System and method for reducing occurrences of unintended operations in an electronic device

• US 8,890,823 B2
• Filed: 01/09/2012
• Issued: 11/18/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 01/09/2012
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Google Technology Holdings LLC (Alphabet Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Motorola Mobility LLC (Lenovo Group Ltd.)
• Inventors: Alameh, Rachid M., Dickinson, Timothy, Dietrich, Aaron L., Zurek, Robert A.
• Primary Examiner(s): NGUYEN, JENNIFER T
• Application Number:
  US13/346,298
• Publication Number:
  US 20130176264A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,044 Days
• Field of Search: 345173-178, 178 1801- 1906, 455/556.1, 455/556.2, 455/566
• US Class Current: 345/173
• 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 2203/04106 Multi-sensing digitiser, i.e. digitiser using at least two different sensing technologies simultaneously or alternatively, e.g. for detecting pen and finger, for saving power or for improving position detection
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0346 with detection of the device orientation or free movement in a 3D space, e.g. 3D mice, 6-DOF [six degrees of freedom] pointers using gyroscopes, accelerometers or tilt-sensors
• 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
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0414 using force sensing means to determine a position
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0418 for error correction or compensation, e.g. based on parallax, calibration or alignment

Abstract

A method of operating an electronic device, and an electronic device, are disclosed in which occurrences of unintended operations of the electronic device, such as can occur in response to inadvertent actuations of actuators of the electronic device, are reduced. In one example embodiment, the method 500 includes detecting 510 an actuation of a first sensor that is associated with a first touch-sensitive component of the electronic device, and acquiring 512 data from an additional sensor of the electronic device. The method also includes determining 518, based at least in part upon the data, whether the actuation is valid, and either performing 524 or refraining 522 from performing at least one operation based at least in part upon the determining. In at least one additional embodiment, the first sensor is a piezoelectric sensor and the additional sensor is an accelerometer.

Claims

1. An electronic device comprising:

a touch screen assembly including a piezoelectric sensor at least indirectly connected to a touchable lens surface;

a different sensor; and

at least one processing device connected at least indirectly to the piezoelectric sensor and to the different sensor,

wherein the at least one processing device is configured to determine whether an actuation of the piezoelectric sensor is invalid based at least in part upon information received by the processing device from the different sensor, and

wherein the at least one processing device is configured to cause the electronic device to refrain from performing, or to perform, at least one operation upon making a determination that the actuation is invalid,

wherein the at least one processing device is configured to determine whether the actuation is invalid based at least in part upon whether a component of a motion normal to a plane of the touchable lens surface exceeds a predetermined threshold, the motion being experienced by the electronic device and being detected by way of the different sensor.

2. The electronic device of claim 1, wherein the touch screen assembly is mounted in relation to a housing and further includes one or more printed circuit board (PCB) components and a light emitting diode (LED) display component positioned between the piezoelectric sensor and the touchable lens surface.

3. The electronic device of claim 1,

wherein the different sensor includes a motion sensor that includes one or more of:

an accelerometer, a gyro, an electronic compass, and a velocity sensor.

4. The electronic device of claim 1, further comprising:

an additional sensing device, wherein the processing device is configured to determine whether the actuation of the piezoelectric sensor is invalid based at least in part upon additional information received by the processing device from the additional sensing device.

5. The electronic device of claim 4, wherein the additional sensing device includes one or more of an infrared sensor, a camera, or a second touch-sensitive device.

6. The electronic device of claim 5 wherein the second touch-sensitive device comprises one or more of:

a capacitive, resistive, acoustic, ultrasonic proximity, or optical touch sensor.

7. The electronic device of claim 4, further comprising:

a memory portion in which are stored a plurality of information portions concerning a plurality of touch event exceptions, and wherein the processing device is configured to determine that the actuation of the piezoelectric sensor is invalid if contextual information sensed by the additional sensing device matches to a first of the information portions concerning a first of the touch event exceptions.

8. The electronic device of claim 1, wherein the electronic device includes one or more contextual sensors to determine contextual information, wherein the contextual sensors include one or more of a touch sensor, an acoustic sensor, a global positioning system (GPS) sensor, an accelerometer, an imager, a proximity sensor, a capacitive sensor, an environmental sensor, and a light sensor, and wherein the contextual information relates to one or more of a device location, a device speed, a manner of device handling, a device position, a device carry mode, and an environmental condition

9. The electronic device of claim 1, wherein the touch screen assembly includes a lens component and an arm component linking the lens component at least indirectly to the piezoelectric sensor, such that first movement of the lens component results in second movement of the piezoelectric sensor.

10. An electronic device comprising:

a touch screen assembly including a piezoelectric sensor at least indirectly connected to a touchable lens surface;

a motion sensor including one or more of an accelerometer, a gyro, an electronic compass, and a velocity sensor; and

at least one processing device connected at least indirectly to the piezoelectric sensor and to the motion sensor,

wherein the at least one processing device is configured to make a determination of whether an actuation of the piezoelectric sensor is invalid based at least in part upon information received by the processing device from the motion sensor, the information being indicative of whether a component of a motion normal to a plane of the touchable lens surface exceeds a predetermined threshold, and

wherein the at least one processing device is configured to cause the electronic device to refrain from performing, or to perform, at least one operation upon the determination.

11. The electronic device of claim 10, further comprising:

wherein the at least one processing device further receives additional information including user data, the user data concerning one or more of a user preference, a user setting, or a user specification,

wherein the motion sensor includes the accelerometer, and

wherein the at least one processing device is configured to make the determination also based at least in part upon each of;

(a) the additional information;

(b) and

whether an additional touch indication is detected as occurring substantially simultaneously with the actuation of the piezoelectric sensor.