METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR IMPLEMENTING MULTIPLE DIAL PADS ON A PORTABLE ELECTRONIC DEVICE

• US 20100173668A1
• Filed: 01/08/2009
• Published: 07/08/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 01/08/2009
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: Malikie Innovations Limited (Key Patent Innovations Limited)
• Original Assignee: Malikie Innovations Limited (Key Patent Innovations Limited)
• Inventors: Marui, Keizo, Groux, Brian, Kuhl, Larry
• Application Number:
  US12/350,752
• Publication Number:
  US 20100173668A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 455/556.100
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 1/1626 with a single-body enclosure integrating a flat display, e.g. Personal Digital Assistants [PDAs]
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 1/1643 the display being associated to a digitizer, e.g. laptops that can be used as penpads details related to the relative motion of the display enclosure with respect to the body enclosure, e.g. to move between laptop and tablet PC configuration G06F1/1615
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 1/1694 the I/O peripheral being a single or a set of motion sensors for pointer control or gesture input obtained by sensing movements of the portable computer
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2200/1637 Sensing arrangement for detection of housing movement or orientation, e.g. for controlling scrolling or cursor movement on the display of an handheld computer
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/017 Gesture based interaction, e.g. based on a set of recognized hand gestures interaction based on gestures traced on a digitiser G06F3/04883
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0233 Character input methods
• 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 2250/22 including a touch pad, a touch sensor or a touch detector

Abstract

A portable electronic device that allows a user to dial a telephone number using a first dial pad configuration selected from more than one dial pad configuration stored in a memory of the portable electronic device. The device may include a touch screen display, and the first dial pad configurations can include a rotary dial configuration and a writing zone configuration. The portable electronic device may also include an accelerometer, in which case the first dial pad configuration may also include a configuration that requires a user to wave the portable electronic device in the air as if to write a digit.

Claims

1. A portable electronic device comprising:

a display;

a communication system that allows the portable electronic device to send and receive wireless communications; and

a first embedded dial pad configuration selected from more than one dial pad configuration stored in a memory of the portable electronic device, the first dial pad configuration enabling a user of the portable electronic device to dial and call a telephone number using the display and the communication system.

2. The device of claim 1, wherein the display is a capacitive touch screen display.

3. The device of claim 2, wherein the first dial pad configuration is a virtual rotary dial pad on the display.

4. The device of claim 2, wherein the first dial pad configuration is a writing zone on the display, and the telephone number is input by interpreting symbols written in the writing zone.

5. The device of claim 4, wherein the symbols are digits.

6. The device of claim 1, further comprising an accelerometer.

7. The device of claim 6, wherein the first dial pad configuration requires that the device be waved in the shape of digits to be dialed.

8. The device of claim 6, wherein the first dial pad configuration requires that the device be waved in motions that the device associates with digits to be dialed.

9. A method of dialing a telephone number using a portable electronic device, the method comprising:

selecting a first dial pad configuration for dialing telephone numbers using the portable electronic device, the first dial pad configuration being selected from more than one configuration embedded in a memory of the portable electronic device.

10. The method of claim 9, wherein the selected first dial pad configuration is a rotary dial pad configuration.

11. The method of claim 10, further comprising using a capacitive touch screen display to display the virtual rotary dial pad and to input a dialed telephone number based on movements of the virtual rotary dial pad.

12. The method of claim 11, wherein inputting a dialed telephone number comprises determining that a desired digit on the rotary dial pad has been dragged in a predetermined direction to a stopping point on the pad.

13. The method of claim 9, wherein the selected first dial pad configuration is a writing zone on a capacitive touch screen display.

14. The method of claim 13, wherein dialing a telephone number comprises determining that a desired digit was written on the capacitive touch screen display.

15. The method of claim 9, wherein the selected first dial pad configuration requires the portable electronic device to be moved in a manner corresponding to a digit.

16. The method of claim 15, further comprising using an accelerometer to determine motion of the portable electronic device.

17. A system for using hardware of a portable electronic device to dial a telephone number, the system comprising:

a portable electronic device that includes a capacitive touch screen display, a processor, a memory and an accelerometer; and

instructions stored in the memory and acted upon by the processor to render on the capacitive touch screen display one of multiple embedded dial pad configurations that utilize either the capacitive touch screen display or the accelerometer to dial a phone number.

18. The system of claim 17, wherein the instructions direct the processor to render a rotary dial pad on the capacitive touch screen display and to input and dial digits using the rotary dial pad.

19. The system of claim 17, wherein the instructions direct the processor to input and dial digits written on the capacitive touch screen display.

20. The system of claim 17, wherein the instructions direct the processor to input and dial digits based on movements of the portable electronic device that correspond to the digits to be dialed.