Finger hover detection for improved typing
First Claim
1. A method of operation within a computing device having a touchscreen and one or more touch sensors, the method comprising:
- rendering a keyboard on the touchscreen, including rendering individual keys of the keyboard in respective positions on the touchscreen;
sensing, via signals received from the one or more touch sensors, one or more fingers of a user hovering at respective hover locations above a surface of the touchscreen;
while sensing the one or more fingers of the user hovering above the surface of the touchscreen, adjusting the respective positions of the individual keys on the touchscreen based on the respective hover locations of the one or more fingers of the user.
2 Assignments
0 Petitions
Accused Products
Abstract
Typing on touchscreens is improved by dynamically and automatically positioning the desired home-row keys of an onscreen keyboard below the user'"'"'s fingers while their fingers are hovering above the surface, thus reducing the need for the user to look at the onscreen keyboard while typing. The location of each of the user'"'"'s fingers while hovering and/or resting is monitored. Correlation between the hover sensor data and touch sensor data increases the confidence level by which the system can determine which of the user'"'"'s fingers were used to select a key. By determining which finger was used to make the selection, the system accurately disambiguates which letter the user intended to type.
174 Citations
19 Claims
-
1. A method of operation within a computing device having a touchscreen and one or more touch sensors, the method comprising:
-
rendering a keyboard on the touchscreen, including rendering individual keys of the keyboard in respective positions on the touchscreen; sensing, via signals received from the one or more touch sensors, one or more fingers of a user hovering at respective hover locations above a surface of the touchscreen; while sensing the one or more fingers of the user hovering above the surface of the touchscreen, adjusting the respective positions of the individual keys on the touchscreen based on the respective hover locations of the one or more fingers of the user. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8)
-
-
9. A computing device comprising:
-
a touchscreen; one or more processors; one or more touch sensors that are communicably coupled with the one or more processors and the touchscreen; and a memory having program code stored therein which, when executed by one or more processors, causes the one or more processors to; render a keyboard on the touchscreen, including placing individual keys of the keyboard in respective positions on the touchscreen; sense, via signals received from the one or more touch sensors, one or more fingers of a user hovering at respective hover locations above a surface of the touchscreen; while sensing the one or more fingers of the user hovering above the surface of the touchscreen, adjust the respective positions of the individual keys on the touchscreen based on the respective hover locations of the one or more fingers of the user.
-
-
10. A method of operation within a computing device having a touchscreen, the method comprising:
-
tracking respective locations of a user'"'"'s fingers above the touchscreen; detecting that the user unambiguously types, using the user'"'"'s first finger, a first key of a plurality of keys on a keyboard that is displayed on the touchscreen; generating, based on (i) the respective tracked locations of the user'"'"'s fingers and (ii) the user'"'"'s use of the first finger to unambiguously type the first key, finger-to-key correlation information that indicates, for one or more keys of the plurality of keys on the keyboard, which of the user'"'"'s fingers is most likely to be used to type each of the one or more keys; and detecting an ambiguous input that is provided by the user'"'"'s second finger, wherein the ambiguous input is detected near to two or more keys of the plurality of keys on the keyboard; and determining that the ambiguous input corresponds to selection of a particular key of the two or more keys based at least in part on (i) the generated finger-to-key correlation information and (ii) the user'"'"'s use of the second finger to provide the ambiguous input. - View Dependent Claims (11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 18, 19)
-
-
17. A computing device comprising:
-
a touchscreen; one or more processors; and a memory having program code stored therein which, when executed by one or more processors, causes the one or more processors to; track respective locations of a user'"'"'s fingers above the touchscreen; detect that the user unambiguously types, using the user'"'"'s first finger, a first key of a plurality of keys on a keyboard that is displayed on the touchscreen; generate, based on (i) the respective tracked locations of the user'"'"'s fingers and (ii) the user'"'"'s use of the first finger to unambiguously type the first key, finger-to-key correlation information that indicates, for one or more keys of the plurality of keys on the keyboard, which of the user'"'"'s fingers is most likely to be used to type each of the one or more keys; and detect an ambiguous input that is provided by the user'"'"'s second finger, wherein the ambiguous input is detected near to two or more keys of the plurality of keys on the keyboard; and determine that the ambiguous input corresponds to selection of a particular key of the two or more keys based at least in part on (i) the generated finger-to-key correlation information and (ii) the user'"'"'s use of the second finger to provide the ambiguous input.
-
Specification