RF Pulse Synchronization for Data Acquisition Operations

• US 20080165157A1
• Filed: 01/05/2007
• Published: 07/10/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 01/05/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Apple Inc.
• Original Assignee: Apple Computer Incorporated (Apple Inc.)
• Inventors: Mullens, Christopher Tenzin, Fu, Jack I-Chieh
• Granted Patent: US 7,852,325 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 345/174
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0416 Control or interface arrangements specially adapted for digitisers
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/04166 Details of scanning methods, e.g. sampling time, grouping of sub areas or time sharing with display driving Synchronisation with the driving of the display or the backlighting unit to avoid interferences generated internally G06F3/04184
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/044 by capacitive means
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0446 using a grid-like structure of electrodes in at least two directions, e.g. using row and column electrodes
• CPC Class Codes: H04B 15/00 Suppression or limitation of noise or interference by means associated with receiver H04B1/10
• CPC Class Codes: H04B 2215/066 by stopping a clock generator
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 1/724 User interfaces specially adapted for cordless or mobile telephones
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 1/74 with means for reducing interference; with means for reducing effects due to line faults
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 2250/22 including a touch pad, a touch sensor or a touch detector digitizers for touch screens G06F3/041

Abstract

Data acquisition from a touch-surface input unit may be disrupted during the generation of radio frequency (“RF”) pulses. To mitigate this problem, touch-surface data acquisition is temporarily halted during RF pulse generation. Data collected prior to temporarily halting is retained, with subsequently acquired data being added to prior collected data.

Claims

1. A method to acquire sensor data from a touch-surface, the touch surface being used for user-input in an electronic device that provides radio frequency (“

RF”

) communications capability, comprising;

acquiring first data from a first set of sensors associated with a touch-surface;

recording the first data;

acquiring second data from a second set of sensors associated with the touch-surface; and

recording the second data if a first RF pulse is not detected during the act of acquiring the second data, else discarding the second data and repeating the act of acquiring the second data after the first RF pulse terminates.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising acquiring additional data from each of one or more additional sets of sensors associated with the touch-surface, wherein the combination of the first, second and additional data comprise a first frame of data.

3. The method of claim 2, further comprising initiating acquisition of a second frame of data a specified time period after the first frame of data is acquired.

4. The method of claim 2, further comprising initiating acquisition of a second frame of data a specified time period after the act of acquiring the first data was initiated.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the electronic device comprises a portable electronic device.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the touch-surface comprises a two-dimensional array of sensors and each of the first, second and third sets of sensors comprise at least one row of sensors.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein each sensor associated with the touch-surface is in a single set of sensors.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the RF communications capability includes the RF transmission of voice information.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the RF communications capability includes the RF transmission of digital data.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein the touch-surface comprises a capacitive touch-surface.

11. The method of claim 1, wherein the RF communications comprise RF communications that conform to a global system for mobile communications standard.

12. A program storage device, readable by a programmable control device, comprising instructions stored on the program storage device for causing the programmable control device to perform acts in accordance with claim 1.

13. A method to avoid capturing touch-surface input during radio frequency (“

RF”

) pulses in an electronic device, comprising;

acquiring first data from a first set of sensors associated with a touch-surface;

recording the first data;

acquiring second data from a second set of sensors associated with the touch-surface if a RF pulse is not being generated and, if the RF pulse is being generated, postponing acquisition of the second data from the second set of sensors until after the RF pulse terminates; and

recording the second data and identifying a third set of sensors associated with the touch-surface if a subsequent RF pulse is not detected during the act of acquiring the second data and, if the subsequent RF pulse is detected, discarding the second data and waiting until after the subsequent RF pulse terminates to repeat the act of acquiring the second data.

14. The method of claim 13, further comprising acquiring additional data from each of one or more additional sets of sensors associated with the touch-surface, wherein the combination of the first, second and third data comprise a frame of data.

15. The method of claim 14, further comprising initiating acquisition of a second frame of data a specified time period after the act of acquiring the first data is begun.

16. The method of claim 13, wherein the electronic device comprises a hand-held electronic device.

17. The method of claim 13, wherein the electronic device comprises an electronic device capable of providing mobile telephone functionality.

18. The method of claim 17, wherein the mobile telephone functionality conforms to a global system for mobile communications standard.

19. The method of claim 13, wherein the touch-surface comprises a two-dimensional grid of capacitive sensor elements.

20. The method of claim 19, wherein the act of acquiring data from the second set of sensors comprises acquiring data from one row of sensors.

21. The method of claim 19, wherein the act of acquiring data from the second set of sensors comprises acquiring data from two or more rows of sensors.

22. The method of claim 13, wherein each sensor associated with the touch-surface is associated with only a single set of sensors.

23. The method of claim 13, wherein each act of acquiring comprises acquiring data at a single sampling frequency.

24. The method of claim 13, wherein each act of acquiring comprises acquiring data at two or more sampling frequencies.

25. The method of claim 13, wherein the act of recording comprises storing acquired data in a memory.

26. The method of claim 25, wherein the act of storing comprises storing acquired data in a buffer memory.

27. A program storage device, readable by a programmable control device, comprising instructions stored on the program storage device for causing the programmable control device to perform acts in accordance with claim 13.

28. A method to acquire data from a touch-surface, the touch-surface comprising a plurality of sets of sensors and being used for user input in a portable electronic device, the portable electronic device providing telephone functionality, comprising:

acquiring first data from a first set of sensors associated with the touch-surface;

storing the first data;

identifying a second set of sensors associated with the touch-surface;

determining if a first radio frequency (“

RF”

) pulse is being generated and—

if the first RF pulse is not being generated, acquiring second data from the second set of sensors, else

postponing acquisition of the second data until after the first RF pulse terminates; and

determining if a second RF pulse was initiated during the act of acquiring the second data, the second RF pulse being generated after the first RF pulse and before any other RF pulse, and—

if the second RF pulse is not detected, storing the second data, identifying a third set of sensors associated with the touch-surface and repeating the acts of determining for the third set of sensors, else

discarding the second data and repeating the acts of determining for the second set of sensors.

29. The method of claim 28, wherein the portable electronic device is adapted to provide at least one functionality in addition to the telephone functionality.

30. The method of claim 29, wherein the at least one functionality in addition to the telephone functionality comprises video playback functionality.

31. The method of claim 29, wherein the at least one functionality in addition to the telephone functionality comprises audio playback functionality.

32. The method of claim 29, wherein the at least one functionality in addition to the telephone functionality comprises address book functionality.

33. The method of claim 29, wherein the at least one functionality in addition to the telephone functionality comprises web browser functionality.

34. The method of claim 29, wherein the at least one functionality in addition to the telephone functionality comprises calendar functionality.

35. The method of claim 28, wherein the touch-surface comprises a capacitance-based touch-surface.

36. The method of claim 28, wherein the touch-surface comprises a two-dimensional grid of sensors.

37. The method of claim 36, wherein each of the first, second and third sets of sensors comprise at least one row of sensors.

38. The method of claim 37, wherein each sensor is in a single set of sensors.

39. The method of claim 28, wherein the acts of identifying and determining are repeated until data from all sensors associated with the touch-surface has been acquired.

40. A program storage device, readable by a programmable control device, comprising instructions stored on the program storage device for causing the programmable control device to perform acts in accordance with claim 28.

41. A portable electronic device providing telephone functionality, comprising:

a radio frequency (“

RF”

) generation circuit;

a RF pulse detection circuit, operatively coupled to the RF generation circuit, for indicating when a RF pulse is being generated by the RF generation circuit;

a touch-surface sensor array for detecting user input;

a sense circuit, operatively coupled to sensors in the touch-surface sensor array, for acquiring data from the sensors in the touch-surface sensor array; and

a control circuit, operatively coupled to the RF pulse detection circuit and the sense circuit, for controlling the sense circuit, the control circuit adapted to—

cause the sense circuit to acquire first data from a first set of sensors associated with the touch-surface sensor array,

cause the first data to be recorded,

cause the sense circuit to acquire second data from a second set of sensors associated with the touch-surface sensor array if the RF pulse detection circuit indicates a first RF pulse was not generated during the act of acquiring the second data, else to cause the sense circuit to acquire the second data after the first RF pulse has terminated, and

cause the second data to be recorded and to identify a third set of sensors associated with the touch-surface sensor array if the RF pulse detection circuit indicates a subsequent RF pulse was not generated prior to causing the second data to be recorded and, if the RF pulse detection circuit indicates the subsequent RF pulse was being generating prior to causing the second data to be recorded, to discard the second data and to wait until the RF pulse detection circuit indicates the subsequent RF pulse has terminated before causing the control circuit to retry acquisition of the second data and, following the recording of the second data.

42. The portable electronic device of claim 41, wherein the control circuit is further adapted to cause the sense circuit to acquire and record third data from the third set of sensors in a manner equivalent to that described in claim 41 for the second set of sensors.

43. The portable electronic device of claim 41, wherein the control circuit is further adapted to cause the sense circuit to acquire additional data from one or more additional sets of sensors associated with the touch-surface sensor array, wherein the combination of the first, second, third and additional data comprise a first frame of data.

44. The portable electronic device of claim 43, wherein the control circuit is further adapted to cause a second frame of data to be acquired a specified period of time after acquisition of the first frame was initiated.

45. The portable electronic device of claim 43, wherein the control circuit is further adapted to cause a second frame of data to be acquired a specified period of time after the first frame acquired.

46. The portable electronic device of claim 41, wherein the touch-surface comprises a two-dimensional array of capacitive sensors.

47. The portable electronic device of claim 46, wherein each of the first, second and third sets of sensors comprise non-overlapping groups of sensors.

48. The portable electronic device of claim 47, wherein each group of sensors comprise at least one row of sensors.

49. An electronic device for providing radio frequency (“

RF”

) communication capability, comprising;

a touch-surface having a plurality of sets of sensors;

a RF generation circuit for generating RF pulses;

a RF detection circuit for detecting when a RF pulse is being generating by the RF generation circuit; and

means, operatively coupled to the touch-surface and the RF detection circuit, for acquiring data from each of the plurality of the sets of sensors in turn only during the time when the RF detection circuit indicates no RF pulse is being generated by the RF generation circuit and, further, for discarding data acquired from a set of sensors if said acquisition was not completed prior to the RF detection circuit indicating the RF generation circuit has initiated generation of a RF pulse.

50. The electronic device of claim 49, wherein the electronic device comprises a hand-held electronic device.

51. The electronic device of claim 49, wherein the electronic device comprises a mobile telephone.

52. The electronic device of claim 49, wherein the electronic device further provides at least one additional functional capability.

53. The portable electronic device of claim 52, wherein the at least one additional functional capability comprises video playback functionality.

54. The portable electronic device of claim 52, wherein the at least one additional functional capability comprises audio playback functionality.

55. The portable electronic device of claim 52, wherein the at least one additional functional capability comprises address book functionality.

56. The portable electronic device of claim 52, wherein the at least one additional functional capability comprises web browser functionality.

57. The portable electronic device of claim 52, wherein the at least one additional functional capability comprises calendar functionality.