SELECTIVE TOUCH SCAN AREA AND REPORTING TECHNIQUES

• US 20140204035A1
• Filed: 01/24/2013
• Published: 07/24/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 01/24/2013
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Nook Digital, LLC (f/k/a Barnesandnoble.com LLC) (Bahwan CyberTek Pvt Ltd.)
• Original Assignee: Nook Digital, LLC (f/k/a Barnesandnoble.com LLC) (Bahwan CyberTek Pvt Ltd.)
• Inventors: Chang, Songan Andy
• Granted Patent: US 9,836,154 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 345/173
• 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

Abstract

Techniques are disclosed for selective area scanning, touch scanning, and/or reporting of touch screen contacts in electronic touch sensitive devices. The selective area scanning can be used to only scan a specific section of a touch screen area, the selective touch scanning can be used to scan only for specific touches or input sources on a touch screen, and the selective reporting can be used to selectively report only desired contacts to a device processor and reject all other contacts. Multiple selective scan areas can be provisioned, with each discrete area customizable with respect to location, size, accepted touch types and/or reporting criteria. En some cases the user can configure some or all of these selective screen features.

Claims

1. An electronic device, comprising:

a processor;

a touch screen display for displaying content to a user and allowing user input; and

a touch screen controller in communication with the processor for selectively scanning the touch screen display and/or selectively reporting to the processor contacts detected on the touch screen display.

2. The device of claim 1 wherein selectively scanning the touch screen display includes scanning only a portion of the touch screen display area.

3. The device of claim 2 wherein the portion of the touch screen display area is user configurable.

4. The device of claim 1 wherein selectively scanning the touch screen display includes scanning for only a specific user input.

5. The device of claim 4 wherein the specific user input includes at least one of a finger contact, an active stylus input resulting from direct or proximate contact, and/or a capacitive stylus contact.

6. The device of claim 1 wherein selectively reporting to the processor includes reporting to the processor only contacts from a specific user input source and rejecting all other contacts, wherein the specific user input source includes at least one of direct and/or proximate contact with respect to the touch screen display.

7. The device of claim 1 wherein selectively reporting to the processor includes reporting to the processor only specific types of user contact and rejecting all other contacts.

8. The device of claim 7 wherein specific types of user contact include at least one of a tap gesture, a multi-point contact, a press-and-hold contact, a pinch gesture, a sweeping gesture, and/or a multi-contact sweeping gesture.

9. The device of claim 1 wherein the device is an eReader device or a tablet computer or a smartphone.

10. The device of claim 1 wherein functions of the touch screen controller are user configurable.

11. The device of claim 1 wherein selectively scanning the touch screen display and/or selectively reporting to the processor includes scanning a plurality of discrete sections of the touch screen display and reporting to the processor distinct user contacts detected within each of the discrete sections.

12. A system, comprising:

a touch screen controller configured to selectively scan an area of a touch sensitive screen and to selectively report specific user contacts detected on the touch sensitive screen to a processor, wherein all other user contacts detected on the touch sensitive screen are discarded by the touch screen controller.

13. The system of claim 12 wherein the device is an eReader device or a tablet computer or a smartphone.

14. The system of claim 12 wherein the controller is configured to scan multiple discrete areas within the entire touch screen area.

15. The system of claim 12 wherein the controller is configured to scan only for a specific user input source.

16. The system of claim 12 wherein the controller is configured to report to the processor only specific user contacts and discard all other user contacts detected, wherein the specific user contacts include at least one of a tap gesture, a multi-point contact, a press-and-hold contact, a pinch gesture, a sweeping gesture, and/or a multi-contact sweeping gesture.

17. A computer readable medium encoded with instructions that when executed by one or more processors, cause a process to be carried out, the process comprising:

selectively scanning an area of a touch screen display; and

selectively reporting to a processor user inputs detected on the touch screen display.

18. The computer readable medium of claim 17 wherein selectively scanning an area of a touch screen display includes scanning only a portion of the touch screen area.

19. The computer readable medium of claim 17 wherein selectively scanning an area of the touch screen display includes scanning the touch screen area for only a specific user input source.

20. The computer readable medium of claim 17 wherein selectively reporting to a processor includes reporting only specific user inputs to the processor and discarding all other inputs at a touch screen controller.