Adaptable User Interface and Mechanism for a Title Portable Electronic Device

• US 20080204463A1
• Filed: 02/27/2007
• Published: 08/28/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 02/27/2007
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: Motorola Mobility, Inc. (Lenovo Group Ltd.)
• Original Assignee: Motorola Mobility, Inc. (Lenovo Group Ltd.)
• Inventors: Zhuang, Zhiming, Foo, Ken K., Cybart, Adam, Cranfill, David B., Emmert, Steve C., Daverman, R. Dodge D., Baciu, Paul N.
• Application Number:
  US11/679,233
• Publication Number:
  US 20080204463A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 345/520
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 1/1662 Details related to the integrated keyboard
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 1/1692 the I/O peripheral being a secondary touch screen used as control interface, e.g. virtual buttons or sliders
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0238 Programmable keyboards key guide holders G06F3/0224
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0443 using a single layer of sensing electrodes
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 1/23 Construction or mounting of dials or of equivalent devices; Means for facilitating the use thereof by improving visibility H04M1/22
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 1/233 including a pointing device, e.g. roller key, track ball, rocker switch or joystick constructional details of pointing devices per se G06F3/033
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 1/72466 with selection means, e.g. keys, having functions defined by the mode or the status of the device
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 2250/22 including a touch pad, a touch sensor or a touch detector digitizers for touch screens G06F3/041

Abstract

A multimodal electronic device (100) includes a shutter enabled dynamic keypad for presenting one of a plurality of keypad configurations to a user. Each keypad configuration, which is presented by an optical shutter (204) that opens or closes windows or shutters that are geometrically configured as alphanumeric or device keys or symbols. Each keypad configuration, in one embodiment, is limited to those needed for the particular mode of operation of the device (100). The optical shutter (204) is a low-resolution display that presents user actuation targets to a user in a low-resolution key area. As each mode of the device changes, the corresponding keypad configuration presented changes accordingly.

Claims

1. A mobile device having a user interface comprising:

a front surface comprising a scroll device;

a display for presenting information to a user;

a dynamic user input interface configured to present different indicators across the user interface in areas other than the display; and

a capacitive sensor configured to detect objects proximate to the different indicators.

2. The mobile device of claim 1, wherein the user interface comprises a segmented optical shutter that is selectively controllable so as to present different keypad configurations corresponding to different operational modes of the mobile device across the display.

3. The mobile device of claim 1, wherein the scroll device comprises a scroll wheel.

4. The mobile device of claim 3, wherein the scroll wheel comprises a tactile guide.

5. The mobile device of claim 1, wherein the scroll device is configured to permit selection between operating modes of the mobile device.

6. The mobile device of claim 5, wherein the operating modes comprises one of a radiotelephone mode, a navigational mode, a gaming mode, a music player mode, a video player mode, a picture display mode, a text capture mode, a picture capture mode, or a video capture mode.

7. The mobile device of claim 1, wherein the front surface comprises a display region, a dynamic keypad region and a navigation region.

8. The mobile device of claim 7, wherein the scroll device is disposed within the navigation region.