Flexible user input device system

• US 9,176,665 B2
• Filed: 01/30/2008
• Issued: 11/03/2015
• Est. Priority Date: 01/30/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. (HP Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. (HP Inc.)
• Inventors: Mishra, Garima
• Primary Examiner(s): Moorad, Waseem
• Application Number:
  US12/011,931
• Publication Number:
  US 20090189865A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,834 Days
• Field of Search: 345/173
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/018 Input/output arrangements for oriental characters
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/04886 by partitioning the display area of the touch-screen or the surface of the digitising tablet into independently controllable areas, e.g. virtual keyboards or menus

Abstract

A flexible user input system, comprising a computing system having a display device and a flexible user input device with a touch screen display member, the flexible user input device configured to concurrently display at least two user input interface representations.

Claims

1. A computing system comprising:

a component providing processing and storage capability;

a display device; and

a flexible user input device with a touch screen display member, the flexible user input device configured to concurrently display a plurality of user input interface representations on the touch screen display member, wherein the plurality comprises at least two keyboard interface representations to receive user input for display on the display device and a touch pad interface representation comprising a mouse pad representation.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein the flexible user input device further comprises:

an optimization module configured to dynamically apportion the touch screen display member for each user input interface representation; and

a format module configured to size each of the user input interface representations based on an amount of space apportioned for each user input interface representation.

3. The system of claim 1, wherein the flexible user input device further comprises an optimization module configured to determine a layout of the user input interface representation on the touch screen display member based on a number of user input interface representations.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein the flexible user input device further comprises an ergonomic module configured to ergonomically size each input element of each user input interface representation.

5. The system of claim 1, wherein the flexible user input device further comprises an ergonomic module configured to determine if a quantity of user input interface representations to be displayed on the display member exceeds an ergonomic threshold set for the touch screen display member.

15. The system of claim 1, wherein the computing system is a desktop computer, the component comprising the processing and storage capability is a computing tower, and the display device is a monitor.

16. The system of claim 1, wherein the flexible user input device is wirelessly coupled to the display device.

6. A flexible user input device, comprising:

a touch screen display member configured to receive a user selection of user input interface representations to be concurrently displayed on the touch screen display member, wherein the touch screen display member is configured to automatically determine a layout for selected user input interface representations based on a quantity of the selected user input interface representations, and wherein the selected user input interface representations comprise at least two keyboard interface representations to receive user input for display on a display device and a touch pad interface representation comprising a mouse pad representation.

7. The flexible user input device of claim 6, wherein the selected user input interface representations are automatically sized to prevent exceeding an ergonomic threshold.

8. The flexible user input device of claim 6, wherein the selected user input interface representations are automatically sized based on a number and type of user input interface representations selected.

9. The flexible user input device of claim 6, wherein the selected user input interface representations are equally apportioned on a portion of the touch screen display member.

10. The flexible user input device of claim 6, wherein position of at least one selected user interface representations is dynamically interchangeable with another selected user interface representation.

17. The flexible user input device of claim 6, wherein the flexible user input device comprising the touch screen display member is configured to wirelessly couple to the display device.

11. A flexible user input device usage method, comprising:

configuring a touch screen display member for a computing system to concurrently display a plurality of user input interface representations, the computing system having a display device, and a flexible user input device comprising the touch screen display member, wherein the plurality of user input interface representations comprise at least two keyboard interface representations to receive user input for display on the display device and a touch pad interface representation comprising a mouse pad representation.

12. The method of claim 11, further comprising dynamically apportioning the touch screen display member for each user input interface representation, and sizing each user input interface representation for presentation on the touch screen display member based on an amount of space apportioned for each user input interface representation.

13. The method of claim 11, further comprising configuring a layout for the user input interface representations on the touch screen display member based on a number of user input interface representations.

14. The method of claim 11, further comprising ergonomically sizing each input element of each user input interface representation, and determining if a quantity of user input interface representations to be displayed on the display member exceeds an ergonomic threshold set for the touch screen display member.

18. The method of claim 11, configuring the flexible user input device to wirelessly couple to the display device.