Information Handling System Virtualized Pointing Device Support Between Multiple Protocols

• US 20170031464A1
• Filed: 07/30/2015
• Published: 02/02/2017
• Est. Priority Date: 07/30/2015
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Dell Products LP (Dell Technologies Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Dell Products LP (Dell Technologies Inc.)
• Inventors: Montero, Adolfo S.
• Granted Patent: US 9,916,021 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 13/4282 on a serial bus, e.g. I2C bus, SPI bus on daisy chain buses G06F13/4247
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2213/0016 Inter-integrated circuit (I2C)
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/03543 Mice or pucks G06F3/03541 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/03547 Touch pads, in which fingers can move on a surface
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/038 Control and interface arrangements therefor, e.g. drivers or device-embedded control circuitry

Abstract

An information handling system having a precision touch pad (PTP) touch input device interfaced through a multi-drop serial link with a processor sends information passing through the serial link to an embedded controller. The embedded controller translates the PTP information into legacy PS2 touch device inputs and forwards the inputs to the processor to provide touch inputs during states in which the processor cannot process information provided through the PTP serial link, such as when the operating system is not active or does not have native support for PTP.

Claims

1. An information handling system comprising:

a housing;

a processor disposed in the housing and operable to execute instructions to process information;

a memory disposed in the housing and interfaced with the processor, the memory operable to store the information;

a display interfaced with the processor and memory, the display operable to present the information as visual images;

an input device operable to detect end user touches and generate touch information from the touches in a first protocol;

an embedded controller disposed in the housing and interfaced with the processor, the embedded controller operable to execute firmware instructions to manage predetermined functions of the information handling system; and

a serial link interfacing the input device and the processor to communicate the touch information to the processor, the serial link further interfaced with the embedded controller to share the touch information with the embedded controller;

wherein the embedded controller is further operable to accept the touch information in the first protocol, translate the touch information to a second protocol and forward the touch information in the second protocol to the processor.

2. The information handling system of claim 1 wherein the first protocol comprises a precision touch pad protocol and the second protocol comprises a PS2 mouse input protocol.

3. The information handling system of claim 1 further comprising an operating system executing on the processor and accepting the touch information in the first protocol, the processor using the touch information in the second protocol when the operating system is unable to process touch information in the first protocol.

4. The information handling system of claim 3 further comprising a mouse stack disable module integrated in the operating system and operable to command the embedded controller to disable touch inputs forwarded in the second protocol when the operating system is able to process touch information in the first protocol.

5. The portable information handling system of claim 1 wherein the serial link comprises an I2C link having a multidrop topology to share touch information with the embedded controller.

6. The information handling system of claim 1 wherein the input device comprises a touchpad integrated in the housing.

7. The information handling system of claim 1 wherein the input device comprises a mouse.

8. The information handling system of claim 1 wherein the input device commands the embedded controller to translate the touch information when the input device lacks an operating system interface and to cease translating the touch information when the input device has an operating system interface.

9. A method for processing touch inputs at an information handling system, the method comprising:

detecting touch inputs at a touch device;

converting the touch inputs into a first protocol for communication to an operating system executing on a processor through a serial link;

sharing the communication by the serial link with an embedded controller;

converting the touch inputs at the embedded controller from the first protocol into a second protocol; and

communicating the touch inputs in the second protocol from the embedded controller to the processor.

10. The method of claim 9 wherein communicating the touch inputs in the second protocol from the embedded controller to the processor further comprises communicating the touch inputs as PS2 mouse inputs to the processor through a legacy interface.

11. The method of claim 9 further comprising:

communicating the touch inputs in the first protocol to a processor running the operating system;

determining that the operating system is processing the touch inputs in the first protocol; and

in response to determining, commanding the embedded controller to stop communicating the touch inputs to the processor.

12. The method of claim 11 wherein commanding the embedded controller to stop communicating the touch inputs to the processor further comprises sending a command to the embedded controller from the operating system.

13. The method of claim 11 wherein commanding the embedded controller to stop communicating the touch inputs to the processor further comprises sending a command to the embedded controller from the touch device.

14. The method of claim 9 wherein the first protocol comprises I2C formatted communications and the second protocol comprises PS2 mouse formatted communications.

15. The method of claim 9 wherein the first protocol comprises USB formatted communications and the second protocol comprises PS2 mouse formatted communications.

16. The method of claim 9 wherein the sharing the communication comprises a multidrop communication directed from the link between the touch device and operating system towards the embedded controller.

17. A system for managing communications between a touch device and an operating system, the system comprising:

an embedded controller having processing resources and firmware instructions that execute on the processing resources, the embedded controller further having a physical output to provide touch device information to a processor and a physical input to accept touch device information from a touch device in a serial protocol;

a serial pointing device converter stored in non-transitory memory accessible by the embedded controller and operable to convert the touch device information from the serial protocol into a legacy touch device protocol; and

a legacy touch device stack stored in non-transitory memory accessible by the embedded controller and operable to communicate the converted touch device information to the physical output.

18. The system of claim 17 wherein the physical input to accept touch information at the embedded controller comprises a multidrop interface from an I2C link between the touch device and the processor.

19. The system of claim 17 wherein the serial protocol comprises a precision touch pad protocol and the legacy touch device protocol comprises a PS2 mouse touch protocol.

20. The system of claim 17 wherein the touch device selectively commands the embedded controller to stop communicating converted touch device information to the pin out if the touch device establishes bi-directional communication with an operating system executing on the processor.

21. The system of claim 17 wherein the embedded controller detects an operating system type, determines the detected operating system is capable of native support of the serial protocol, and in response to detecting the operating system as operational, ceases communicating the converted touch device information.