HAND-HELD DEVICE WITH CHARACTER INPUT ROTARY WHEEL

• US 20070195071A1
• Filed: 11/22/2006
• Published: 08/23/2007
• Est. Priority Date: 02/18/2006
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: Hon Hai Precision Industry Co., Ltd.
• Original Assignee: Hon Hai Precision Industry Co., Ltd.
• Inventors: Hsieh, Kuan-Hong, Li, Xiao-Guang, Lin, Tay-Yang, Chen, Chin-Feng, Yeh, Te-Yao
• Application Number:
  US11/562,963
• Publication Number:
  US 20070195071A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 345/184
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 1/1626 with a single-body enclosure integrating a flat display, e.g. Personal Digital Assistants [PDAs]
• 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 3/0233 Character input methods
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0362 with detection of 1D translations or rotations of an operating part of the device, e.g. scroll wheels, sliders, knobs, rollers or belts

Abstract

A hand-held device is provided. The hand-held device includes a rotary wheel, a first switch, a second switch, an encoder, a memory, and a controller. The rotary wheel has a plurality of positioning inputs. The encoder is responsive to operations on the rotary wheel and outputs positioning codes. The memory stores a plurality of input modes, wherein each input mode includes characters corresponding to positioning codes. The controller obtains an input mode from the memory, and shifts a current input mode to the input mode obtained in responsive to an input from the first switch. The controller inputs a character of the current input mode according to a positioning code that the encoder outputs in response to an input from the second switch. The above-mentioned rotary wheel can replace keyboard in the hand-held device.

Claims

1. A hand-held device comprising:

a rotary wheel having a plurality of positioning inputs;

a first switch;

a second switch;

an encoder responsive to operation on the rotary wheel and outputting positioning codes;

a memory storing a plurality of input modes, wherein each input mode includes a plurality of characters corresponding to the positioning codes; and

a controller configured for obtaining an input mode from the memory, and shifting a current input mode to the input mode obtained in responsive to an input from the first switch;

the controller inputs a character of the current input mode according to a positioning code that the encoder outputs in response to an input from the second switch.

2. The hand-held device of claim 1, further comprising a plurality of character regions corresponding to the input modes, each character region including a plurality of icons corresponding to the positioning inputs of the rotary wheel, each icon including a character.

3. The hand-held device of claim 1, further comprising an indicator to indicate the positioning input of the rotary wheel.

4. The hand-held device of claim 3, wherein the indicator is placed on the rotary wheel.

5. The hand-held device of claim 1, wherein the first switch is adjacent to the rotary wheel.

6. The hand-held device of claim 1, wherein the second switch is placed on the rotary wheel.

7. The hand-held device of claim 5, wherein the first switch and the second switch are buttons.

8. The hand-held device of claim 6, wherein the first switch and the second switch are buttons.