMC (eMMC) card, or another suitable computer-readable storage medium or a combination of two or more of these, where appropriate. Herein, reference to a computer-readable storage medium excludes any medium that is not eligible for patent protection under 35 U.S.C. §101. Herein, reference to a computer-readable storage medium excludes transitory forms of signal transmission (such as a propagating electrical or electromagnetic signal per se) to the extent that they are not eligible for patent protection under 35 U.S.C. §101.
This disclosure contemplates one or more computer-readable storage media implementing any suitable storage. In particular embodiments, a computer-readable storage medium implements one or more portions of controller 704 (such as, for example, one or more internal registers or caches), one or more portions of memory 705, or a combination of these, where appropriate. In particular embodiments, a computer-readable storage medium implements RAM or ROM. In particular embodiments, a computer-readable storage medium implements volatile or persistent memory. In particular embodiments, one or more computer-readable storage media embody software. Herein, reference to software may encompass one or more applications, bytecode, one or more computer programs, one or more executables, one or more instructions, logic, machine code, one or more scripts, or source code, and vice versa, where appropriate. In particular embodiments, software includes one or more application programming interfaces (APIs). This disclosure contemplates any suitable software written or otherwise expressed in any suitable programming language or combination of programming languages. In particular embodiments, software is expressed as source code or object code. In particular embodiments, software is expressed in a higher-level programming language, such as, for example, C, Perl, JavaScript, or a suitable extension thereof. In particular embodiments, software is expressed in a lower-level programming language, such as assembly language (or machine code). In particular embodiments, software is expressed in JAVA. In particular embodiments, software is expressed in Hyper Text Markup Language (HTML), Extensible Markup Language (XML), or other suitable markup language
The present disclosure encompasses all changes, substitutions, variations, alterations, and modifications to the example embodiments herein that a person having ordinary skill in the art would comprehend. Similarly, where appropriate, the appended claims encompass all changes, substitutions, variations, alterations, and modifications to the example embodiments herein that a person having ordinary skill in the art would comprehend.
