Method and device for determining a touch gesture

• US 9,678,606 B2
• Filed: 04/19/2011
• Issued: 06/13/2017
• Est. Priority Date: 04/19/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Elo Touch Solutions, Inc.
• Original Assignee: Elo Touch Solutions, Inc.
• Inventors: Benhamouda, Franck
• Primary Examiner(s): NGUYEN, JENNIFER T
• Application Number:
  US13/641,825
• Publication Number:
  US 20130194226A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,247 Days
• Field of Search: 345173-177
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2203/04104 Multi-touch detection in digitiser, i.e. details about the simultaneous detection of a plurality of touching locations, e.g. multiple fingers or pen and finger
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2203/04808 Several contacts: gestures triggering a specific function, e.g. scrolling, zooming, right-click, when the user establishes several contacts with the surface simultaneously; e.g. using several fingers or a combination of fingers and pen
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/044 by capacitive means
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0488 using a touch-screen or digitiser, e.g. input of commands through traced gestures

Abstract

The invention relates to a device, in particular, a touch sensitive device, and more in particular, a single-touch sensitive device configured to recognize gestures, such as zoom, rotate, flick, using specific characteristics based on a single-touch localization system. The invention also relates to a method for recognizing/identifying gestures, such as zoom, rotate, flick, in a low-end device equipped with such as a single-touch sensitive device which is able to recognize one single point at a time.

Claims

1. A method for determining a touch gesture in a touch sensitive device comprising:

determining a plurality of consecutive touch point coordinates of a multi-touch event on an interaction surface by analyzing each touch point coordinate one at a time as sensed single touches during the touch gesture;

determining that the plurality of consecutive touch point coordinates satisfies the relationship;

y_i=ax_i+b±

Δ

or

x_i=c±

Δ

wherein y_i and x_i correspond to touch point coordinates of touch point i of the plurality of consecutive touch point coordinates, a is a first constant, b is a second constant, c is a third constant, and Δ

is a fourth constant, and

wherein a is limited to discrete values of;

less than 50, less than 10, or less than 5;

determining a multi-touch touch pattern based on the relationship among the plurality of consecutive touch point coordinates; and

attributing a predetermined action corresponding to the multi-touch touch pattern.

2. The method according to claim 1, further comprising:

determining, within a predetermined duration, the multi-touch touch pattern in response to;

a number of the plurality of consecutive touch point coordinates being greater than a minimum threshold value, or

a distance between at least two consecutive touch point coordinates of the plurality of consecutive touch point coordinates being greater than a predetermined value.

3. The method according to claim 2, wherein the predetermined duration is from 400 ms to 800 ms.

4. The method according to claim 1, further comprising:

determining that the plurality of consecutive touch point coordinates is approximately positioned on a line.

5. The method according to claim 1, wherein a is less than 5, and wherein a is limited to the values of:

a=0, 1, or −

1, or

a=0, ½

, −

½

, 1, −

1, 2, or −

2.

6. The method according to claim 1, wherein the determining the multi-touch touch pattern comprises determining a zoom event by identifying two approximately linear, simultaneous, trajectories with different directions in the multi-touch event.

7. The method according to claim 6, wherein the determining the zoom event comprises determining a changeover from increasing to decreasing coordinates x_i and/or y_i, or a changeover from decreasing to increasing coordinates x_i and/or y_i wherein y_i and x_i correspond to touch point coordinates of touch point i of the plurality of consecutive touch point coordinates.

8. The method according to claim 6, wherein the determining the multi-touch touch pattern further comprises determining vectors for pairs of consecutive touch point coordinates of the plurality of consecutive touch point coordinates, wherein a starting point of a vector relates to touch point coordinates of an earlier touch point in the multi-touch event compared to an end point of the vector.

9. The method according to claim 8, further comprising:

determining scalar products between pairs of the vectors; and

determining scalar products with opposing signs.

10. The method according to claim 6, further comprising:

determining that touch point coordinates of a first touch point are positioned within a line defined by touch point coordinates at two extremities; and

attributing a zoom-in action to the zoom event.

11. A non-transitory computer readable medium having instructions stored therein which when executed by a processor cause the processor to perform operations for determining a touch gesture in a touch sensitive device, the operations comprising:

determining a plurality of consecutive touch point coordinates of a multi-touch event on an interaction surface by analyzing each touch point coordinate one at a time as sensed single touches during the touch gesture;

determining that the plurality of consecutive touch point coordinates satisfies the relationship;

y_i=ax_i+b±

Δ

or

x_i=c±

Δ

wherein y_i and x_i correspond to touch point coordinates of touch point i of the plurality of consecutive touch point coordinates, a is a first constant, b is a second constant, c is a third constant, and Δ

is a fourth constant, and

wherein a is limited to discrete values of;

less than 50, less than 10, or less than 5;

determining a multi-touch touch pattern based on the relationship among the plurality of consecutive touch point coordinates; and

attributing a predetermined action corresponding to the multi-touch touch pattern.

12. A touch sensitive device comprising:

a computer readable media;

a processor coupled to the computer readable media;

a touch sensitive interaction surface coupled to the processor, wherein the processor is configured to;

determine a plurality of consecutive touch point coordinates of a multi-touch event on the touch sensitive interaction surface by analyzing each touch point coordinate one at a time as sensed single touches during a touch gesture;

determine that the plurality of consecutive touch point coordinates follows an arc-shaped trajectory;

determine a distance d1_i between touch point coordinates i and i+2 of the plurality of consecutive touch point coordinates;

determine a distance d2_ibetween touch point coordinates i+1 of the plurality of consecutive touch point coordinates and a line defined by the touch point coordinates i and i+2;

determine that the multi-touch event relates to an arc-shaped trajectory based on d2_i/d1_i=d±

Δ and

/or d2_i*d2_i/d1_i=e±

Δ

for the plurality of consecutive touch point coordinates, wherein i, i+1, and i+2 indicate three consecutive touch point locations of the plurality of consecutive touch point coordinates, d and e are constants, and Δ

is a predetermined parameter;

determine a multi-touch touch pattern based on the arc-shaped trajectory among the plurality of consecutive touch point coordinates; and

attribute a predetermined action corresponding to the multi-touch touch pattern.

13. The touch sensitive device according to claim 12, wherein to determine the multi-touch touch pattern, the processor is further configured to determine vectors for pairs of consecutive touch point coordinates of the plurality of consecutive touch point coordinates, wherein a starting point of a vector relates to touch point coordinates of an earlier touch point in the multi-touch event compared to an end point of the vector.

14. The touch sensitive device according to claim 13, wherein to determine that the plurality of consecutive touch point coordinates follows the arc-shaped trajectory, the processor is further configured to

sum angles between successive vectors;

determine that the angles have a same sign; and

attribute a rotation action to the multi-touch touch pattern.

15. The touch sensitive device according to claim 13, wherein to determine the multi-touch touch pattern, the processor is further configured to:

sum angles between successive vectors;

determine that the sum satisfies a first predetermined threshold; and

attribute a positive rotation action to the multi-touch touch pattern in response to the sum satisfying the first predetermined threshold.

16. The touch sensitive device according to claim 15, wherein the processor is further configured to:

determine that the sum satisfies a second predetermined threshold; and

attribute a negative rotation action to the multi-touch touch pattern.

17. The touch sensitive device according to claim 12, wherein the processor is further configured to:

determine the plurality of consecutive touch point coordinates based on an analysis of acoustic signals.