Patent Application
20140045547
(1) Field of the Disclosure
This disclosure relates generally to electronic mobile devices and relates in particular to wearable communication devices using short range communication to a cell phone or other portable electronic device.
(2) Background
Notification watches are used for some time now, which can receive information from portable electronic devices such as cell phones. They notify a user when a mobile phone rings by a vibrating or alerting for specific issues. They can pass through from the mobile phone information such as emails, SMS, calendar events and caller Ids.
A principal object of the present disclosure is to allow use of a wearable communication device, such as a watch (and hereinafter referred to as, but not limited to, a watch), which has a very small form factor and limited physical real-estate for conventional input mechanisms such as push buttons and scroll wheels, to be able to accept a large number of different user inputs in ways that are natural and intuitive for the user.
A further object of the present disclosure is to implement these users input methods with low power consumption as would be advantageous for wearable, battery-powered devices.
A further object of the present disclosure is to use, either individually or a combination of, the following type of sensors: accelerometer, magnetometer, gyroscope, infrared proximity detectors, and microphone and touch sensors.
A further object of the present disclosure is to achieve lower power consumption by only operating the required sensors, and at the lowest power states sufficient for processing the type of user input to be detected at a particular state of the device operation.
A further object of the present disclosure is to allow use of a wearable communication device, such as a watch (and hereinafter referred to, but not limited to, a watch), to be notified with vibration, an LED light and OLED text display of incoming calls, texts, and calendar events, all while a phone is nearby but not visible, such as in a pocket or purse.
A further object of the present disclosure is to be notified with vibration, an LED light and OLED text display of incoming calls, texts, and calendar events, all without a phone being visible.
A further object of the present disclosure is to put a wearable Bluetooth communication device into a watch that would connect to a cell phone.
A further object of the present disclosure is to achieve a wearable Bluetooth communication device enabling a hands-free communication with a cell phone.
Moreover an object of the present disclosure is to achieve a wearable Bluetooth communication device which can be used as input device to interact with a smart phone application.
In accordance with the objects of the invention a wearable communication device configured to talk and to listen, place and answer calls, send and receive text messages, initiate voice commands to mobile search for information and to find locations, and be notified of incoming calls, texts, and events, all while a smart phone is nearby has been achieved, The communication device disclosed comprises: a near-field short distance wireless communication chipset, wherein the near-field short distance wireless communication chipset is used for communication with the smart phone and motion sensors comprising an accelerometer, a magnetometer, and a gyroscope sensing movements of a user's arm or wrist determining velocity, direction and displacement vector in 3-D space which can be used as input selection for an application of the smart phone.
In accordance with the objects of the disclosure a method to achieve a wearable communication device configured for gaming applications, to talk and to listen, place and answer calls, send and receive text messages, initiate voice commands to mobile search for information and to find locations, and be notified of incoming calls, texts, and events, all while a smart phone is nearby, has been disclosed. The method disclosed comprises the steps of: (1) deploying a mobile phone within reach of a near-field short distance wireless communication chipset used for communication between the wearable communication device and the mobile phone, (2) deploying the near-field short distance wireless communication chipset, (3) deploying motion sensors comprising an accelerometer, a magnetometer, and a gyroscope sensing movements of a user's arm or wrist determining velocity, direction and displacement vector in 3-D space which can be used as input selection for an application of the smart phone, and (4) connecting the mobile phone to the internet via Wi-Fi or to mobile phone networks.
In the accompanying drawings forming a material part of this description, there is shown:
a shows a preferred embodiment of the IR proximity sensors for detection of finger motion.
b shows the normal orientation of watch on the hand
d shows the hand with watch tilted upwards
e shows the hand with watch oriented upwards
f shows the hand with watch oriented downwards
g shows hand motion down followed by selection
The preferred embodiments of the present disclosure present a wearable communication device and its interfaces, wherein the communication device can be, for example, a watch, comprising functions enabling to talk and to listen, place and answers call, send and receive text messages, initiates voice commands to mobile search for information and find locations, and be notified of incoming calls, texts, and events, all while a phone is nearby but not visible, as when it is in the user's pocket or purse.
It is a challenge to designers of wearable communication devices such as a watch, to provide access to the users the rich sets of features available on a phone, such as to talk and to listen, place and answers call, send and receive text messages, initiates voice commands to mobile search for information and find locations, and be notified of incoming calls, texts, and events, all while a phone is in a pocket or purse
The watch 1 has an always-on analog watch movement. Alternatively a digital watch display, instead of an analog clock, can be used; there is no need to touch the screen to see the time. The upper half shows the hands of an analog Quartz watch. The watch comprises two physical buttons 3 and 4. Knob 2 can be used to adjust time of the day. Button 3 is an upper command button; button 4 is a lower select button.
The buttons 3 and 4 are programmable buttons, configured by user via either (a) web portal or (b) smartphone app. Pre-programmed configurations such as “social”, “messaging/tweet”, “emergency”. Other pre-programmed configurations are possible, such as for example: in idle state, short press a button to activate voice recognition, long press to call last number dialed, OR, short press to read new texts or messages, long press to send new texts or messages.
The table below shows examples of such pre-programmed configurations. The functions in the table are determined by the state of the watch, together with the duration and number of times the button is pressed:
The preferred embodiment has an OLED display and an RGB LED light. Alternatively an LCD display, as e.g. one line LCD dot matrix, can be used. The communication is performed using a Bluetooth, or other near-field short distance wireless communication technology, chip. Bluetooth is a proprietary open wireless technology standard for exchanging data over short distances (using short-wavelength radio transmissions in the ISM band from 2400-2480 MHz) from fixed and mobile devices, creating personal area networks (PANs) with high levels of security. It can connect several devices, overcoming problems of synchronization. For example, a chip meeting the specifications of Bluetooth 4.0 can be used, together with a microphone and speaker. Speakerphone capabilities are built in the watch such as echo cancellation and make/receive calls. In the preferred embodiment a piezo speaker has been deployed. Other types of speakers are possible as well.
The two buttons 3 and 4 control all functions of the wearable communication device 1 other than setting time, which is performed by button 2, One button can be used to activate voice recognition, and use to, for example, initiate a call, e.g. “call home”.
In the case of an analog watch display, the analog watch movements may contain mechanisms for the watch hands to be adjusted according to signals sent by the Processor 43. It may also contain mechanisms for the hand positions to be sensed by the Processor. The analog watch may therefore be set accurately by the Processor, which receives time information over Bluetooth from the phone.
A processor 43 controls the operation of the watch disclosed including a microphone 44, a speaker 45, a vibration motor 500, motion sensors as a 3-axis accelerometer 46, a magnetometer 47, a gyroscope 48, an IR proximity sensor 405, and a touch sensor 406 connected to a capacitive touch panel 407.
Furthermore the processor 43 controls a Bluetooth (BT) chipset 49 which may comprise a regular BT chip and/or a Bluetooth low energy chip. Both used for communication to a phone, smartphone or another BT-device 401.
Moreover a Near Field Communication (NFC) chip 402 can be provided in the watch disclosed. It allows “bump”-type feature to transfer data from a cell phone to the watch, for instance for admission control, as used e.g. on subways in Taiwan, China, or Tokyo subways to eliminate the need for a separate subway card.
For the power supply of the watch is a micro USB-port 403 provided, which enables charging of the main battery 404. The main battery 404 provides power to all components of the watch requiring power.
Multiple similar devices can be synchronized via star or mesh network for multi-point motion sensing. For example, an arm-swing movement detected can cause a punching sound to be produced, in a “hand-combat” game. Two players may be networked with their watches synchronized, and depending on the velocity and 3-D locations of the watches, may be playing against each other with suitable sounds being generated to simulate the opponents being hit. Another example may be simulation of musical instrument sounds such as drum and guitar, and multiple players may engage in generating sounds synchronized with their watch movements, in a kind of “air-instruments” game, while background music is being played.
Motion sensors such as accelerometer 20, magnetometer 21 and gyroscope 22 can be used to sense movement of the user's arm/wrist, determining velocity, direction, and displacement vector in 3-D space, which can be used as input selection for a smart phone application or together with an audio generation device for gaming applications. For example, an incoming call can be accepted by swinging the wrist in the horizontal direction, or vice versa rejected by swinging in the vertical direction. More complex motion up to full 3-D displacement can be determined by combining data generated by the accelerometer, magnetometer and gyroscope.
a shows a preferred embodiment of the IR proximity sensors for detection of finger motion. The IR sensors can be worn on the lower side of the arm to follow better the movement of the fingers.
Multiple devices can be synchronized via star or mesh network for multi-point motion sensing. Motion data can be tagged with time-stamp, sent wirelessly over Bluetooth using SCO packets, so that data from multiple devices are time-synchronized to each other. Multiple gaming controllers can be playing one game with audio and vibration feedback to each user in real time, all synchronized to each other.
Moreover through an application (app) on a Smart Phone or through a web portal a user can utilize the equivalent of paper ‘post-it notes’, which will be sent to the watch. Using hand gestures, as shown in
It should be noted that the user can browse through menus using the wrist watch. The wrist watch has a small display, and an accelerometer. Therefore the user can browse through them by tilting the watch up/down/sideways, and select by a vertical shake, and exit/reject using a horizontal shake. This can be used by the user to view the contact list, and call them without touching the watch, or phone. As outlined above the watch can be used to look at post-it notes and also as a remote control.
b shows the normal orientation of the watch on the hand. Followed are some key functions of the watch which can be used in conjunction with hand/wrist orientation and/or movement:
Motion sensing can also allow applications for the wearable communication device such as
It should be noted that the sound comes from the watch itself, different than prior art devices.
Furthermore a vibrator motor of the watch can be used for haptic feedback, e.g. in combination with motion sensors to provide force effects for drums, punch-ups, etc.
Moreover the watch may be equipped with one or more infrared (IR) proximity sensors. These sensors can be deployed on the watch and/or watch bands to sense finger movements. The IR proximity sensors may be used for hand gesture input. The IR proximity sensors, mounted on wrist band with focus towards inside palm of hand, sense for example finger movements. The IR proximity sensors work by sensing heat, determining distance, and triangulating to determine position. Gaming applications can be provided by the IR proximity sensors of the watch, such as air guitar.
An important feature is also voice recognition. One exemplary application is for an incoming call, with the user saying “yes” to answer the call or “no” to decline and send the caller to a voicemail application. Other commands are of course possible to accept or to decline a call as well, especially considering other languages. The voice commands can also be used for other functions. It should be noted that this feature implements true hands-free use. More generally, voice command may be used to generate an action. Furthermore an incoming call could first turn on voice recognition; otherwise voice recognition can be left off to save power.
A list of exemplary actions which can be activated by voice recognition comprises read/send text; make/receive calls, read notifications, any internet searches as supported by any browsers, activating other phone apps, local settings for phone or watch (e.g. ringer off, mute on/off).
For low power consumption, sensors are configured so that only the sensors and the operations necessary to detect the specific user interface actions are activated at a given state of the device. For example, an incoming call may be answered by the user speaking either “yes” or “no”, or alternatively either a horizontal or a vertical wave of the watch. In this case the microphone and audio input circuitry is activated, but the voice recognition engine may be limited to a small vocabulary of the two words only. The accelerometer may be activated to detect the hand wave, but the sampling rate may be kept very low as it is only required to distinguish between two different axes of motion.
The following is an example list of parameters that can be adjusted to reduce power consumption:
A set of specific settings of the above parameters would be associated with each state of the device, so that the device power consumption is optimized dynamically with the device functions.
While the disclosure has been particularly shown and described with reference to the preferred embodiments thereof, it will be understood by those skilled in the art that various changes in form and details may be made without departing from the spirit and scope of the disclosure.
This application claims priority to U.S. provisional patent application Ser. No. 61/682,804 filed Aug. 14, 2012, which is owned by a common assignee, and which is herein incorporated by reference in its entirety. This application claims priority to U.S. provisional patent application Ser. No. 61/682,814 filed Aug. 14, 2012, which is owned by a common assignee, and which is herein incorporated by reference in its entirety. This application claims priority to U.S. provisional patent application Ser. No. 61/681,791 filed Aug. 10, 2012, which is owned by a common assignee, and which is herein incorporated by reference in its entirety.
| Number | Date | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 61682804 | Aug 2012 | US | |
| 61682814 | Aug 2012 | US | |
| 61681791 | Aug 2012 | US |
