Position and usage based prioritization for capacitance sense interface

• US 9,766,738 B1
• Filed: 08/23/2006
• Issued: 09/19/2017
• Est. Priority Date: 08/23/2006
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Cypress Semiconductor Corporation (Infineon Technologies AG)
• Original Assignee: Cypress Semiconductor Corporation (Infineon Technologies AG)
• Inventors: Verge, Gregory J., Page, Andrew C.
• Primary Examiner(s): CRAWLEY, KEITH L
• Application Number:
  US11/509,513
• Time in Patent Office: 4,045 Days
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 1/1662 Details related to the integrated keyboard
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 1/169 the I/O peripheral being an integrated pointing device, e.g. trackball in the palm rest area, mini-joystick integrated between keyboard keys, touch pads or touch stripes G06F1/1643 takes precedence; constructional details of pointing devices G06F3/033
• 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 2200/1614 Image rotation following screen orientation, e.g. switching from landscape to portrait mode
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/03547 Touch pads, in which fingers can move on a surface
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/04186 Touch location disambiguation
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/044 by capacitive means
• 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 technique for improving capacitive sensing accuracy. Concurrent activations of multiple capacitance sensors within an array of capacitance sensors are sensed. One of the concurrent activations of the multiple capacitance sensors is accepted as a user activation. Remaining ones of the concurrent activations of the multiple capacitance sensors are rejected based on their physical location within the array of capacitance sensors relative to the one of the concurrent activations of the multiple capacitance sensors accepted as the user activation.

Claims

1. A method, comprising:

sensing concurrent activations of multiple capacitance sensors within an array of capacitance sensors, wherein each of the multiple capacitance sensors within the array of capacitance sensors has a different threshold sensitivity based on its position and priority that triggers an activation of each of the multiple capacitance sensors, wherein the priority is determined by user interface requirements for the multiple capacitance sensors;

comparing the priorities of the capacitance sensors of the multiple capacitance sensors that are associated with the concurrent activations;

accepting one of the concurrent activations of the capacitance sensors as a user activation based on the comparing; and

rejecting remaining ones of the concurrent activations of the capacitance sensors based on their physical location within the array of capacitance sensors relative to the one of the concurrent activations of the capacitance sensors accepted as the user activation.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the array of capacitance sensors comprises a user interface of a device and wherein rejecting the remaining ones of the concurrent activations of the capacitance sensors based on their physical location comprises rejecting the remaining ones of the concurrent activations of the capacitance sensors that are physically located below the accepted one of the concurrent activations in the user interface.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein rejecting the remaining ones of the concurrent activations of the capacitance sensors based on their physical location further comprises rejecting the remaining ones of the concurrent activations of the capacitance sensors that are physically located laterally right of the accepted one of the concurrent activations in the user interface.

4. The method of claim 2, further comprising:

operating the device in a portrait mode, wherein rejecting the remaining ones of the concurrent activations of the capacitance sensors based on their physical location comprises rejecting the remaining ones of the concurrent activations of the capacitance sensors that are physically located below the accepted one of the concurrent activations in the user interface relative to a portrait orientation of the user interface when the device is operating in the portrait mode; and

operating the device in a landscape mode, wherein rejecting the remaining ones of the concurrent activations of the capacitance sensors based on their physical location comprises rejecting the remaining ones of the concurrent activations of the capacitance sensors that are physically located below the accepted one of the concurrent activations in the user interface relative to a landscape orientation of the user interface when the device is operating in the landscape mode.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the different threshold sensitivity comprises at least one of a different threshold capacitance change that does not trigger the activation, or a different threshold capacitance change that does trigger the activation.

6. The method of claim 1 wherein the physical location of the remaining ones of the concurrent activations is assigned a lower priority than the accepted one of the concurrent activations.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the array of capacitance sensors comprises a user interface of a device, the user interface including a first capacitance sensor having a first threshold sensitivity assigned to implement a pointer or arrow function, second capacitance sensor physically located at corners of the array of capacitance sensors having a second threshold sensitivity, and a third capacitance sensor having a third threshold sensitivity assigned to implement a select or enter function, wherein the first threshold sensitivity is more sensitive to a user interaction than the second threshold sensitivity and the second threshold sensitivity is more sensitive to the

user interaction than the third threshold sensitivity.

8. A non-transitory machine-readable medium having instructions recorded on the medium that provides instructions that, if executed by a machine, will cause the machine to perform operations comprising:

sensing concurrent activations of multiple capacitance sensors within an array of capacitance sensors, wherein each of the multiple capacitance sensors within the array of capacitance sensors has a different threshold sensitivity based on its position and priority that triggers an activation of each of the multiple capacitance sensors, wherein the priority level is determined by user interface requirements for the multiple capacitance sensors;

comparing the priorities of the capacitance sensors of the multiple capacitance sensors that are associated with the concurrent activations;

accepting one of the concurrent activations of the capacitance sensors as a user activation based on the comparing; and

rejecting remaining ones of the concurrent activations of the capacitance sensors based on their physical location within the array of capacitance sensors relative to the one of the concurrent activations of the capacitance sensors accepted as the user activation.

9. The non-transitory machine-readable recording medium having instructions recorded on the medium of claim 8, wherein the array of capacitance sensors comprises a user interface of a device and wherein rejecting the remaining ones of the concurrent activations of the capacitance sensors based on their physical location comprises rejecting the remaining ones of the concurrent activations of the capacitance sensors that are physically located below the accepted one of the concurrent activations in the user interface.

10. The non-transitory machine-readable recording medium having instructions recorded on the medium of claim 9, wherein rejecting the remaining ones of the concurrent activations of the capacitance sensors based on their physical location further comprises rejecting the remaining ones of the concurrent activations of the capacitance sensors that are physically located laterally right of the accepted one of the concurrent activations in the user interface.

11. The non-transitory machine-readable recording medium having instructions recorded on the medium of claim 8, wherein at least two capacitance sensors within the array of capacitance sensors are assigned different priority levels, the non-transitory machine readable medium further providing instructions that, if executed by the machine, will cause the machine to perform further operations, comprising:

accepting higher priority activations between two of the concurrent activations having different priority levels that are physically located lateral to each other; and

rejecting lower priority activations between two of the concurrent activations having different priority levels that are physically located lateral to each other.

12. The non-transitory machine-readable recording medium having instructions recorded on the medium of claim 8, wherein at least two capacitance sensors within the array of capacitance sensors each have a different threshold sensitivity that triggers an activation of each of the at least two capacitance sensors, and wherein the different threshold sensitivity comprises at least one of a different threshold capacitance change that does not trigger the activation, or a different threshold capacitance change that does trigger the activation.

13. The non-transitory machine-readable recording medium having instructions recorded on the medium of claim 8, wherein at least two capacitance sensors within the array of capacitance sensors each have a different threshold sensitivity that triggers an activation of each of the at least two capacitance sensors, and wherein the different threshold sensitivity comprises a different threshold capacitance change duration that must occur prior to triggering the activation.

19. The non-transitory machine-readable recording medium having instructions recorded on the medium of claim 8 wherein the physical location of the remaining ones of the concurrent activations is assigned a lower priority than the accepted one of the concurrent activations.

14. An apparatus, comprising:

a processing device;

a user interface including an array of capacitance sensors coupled to the processing device; and

a memory unit coupled to the processing device, the memory unit having stored therein instructions that, if executed by the processing device, will cause the processing device to perform operations comprising;

sensing concurrent activations of multiple capacitance sensors within the array of capacitance sensors, wherein each of the multiple capacitance sensors within the array of capacitance sensors has a different threshold sensitivity based on its position and priority that triggers an activation of each of the multiple capacitance sensors, wherein the priority level is determined by user interface requirements for the multiple capacitance sensors;

comparing the priorities of the capacitance sensors of the multiple capacitance sensors that are associated with the concurrent activations;

accepting one of the concurrent activations of the capacitance sensors as a user activation based on the comparing; and

rejecting remaining ones of the concurrent activations of the capacitance sensors based on their physical location within the array of capacitance sensors relative to the one of the concurrent activations of the capacitance sensors accepted as the user activation.

15. The apparatus of claim 14, wherein rejecting the remaining ones of the concurrent activations of the capacitance sensors based on their physical location comprises rejecting the remaining ones of the concurrent activations of the capacitance sensors that are physically located below or laterally right of the accepted one of the concurrent activations in the user interface.

16. The apparatus of claim 14, wherein at least two capacitance sensors within the array of capacitance sensors have a different threshold sensitivity that triggers an activation of each of the at least two capacitance sensors and wherein the different threshold sensitivity comprises at least one of a different threshold capacitance change or a different threshold capacitance change duration that occur prior to triggering the activation.

17. The apparatus of claim 14, wherein the processing device comprises:

a capacitance sensor circuit coupled to measure values indicative of a capacitance of each of the capacitance sensors within the array of capacitance sensors; and

an analog multiplexer bus to selectively couple the capacitive sensors within the array of capacitive sensors to the capacitance sensor circuit.

18. The apparatus of claim 14, wherein the apparatus comprises a cellular phone.

20. The apparatus of claim 14 wherein the physical location of the remaining ones of the concurrent activations is assigned a lower priority than the accepted one of the concurrent activations.