INPUT COMMANDS

• US 20130159555A1
• Filed: 12/20/2011
• Published: 06/20/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 12/20/2011
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Rosser, Peter D., Klein, Christian, Young, Anthony R., Choudhury, Arnab, Tudor, Alexander D.
• Application Number:
  US13/331,886
• Publication Number:
  US 20130159555A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 710/5
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2203/0381 Multimodal input, i.e. interface arrangements enabling the user to issue commands by simultaneous use of input devices of different nature, e.g. voice plus gesture on digitizer
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/038 Control and interface arrangements therefor, e.g. drivers or device-embedded control circuitry

Abstract

Input command techniques are described. In one or more implementations, a computing device processes one or more inputs that are received from one or more input sources to determine a command that corresponds to the one or more inputs. The command is exposed to one or more controls that are implemented as software that is executed on the computing device and that have subscribed to the command.

Claims

1. A method comprising:

processing one or more inputs by a computing device that are received from one or more input sources to determine a command that corresponds to the one or more inputs; and

exposing the command to one or more controls that are implemented as software that is executed on the computing device and that have subscribed to the command.

2. A method as described in claim 1, wherein the processing is configured to be performed for a plurality of different types of input sources.

3. A method as described in claim 2, wherein the exposing of the command is performed such that the command is not indicative of the type of input source used to provide the command.

4. A method as described in claim 1, wherein the processing is configured to be performed responsive to a determination that the one or more controls have subscribed to the command.

5. A method as described in claim 1, wherein the processing includes processing an output of a translation module that is configured to translate source-specific information of a corresponding said input source to an application-readable format.

6. A method as described in claim 5, wherein the translation module is implemented as one or more device drivers.

7. A method as described in claim 1, wherein the processing includes normalization of the one or more inputs to produce a lower-bandwidth representation of the one or more inputs.

8. A method as described in claim 1, wherein the processing includes conversion of input-specific data into the command such that the command includes command-specific data that is semantically relevant to the command.

9. A method as described in claim 1, wherein:

the processing includes a determination of whether to invoke the command based on the one or more input sources and a definition of the command; and

the exposing is performed responsive to the determination that the command is to be invoked.

10. A method as described in claim 1, wherein the determination is based on a threshold included in the definition of the command or upon successful recognition of the one or more inputs.

11. A method as described in claim 1, wherein the exposing is performed via message passing, event, or setting a state that is polled by the software that implements the one or more controls on the computing device.

12. A system comprising:

an adaptation module implemented at least partially in hardware of a computing device to convert one or more inputs received from one or more input sources into one or more corresponding commands; and

a notification module implemented at least partially in hardware of the computing device to notify one or more controls of the computing device of the one or more commands.

13. A system as described in claim 12, further comprising a normalization module implemented at least partially in hardware of the computing device as a device driver to normalize data from the one or more input sources into a lower-bandwidth representation of the data, the lower-bandwidth representation configured for processing by the adaptation module.

14. A system as described in claim 12, further comprising a translation module implemented at least partially in hardware of the computing device to translate data from the one or more input sources from source-specific information into a format that is understandable by the adaptation module.

15. A system as described in claim 12, wherein the adaptation module is configured to process inputs from a plurality of different types of input sources into one or more corresponding commands that are not indicative of the type of input sources used to provide the one or more inputs.

16. A method comprising:

processing a first input by a computing device that is received from a first input source to determine a command that corresponds to the first input;

responsive to the processing of the first input, exposing the command to one or more controls that are implemented as software that is executed on the computing device;

processing a second input by a computing device that is received from a second input source to determine that the command corresponds to the second input, the second input source of a type that is different than the first input source; and

responsive to the processing of the second input, exposing the command to the one or more controls.

17. A method as described in claim 16, wherein at least one of the first or second inputs is input via a gesture.

18. A method as described in claim 17, wherein the other of the first or second inputs is not input via a gesture.

19. A method as described in claim 16, wherein the exposing of the first and second commands is performed for the one or more controls responsive to receiving a subscription from the one or more controls to the command.

20. A method as described in claim 16, wherein the exposing of the first and second commands is performed without indicating a respective said type of the first and second input sources, respectively.