Activating virtual keys of a touch-screen virtual keyboard

Number: 20060085757
Inventors: Andre; Bartley K.; (Menlo Park, CA) ; Ording; Bas; (San Francisco, CA) ; Christie; Greg; (San Jose, CA)
Filed: September 16, 2005

Virtual keyboard for use in “a personal computer, a computing system embedded within an electronic device (such as, for example, a cellular telephone, media player or other consumer electronic device.)”

Apple copying Microsoft or vice versa?
A new Apple patent application shows Apple’s plans for virtual keyboards. Interestingly one of the figures shows a keyboard similar the virtual keyboard on the Ultra-Mobile PC platform. These arc-like virtual keyboards are perhaps an obvious solution to allow input while holding the devices. Apple filed for this patent on September 16 last year (surely after Microsoft had come up with its prototypes?). The figure below was at the end of the application- perhaps added as an afterthought? My theory is that Apple will release a touchsenstive device but didn’t want to be seen to be following Microsoft so they filed these patents after they got wind of Microsoft’s new Ultra-Mobile PC-based machines.

For example, FIG. 8 illustrates an example of an arc-shaped keyboard that may be particularly suited for thumb activation of the relatively small and close- together virtual keys. The visual display 802 associated with the FIG. 8 keyboard, as well as (nominally) the layout of the key locations used to determine which virtual key is activated) is arc-shaped. An output area 804 is also shown, which provides an indication of the activated virtual keys.

Virtual Keyboards- what key is user trying to hit?

Correlating what key a user is trying to hit and the sensory data from a touch screen can be difficult. In this application Apple suggests having different visual keys and sensory keys. They also suggest the use of contextual analysis and dictionary lookups to figure out what key is the most likely in a given context.

The average of the touch data [20] may not represent what the user understands where their click is directed [10]

The lines [702] indicate the boundaries of the virtual keys, whereas the lines [704] indicate the key boundaries as displayed to the user on the touch screen.

The 'what makes sense' directive'

It is desirable to process touches on a touch screen in a way that “makes sense,” which may include considering factors beyond (or instead of) a correspondence of the visual target and the touch area of a touch to activate the GUI to which the visual target corresponds."

Complex weighting of the likelihood of a key-press is directed at a particular key is done for each key and varies in response to context:

The weighting factor for each virtual key affects the size of that virtual key. The smaller the weighting factor associated with a first virtual key relative to the weighting factor associated with a second virtual key, the smaller the first virtual key is relative to the second virtual key (that is, the closer a touch location must be to a key location, relatively, to cause activation of the virtual key to which the key location corresponds.) In some examples, the weighting factors are normalized such that a weighting factor of one has no effect on the size of a virtual key, while a weighting factor greater than one has the effect of enlarging a virtual key, while a weighting factor less than one has the effect of diminishing the virtual key. The application of the weighting factors need not be linear. For example, the square root of the distance may be multiplied by the weighting factor.

The weightings associated with a click and various possible keys

In addition, the weights associated with particular virtual keys (see step 202 in FIG. 2 and step 606 in FIG. 6) may be adjusted dynamically. In one example, the weights are adjusted based on the sequence of virtual keys already activated. For example, the weight associated with the most likely next virtual key to be activated, based on the sequence of virtual keys already activated, may be set to be higher (or lower) than the weights associated with other virtual keys. What virtual key is most like to be activated may be determined, for example, using a dictionary (word-based), statistical probability for individual letters (for example, based on statistical frequency of occurrence), or a combination of both.

‘Dangerous’ keys are made virtually smaller

In some examples, virtual keys deemed to be “dangerous” (e.g., whose the result of whose activation may be difficult to reverse) are given a smaller weight. Potential examples of such “dangerous” keys may include, for example, a “delete” key or “cancel” key (for example, the “delete” GUI item 906 in FIG. 9.) Furthermore, in some examples, the slower virtual keys are activated (corresponding, nominally, to more deliberate activation), the less any particular virtual key would be weighted.

Come on Apple release the damn touchscreen product already