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- I posted that already, he/she just won't concede that a fully fuctional but virtual keyboard is still a keyboard. While I prefer hard keys myself, I would still call this a keyboard. There're other things with touch interfaces too, doesn't mean they're not real, just not physical.06-11-2007 11:04 AMLike 0
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- Just because you can't physically touch or feel something doesn't mean it doesn't exist.
"I'd like 3 feet of Love, with a side of Compassion, and a pinch of Sarcasm... hold the Melancholy!"
"But do you want fries with that?"
Actually- the phone's case is just filled with water,
and a clownfish is enclosed in each i-phoQuarium.
The fish sees your finger movements, and translates them into messages they relay via sonar through the water, (like the Incredible Mr. Limpett) and air, to other iphoQuarium users. No FCC approval needed, but they did have to get permission from the Department of Fisheries.06-11-2007 11:49 AMLike 0 - 06-11-2007 12:07 PMLike 0
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- I just bought a touch screen MP3 player. The interface is also "virtual", but it recognizes all I'm doing, so are the controls "real" or not?
Now you all have me interested in what type of technology these devices use.06-13-2007 07:20 AMLike 0 -
I doubt that the success of the iPhone is going to turn on any single feature. Let's take this thread back to its root or on to something else more interesting.06-13-2007 08:31 AMLike 0 -
The iPhone has a capacitive touchscreen:
https://www.apple.com/iphone/technology/#mn_p
Capacitive screens work quite differently to the resistive touchscreens found on Treos and most other phones.
Resistive screens have two layers a short distance apart and sense touch when the upper layer is deformed by the pressure of an object (any object) such that the two layers make contact. An electrical current runs through the two layers and when they touch the electrical field is altered and this allows calculation of point of contact.
A capacitive screen has a layer of stored electrical charge on its surface and when you touch it some of the charge is transferred to your finger. The local decrease in charge is detected and allows calculation of where the screen was touched. Capacitive screens don't need to deform to work and can thus be much tougher, but they do require that you touch them either with a bare finger or a capacitive device held in a bare hand.
Touchpads on laptops work by capacitive technology and I wondered if you can get some idea of how an iPhone screen will work from them. My detailed experimentation (not) shows that touch of the touchpad with a finger is detected, touch with a wooden pencil held in a hand isn't registered, but touch with an empty Coke can held in a hand is registered after a fashion - it moves the cursor around a bit, although not in a very controlled way.
Again, I'm no expert and most of the above is based on the articles linked below.
http://electronics.howstuffworks.com/question716.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Touchscreen
http://www.digitimes.com/displays/a20070604PD213.html
There is of course at least one other phone with a capacitive screen, the LG Prada. One thing the iPhone and the Prada share is the lack of a raised bit of casing (bezel?) around the screen. This is a good thing in my view.
Surur reckons the HTC Touch also has a capacitive screen, but I've not seen that confirmed. It's a bit hard to tell if it has a bezel (not that that should be regarded as completely diagnostic anyway):
06-13-2007 09:13 AMLike 0 -
We should do HTC patent searches like we do Apple ones.
Surur06-13-2007 09:16 AMLike 0 - You mean screen technology? I'm very far from being an expert but I'll have a go.
The iPhone has a capacitive touchscreen:
https://www.apple.com/iphone/technology/#mn_p
was touched. Capacitive screens don't need to deform to work and can thus be much tougher, but they do require that you touch them either with a bare finger or a capacitive device held in a bare hand.
I think that the capacitive screen and "multi-touch" are closely related and will be important to the success of the iPhone. It remains to be seen, but Multi-touch may top Graffiti as an innovation and even rival the mouse.06-13-2007 09:28 AMLike 0 - According to the ROM cookers for the Hermes, who are trying to extract the "touch" interface from the elf to their ROM's, there is definitely something "different" with the elf's screen. It detects and measures pressure is what I think they said. What is different about it is still unclear, it might just be a registry setting they're missing.06-13-2007 09:37 AMLike 0
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Here you go:
http://www.google.com/patents06-13-2007 09:38 AMLike 0 - That's what apple is banking on, and I will not judge until I use it, but I am a little pessimistic about it. "Multi-touch" also means TWO HANDS, which I'm sure some people won't mind but I know some will. Even at the keynote, Jobs was holding the device with one hand and interacting w/the phone with the other. I like one-handed use myself (as do most treo users), so we'll see how conducive that is on the iPhone.06-13-2007 09:41 AMLike 0
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