KR20050115156A - Mobile communication terminal having touch switch - Google Patents

Abstract

The present invention relates to a mobile communication terminal, and more particularly, to a mobile communication terminal having a touch switch for driving a plurality of application function menus driven by the terminal using a touch switch.

According to the present invention, since a touch switch corresponding to a function menu of a plurality of user applications provided by a mobile communication terminal is formed on one side of a display unit of the terminal, a corresponding function menu can be easily selected and input without inputting a complicated function key. Frequently added functions have the effect of avoiding the disadvantage of having to design the appearance of the new terminal and the system architecture accordingly.

According to an aspect of the present invention, a mobile communication terminal includes a keypad for receiving and outputting a user's operation command, a display unit for displaying a menu of the mobile communication terminal, and an operation state of a plurality of applications mounted and driven on the terminal, and a display unit. It includes a plurality of touch switches formed on at least one of the top, bottom, left and right, and a system control unit that controls the overall device of the mobile communication terminal, and receives the input signal of the touch switch and drives the function menu of the application corresponding to the touch switch. Characterized in that.

Description

Mobile communication terminal having a touch switch

The present invention relates to a mobile communication terminal, and more particularly, to a mobile communication terminal having a touch switch for driving a plurality of application function menus driven by the terminal using a touch switch.

With the expansion of mobile communication terminals, various functions are being added to mobile communication terminals due to consumer demand and competition among companies.

Camera phones equipped with cameras have been popular enough to occupy most of the new terminal devices recently. Recently, MP3 phones capable of playing MP3 files as well as camera functions, and multimedia phones capable of playing and recording video files such as movies have been released. In addition, recently, a mobile communication terminal with a TV viewing function has been released. This trend, along with the increase in the capacity of the terminal memory, is accelerating the personalization of the terminal's personal multimedia devices.

Meanwhile, according to the multimedia device of the mobile communication terminal, a swivel folder type mobile communication terminal capable of rotating and folding the folder 180 degrees from side to side has been developed in order to implement various functions and support a user-friendly display. The swivel foldable mobile terminal provides convenience for taking a picture of a camera phone, which currently occupies most of the mobile terminal.

For example, when the user rotates the folder 180 degrees, the user folds the folder to the main body, and takes a picture while checking an image input through the camera lens through the display unit. That is, it is possible to take a picture in a manner similar to that of a conventional digital camera, thereby providing convenience to the user.

However, such a swivel-foldable mobile communication terminal is inconvenient for searching and selecting driving of an application menu for taking a picture since the keypad part of the terminal is covered by the folder part when the user rotates the folder by 180 degrees. There was this.

In order to prevent this, the terminal operator used a method of selecting and driving a menu using a side screen installed in the touch screen or the terminal body or the folder. However, an increase in cost and an increase in the number of side buttons when the touch screen is applied to the terminal has the disadvantage of deteriorating the external image of the terminal.

In addition, only a plurality of side buttons may bring limitations to the implementation of complex function keys, and there is an inconvenience of memorizing a plurality of key operations and function keys for menu search.

Implementing many of these functions requires an efficient architecture for proper control between systems as well as the physical problem of securing the space required for the terminal. In addition, because of the frequently added functions, designing the appearance of the new terminal and the system architecture accordingly each time was very inefficient in terms of cost and time.

The present invention has been drawn from such a background, and an object thereof is to provide a mobile communication terminal having a touch switch that can easily select and input an application function menu provided by the mobile communication terminal.

Another object of the present invention is to provide a mobile communication terminal having a touch switch that can provide an efficient architecture for proper control between the external system and the system according to securing a button space for driving a function added to the mobile communication terminal.

Furthermore, the present invention provides a mobile communication terminal having a touch switch that can easily select and enter an application menu provided by the mobile communication terminal even when the input means of the terminal is blocked by the folder unit in the swivel folder type mobile communication terminal. .

Mobile communication terminal having a touch switch according to an aspect of the present invention for achieving the above object is any one of the top, bottom, left and right of the display unit for displaying the operation command menu of the terminal and the operation state of a plurality of applications mounted on the terminal By forming a plurality of touch switches in one-to-one correspondence with the function menu of the currently running application, the user selects and presses one of the soft touch switches to operate the corresponding application function.

For example, when a user takes a picture using a swivel foldable terminal, the user inputs an operation command for driving a camera function using a predetermined button on the keypad and rotates the folder of the terminal 180 degrees for convenient shooting. Rotate and fold. The controller of the terminal receives a user's operation command and reads and drives the user program according to the camera driving from the memory, and outputs an image input through the camera lens to the display unit. The user program according to the driving of the camera displays a function necessary for taking a picture, for example, a menu such as shooting, zooming, flashing, and setting by allocating a portion of the display unit, and the user checks an image input from the lens through the display unit. .

On one side of the display unit of the mobile communication terminal, a plurality of touch switches are positioned to correspond to function menus such as shooting, zoom, flash, and environment setting required for driving a camera function. For example, when the user touches a touch switch corresponding to the zoom function to use the zoom function, the control unit of the terminal receives the same and displays a tele or wide function selection menu necessary for the zoom operation on a part of the display unit. The user may touch the touch switch corresponding to the menu to drive the corresponding operation.

Hereinafter, the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the accompanying drawings so that those skilled in the art can easily understand and reproduce the present invention.

1 is a perspective view schematically showing an appearance of a swivel foldable mobile terminal having a touch switch according to an exemplary embodiment of the present invention. As shown, the clamshell mobile communication terminal 1 according to the present invention is composed of a main body 10 and a folder 20 which is hinged to an upper end thereof. The main body 10 includes a keypad 11 for inputting various information and a talker 12 for receiving a caller's voice on an upper surface thereof, and an upper side thereof receives a CDMA signal transmitted from a base station or a mobile communication terminal 1. An antenna 13 for transmitting a CDMA signal to the base station is provided, and a PCB substrate (not shown) including an MSM chip for controlling each part of the mobile communication terminal 1 is installed therein.

In addition, the folder unit 20 is a display unit 21 such as a graphic LCD that outputs the operation state of the mobile communication terminal 1 to the user by using text data, an avatar, a background screen, and the like facing the main body unit 10. And a sign language unit 22 for outputting a voice, and a sub display unit (not shown) for briefly displaying the current state of the mobile communication terminal 1 using text on the back of the folder unit 20. Can be.

According to a characteristic aspect of the present invention, either one of the upper, lower, left, and right sides of the display unit 21 of the mobile communication terminal 1 provided with the touch switch 23 according to the present invention detects this when a derivative such as a human hand touches the MSM chip. A plurality of touch switches 23 are formed to transmit. Each touch switch 23 corresponds one-to-one with a menu according to a function of a program provided in the mobile communication terminal 1, such as a user application currently running, for example, a camera, an MP3 player, a media player, navigation, and hands-free. . Therefore, the touch switch 23 outputs a detection signal to the PCB substrate (not shown) including the MSM chip when the touch of the human hand or a part of the body is detected, and the MSM chip receives the detection signal according to the corresponding program. Drive the function.

2 is a block diagram schematically illustrating a mobile communication terminal having a touch switch according to an exemplary embodiment of the present invention. As shown, the mobile communication terminal 1 according to the present invention is largely the configuration common to the existing mobile communication terminal 1, the phone control unit 100 and its auxiliary circuits, the display driver 280 and a plurality of It is configured to include a touch switch 290.

The accessory circuits include a keypad 210 for receiving and outputting a user's operation command, a display unit 220 for displaying a menu of the mobile communication terminal 1, and an operation state of a plurality of applications mounted and driven in the mobile communication terminal 1. And a wireless communication unit 230 for extracting voice and data signals from a wireless signal transmitted and received through the antenna 13, and a voice input / output circuit for inputting and outputting a voice call signal from the wireless communication unit 230 through a microphone and a speaker ( 240).

The keypad 210 and the display unit 220 which is a liquid crystal display device may have a conventional well-known configuration. In addition, the wireless communication unit 230 is configured to include an antenna 13 and the RF circuit for communication with the base station. In the present specification, the wireless communication unit 230 is interpreted to cover not only various versions of CDMA but also existing methods such as cellular, GSM, and W-CDMA, as well as mobile communication methods to be introduced in the future. The voice input / output circuit 240 is a well-known configuration that processes digital voice data into an analog voice signal or vice versa, and includes an additional circuit such as an audio amplifying circuit or a filter.

The baseband circuit of the wireless communication unit 230 and most of the circuits of the phone control unit 100 are commercially provided as a single integrated circuit. This integrated circuit, commonly referred to as an MSM chip, includes dedicated hardware to process communications therein, a digital signal processor and a general purpose microprocessor. Logically, these include a communication control unit 110 for controlling voice and data communication, and a system control unit 120 for controlling the entire system according to an operation signal or an operation state input from the keypad 210. The system controller 120 supports a convenient application environment such as a virtual machine, and can process various controls according to a characteristic aspect of the present invention by a program.

The audio reproducing unit 250 includes, for example, a sound source reproducing chip such as a YAMAHA chip for reproducing a ringtone or a DSP chip for reproducing an MP3. The audio reproducing unit 250 reproduces from various sound sources such as reproducing a ringtone, an effect sound, or a music file. Output to (260).

The audio output unit 260 converts an audio signal such as a ring tone or an effect sound reproduced by the audio reproducing unit 250 into an audible sound, and outputs various reproduction sounds such as a ring tone or an effect sound in the mobile communication terminal 1. 120 is selectively output according to the control.

The memory 270 stores a RAM area 271 temporarily storing data generated during a control operation of the mobile communication terminal 1, a control program for controlling the operation of the mobile communication terminal 1, and basic information thereof. The ROM area 272 is divided into a user interface (U / I: USER INTERFACE) provided by the mobile communication terminal 1 or a data area 273 capable of storing data generated by the user application and the user application. The access control is performed by the system control unit 120.

The system controller 120 may interface with external ICs through a serial bus such as an I ² C bus to control them. When an operation command is input from the user through the operation unit or an event such as a call reception occurs, the system controller 120 issues a necessary control command. In addition, the corresponding application is driven according to an operation command input to the keypad 210, and the corresponding menu is received by receiving an input signal of the touch switches 290 and 23 corresponding to the application-specific function menu being driven.

The display driver 280 displays the graphic data output through the display 220 that provides visual information to the user and the display data including the backlight control signal through the display 220.

According to a characteristic aspect of the present invention, the display driver 280 of the mobile communication terminal 1 according to the present invention receives the graphic data according to the function menu of the user application output from the system control unit 120 to the touch switch 290 ) Is displayed on one side of the display unit 220 to correspond to. The user application is, for example, a program provided for allowing a user to operate a plurality of functions implemented in the mobile communication terminal 1 such as a camera, an MP3 player, a media player, a navigation, a hands-free, and the like.

For example, in the case of the mobile communication terminal 1 equipped with a camera, the display driver 280 may display a function menu for setting a shooting, zoom, flash, and other cameras, which are main functions of the camera, of the display unit 220. Allocated part of up, down, left and right is displayed to the user. In addition, in the case of the mobile communication terminal 1 equipped with an MP3 player, graphic data according to the function menu of the MP3 player, such as playing, pausing, stopping playing, playing the next or previous song, or setting an MP3 file, is controlled by the system controller ( Received from the display unit 120 receives any one of the upper, lower, left, and right portions of the display unit 220 and displays it to the user. The function menu displayed on the display unit 220 may be guided by various icons or texts so that the user can easily recognize the function menu. In addition, it is obvious that each of the functional menus can be further divided into multiple levels of submenus.

The touch switch 290 is formed at one of the positions corresponding to the function menu displayed on the display unit 220 by the display driver 280, that is, at the top, bottom, left, and right sides of the display unit 220, and is displayed on the display unit 220. Select and print from the user. Each touch switch 290 transmits a signal such as an interrupt generation to the system controller 120 through, for example, a multiplexer by using a change in electric flux density flowing through two terminals, X Array and Y Array. Input means.

When the touch switch 290 comes into contact with a dielectric such as a human hand, current flowing through a terminal of the portion flows into our body through a finger. As a result, the area where the finger touches becomes smaller than the other parts. For example, when the touch switch 290 is touched to the inverter stand, the flow of electricity changes, and the integrated circuit IC in the stand senses this change to turn on or off the light. Press once to turn on, press again to make it brighter, press once to make it brighter, and press the fourth time to turn off. The integrated circuit recognizes the change in the electric flow and activates the stand. The touch switch 290 works by using a metal instead of a hand, but does not work by bringing a non-conductive non-conductive material such as paper, rubber, or plastic. The touch switch 290 is more stable than the mechanical switch arrangement, and has an advantage of constituting a low-cost key input circuit.

Recognition of the touch switch 290 according to the present invention preferably uses a GPIO signal output from the system control unit 120. If two GPIO signals are used, four states of 00, 01, 10, and 11 may be represented, and thus four touch switches 290 may be implemented and used. Four switches are assigned one of four states, 00 to 11. For example, if an application required for driving the camera has four function menus of shooting, flash function, zoom function, and environment setting, the touch switch 290 corresponding to the shooting function is given a status of 00. In addition, the flash function, the zoom function, and the environment setting function are also given statuses of 01, 10, and 11, respectively. In addition, if three GPIO signals are used, eight states may be represented, and eight touch switches 290 may be implemented and used.

If the user touches the touch switch 290 corresponding to the photographing function, the 4 TO 2 multiplexer connected to the switch detects the change in the electric flux density and inputs 2 bits of binary data, that is, 00 Send to the controller. The controller receives the binary data transmitted from the multiplexer, photographs an image signal input from the camera, and stores the image signal in the data area 273 of the memory 270.

Hereinafter, a menu selection and a driving state of an application through the touch switch 23 according to an embodiment of the present invention will be described with reference to FIG. 3.

3 is an exemplary view of applying a touch switch to a mobile communication terminal according to an embodiment of the present invention. As shown, a function menu bar 24 for driving a function of a user application currently being driven is displayed on one side of the display unit 21 of the mobile communication terminal 1 according to the present invention, and the function menu bar 24 is displayed. The touch switch 23 is provided at a position corresponding to each function menu displayed on the back panel.

For example, when a user inputs an operation command for driving an MP3 player through the keypad 12 to play an MP3 file stored in the mobile communication terminal 1, the system controller 120 stores the MP3 player program in the memory 270. The data is read out from the data area 273 and driven. When the MP3 player is driven, the display driver 280 controls the MP3 player driving state received from the system controller and functions of the MP3 player such as play, pause, stop playback, play of the next or previous song, and configuration. The function menu to be displayed is displayed on the function menu bar 24. The touch switches 23 are formed on the upper, lower, left, and right sides of the display unit 21, and each touch switch 23 corresponds to the function menu of the function menu bar 24 displayed by the display unit 220 in one-to-one correspondence. Is formed. In addition, each touch switch 23 is assigned one of binary data representing a plurality of states according to the GPIO signal output from the system controller 120. That is, if two GPIO signals output from the system controller 120 are used, one of four states 00, 01, 10, and 11 is allocated.

When the user touches the touch switch 23 corresponding to the playback stop function to stop the playback of the MP3 file currently being played, the touch switch 23 is connected to the flow of electricity generated by a dielectric such as a human hand. Send the change to the multiplexer connected to the switch. The multiplexer receives this and transmits binary data corresponding to the switch to the system controller 120.

When there are four touch switches 23 provided in the mobile communication terminal 1 according to the present invention, a multiplexer of 4 TO 2 may be used to transmit data consisting of two binary numbers to the system controller 120. . The system controller 120 receives binary data transmitted from the multiplexer and executes a user application function menu corresponding to the binary data.

Although the system control unit 120 and the multiplexer of the mobile communication terminal 1 according to the present invention may be configured as separate circuits, in order to effectively reduce the PCB board size provided in the mobile communication terminal 1, a general MSM chip is used. It may be provided commercially as a single integrated circuit.

As described above, the mobile communication terminal provided with the touch switch according to the present invention displays the function menu of the user application currently being driven on one of the upper, lower, left, and right sides of the display unit of the mobile communication terminal, and touches one-to-one correspondence with each function menu. By forming a switch, it is possible to easily search and select an application function menu that is currently being driven without inputting complicated function keys.

In addition, in the case of a swivel-foldable mobile communication terminal, when the user rotates the folder 180 degrees and the keypad provided in the mobile communication terminal is obscured by the folder unit, it is currently driven by using a touch switch provided in the display unit. It has the effect of easily searching and selecting the application function menu.

In addition, by driving the touch switch by using the GPIO signal provided by the system control unit, due to the frequently added functions has the effect of avoiding the disadvantage of having to design the appearance of the new terminal and the system architecture accordingly.

The present invention has been described above with reference to preferred embodiments, but is not limited thereto, and is interpreted by the appended claims, which are intended to cover many modifications that will be apparent to those skilled in the art without departing from the scope of the present invention. Should be done.

1 is a perspective view schematically showing an appearance of a swivel foldable mobile terminal having a touch switch according to an exemplary embodiment of the present invention.

2 is a block diagram schematically illustrating a mobile communication terminal having a touch switch according to an exemplary embodiment of the present invention.

3 is an exemplary view of applying a touch switch to a mobile communication terminal according to an embodiment of the present invention.

<Description of the symbols for the main parts of the drawings>

1. Mobile communication terminal 10. Main body

11.Keypad 12. Transmitter

13. Antenna 20. Folder

21. Display part 22. Sign language

23. Touch switch 24. Function menu bar

100. Phone control unit 110. Communication control unit

120. System Controls 210. Keypad

220. Display unit 230. Wireless communication unit

240. Audio input and output circuit 250. Audio playback unit

260. Audio output 270. Memory

271. RAM area 272. ROM area

273. Data area 280. Display driver

290. Touch switch

Claims (6)

In the mobile communication terminal, A keypad for receiving and outputting a user's operation command; A display unit for displaying an operation state of a menu of the mobile communication terminal and a plurality of applications mounted and driven in the terminal; A plurality of touch switches formed on at least one of up, down, left, and right sides of the display unit; A system controller which controls the overall apparatus of the mobile communication terminal, and receives an input signal of the touch switch to drive a function menu of an application corresponding to the touch switch; Mobile communication terminal with a touch switch, characterized in that it comprises a. The system of claim 1, wherein the system control unit: And a function menu bar displaying the function menu of the application on one side of the display unit to correspond to the touch switch. The method of claim 1 or 2, wherein the application is: A mobile communication terminal equipped with a touch switch, characterized in that at least one or all of the picture taking, MP3 player, media player, navigation, hands-free. In the clamshell mobile communication terminal comprising a main body and a folder portion hinged to an upper end thereof, A display unit for displaying visual information to the user on the surface of the folder unit facing the main body unit; A plurality of touch switches positioned on at least one of up, down, left, and right sides of the display unit and receiving selection information of an application function menu displayed on the display unit; Mobile communication terminal with a touch switch, characterized in that it comprises a. The method of claim 4, wherein the mobile communication terminal: The main body and the folder unit is connected to the swivel hinge, the mobile terminal with a touch switch, characterized in that the swivel clamshell can be rotated 180 degrees left and right. The method of claim 4 or 5, wherein the application is: A mobile communication terminal equipped with a touch switch, characterized in that at least one or all of the picture taking, MP3 player, media player, navigation, hands-free.