GB2260207A

GB2260207A - Device for altering an electronic display

Info

Publication number: GB2260207A
Application number: GB9220288A
Authority: GB
Inventors: Maki Kubota
Original assignee: Seikosha KK
Current assignee: Seikosha KK
Priority date: 1991-09-26
Filing date: 1992-09-25
Publication date: 1993-04-07
Also published as: GB9220288D0; DE4232061C2; JPH0587953A; DE4232061A1; KR930007083A

Abstract

A device for altering a value displayed on an electronic digital display 9, which allows quick and smooth adjustment of the display value, has pulse generating moans 1 for generating pulses through manual operations, counting means 6 for counting the number of pulses in predetermined time intervals, specifying means 7 for specifying adjustment values to be used for the adjustment of an electronic digital display value in accordance with the count values, and calculation means 10 for adding or subtracting the adjustment values to or from said electronic digital display value. <IMAGE>

Description

2 M 0 In 17 DEVICE FOR ALTERING AN ELECTRONIC DISPLAY The present

invention relates to a device for altering the value displayed by an electronic display.

A known device for altering the value displayed by an electronic display is disclosed in examined Japanese Patent Publication No. 1-21918. This known device changes the displayed value in accordance with operation pulses generated when a primary pulse generator, such as a stem, is operated. When the frequency of the operation pulses is higher than a predetermined value, adjustment pulses having a higher frequency than the frequency of the operation pulses are generated by a separate secondary pulse generator, and the speed of switching of the value displayed is increased using the adjustment pulses. Specifically, when the frequency of the operation pulses from the pulse generator is higher than a predetermined value, the counter is advanced at a constant rate which is independent of the operation pulse rate.

In the known device described above, it is difficult to select the most suitable frequency for the adjustment pulses. Specifically, if a very high frequency is selected, the switching of the display value may occur too fast to follow with the eye and, as a result, the alteration of the value displayed cannot be carried out smoothly. On the other hand, if the frequency of the adjustment pulses is selected to be only slightly higher than the frequency of the operation pulses from the primary pulse generator, the secondary pulse generator must be operated a large number of times to make a substantial alteration to the display value.

The present invention seeks to provide a device for altering the value displayed by an electronic digital display which enables the alteration of the value displayed to be achieved quickly and smoothly.

According to one aspect of the present invention there is provided a device for altering the value displayed by an electronic display, the device comprising:

adjustment means operable to indicate a required change in the value displayed by the electronic display; control means to form an adjustment value the magnitude of which is determined by operation of the adjustment means; and alteration means to alter the value displayed by the electronic display by an amount equivalent to the magnitude of the adjustment value.

According to a second aspect of the present invention there is provided a device for adjusting an electronic digital value comprising: pulse generating means for generating pulses according to manual operations, counting means for counting the number of pulses generated by the pulse generating means in predetermined time intervals, specifying means for specifying adjustment values to be used for the adjustment of an electronic digital display value in accordance with the count values of the counting means, and calculating means for adding or subtracting the adjustment values specified by the specifying means to or from said electronic digital display value.

For a better understanding of the present invention, and to show how it may be brought into effect, reference will now be made, by way of example, to the following drawings in which:

Fig. 1 is a block diagram showing a first embodiment of the present invention; Fig. 2 shows examples of count values and corresponding adjustment values; Fig. 3 shows the configuration of a pulse generating means; Fig. 4 illustrates the operation of the pulse generating means; Fig. 5 illustrates the operation of the embodiment of Fig. 1; and Fig. 6 is a block diagram showing a second embodiment of the present invention.

An embodiment of the present invention wherein a device for altering the value displayed by an electronic digital display according to the present invention is used in an alarm clock will now be described with reference to the drawings.

In Fig. 1, reference numeral 1 designates a manually operable pulse generating means which may be, for example, a stem switch. Reference numeral 2 designates a time counting circuit for calculating the current time and reference numeral 3 designates an alarm circuit which stores the time at which an alarm should sound and issues an alarm at that time.

Reference numeral 4 designates an oscillation circuit for generating a reference clock signal; reference numeral 5 designates a timer circuit for generating output signals at predetermined time intervals; and reference numeral 6 designates a counting means for counting the number of pulses generated by the pulse generating means 1 in said predetermined time intervals. Reference numeral 7 designates a specifying means such as a ROM which stores the adjustment values used in the adjustment of the value displayed by the electronic digital display and which also stores the adjustment values corresponding to the count values produced by the counting means 6. The adjustment values may be related to the count values in an exponential manner as shown in Fig. 2. Reference numeral 8 designates a control means for controlling operations such as time display and time adjustment; reference numeral 9 designates an electronic display device for displaying the current time and the alarm time in digital values; and 10 designates a calculating means for adding or subtracting said adjustment values 5 to or from said current time or alarm.

Fig. 3 shows an actual configuration of the pulse generating means 1. In this figure, reference numeral 11 designates a rotatable shaft secured to a stem which can be manually rotated, and reference numeral 12 designates a fixed insulating plate. Reference numerals 13a and 13b designate electrodes formed on the insulating plate 12 and reference numeral 13c designates a common electrode. Reference numeral 14 designates an armature secured to the rotatable shaft 11, which comes into contact with the electrode 13a at contact A, with electrode 13b at contact B and with common electrode 13b at contact C. Reference numeral 15a designates an output terminal which is connected to the electrode 13a; 15b designates an output terminal which is connected to the electrode 13b; and 15c designates an output terminal which is connected to the common electrode 13c. These output terminals may be formed, for example, in the back surface of the insulating plate 12.

Fig. 4 (a) shows the pulses generated at the output terminal 15a as a result of the contact made between the electrode 13a and the contact A of the armature 14 when the rotatable shaft 11 is rotated in the normal direction. Fig. 4(b)'shows the pulses generated at the output terminal 15b as a result of the contact made between the electrode 13b and the contact B of the armature 14 when the rotatable shaft 11 is rotated in the normal direction. Fig. 4 (c) shows the pulses generated at the output terminal 15a as a result of the contact made between the electrode 13a and the contact A of the armature 14 when the rotatable shaft 11 is rotated in the reverse direction. Fig. 4 (d) shows the pulses generated at the output terminal 15b as a result of the contact made between the electrode 13b and the contact B of the armature 14 when the rotatable shaft 11 is rotated in the reverse direction. The electrodes 13a and 13b are arranged so that the output terminals 15a and 15b provide pulses which are shifted in time with respect to each other. As can be seen from Fig. 4 the pulses provided from output terminals 15a and 15b partially overlap each other, and the order of the pulses depends upon whether the rotatable shaft 11 is rotated in the normal direction, or in the reverse direction.

An operation to adjust the current time displayed will now be described with reference to Fig. 5. First, a time correcting mode is selected, and the current time is displayed by the display device 9. The selection of the time correcting mode causes the timer circuit 5 to start operation and generate output signals at predetermined time intervals (e.g. every 1/16 sec.) as shown in Fig. 5 (a). To correct the time displayed the rotatable shaft 11 is rotated. When the rotatable shaft 11 is rotated pulses are generated by the contact of the armature 14 and the electrodes 13a, 13b and appear at the output terminals 15a and 15b respectively. Since the pulses generated by the contact of the armature and the electrodes 13a, 13b are identical except for the time-shift only one of the pulse-trains is shown in Fig. 5 (b). The number of pulses is counted by the counting means 6. Then, after the elapse of the predetermined time interval, the timer circuit 5 generates on output signal which causes the control means 8 to read out the count value from the counting means 6 and then reset the count value.

Thus, as shown in Fig. 5 (c), the number of pulses generated by the pulse generating means 1 in said predetermined time interval (l/16 sec.) is detected. As shown in Fig. 5 (d), for each of said predetermined time intervals the control means 8 reads out adjustment values corresponding to the associated count value from the specifying means 7. Specifically, as illustrated by Fig. 2, when the count value in the previous time interval is 111 an adjustment value 121 is read out and when the count value is 121 an adjustment value 141 is read out.

Furthermore, in order to determined whether the rotatable shaft 11 is rotating in the normal direction or whether it is rotating in the reverse direction, and hence whether the time shown by the display device should be advanced or moved back, the control means 8 detects whether the pulse-train from output terminal 15a leads or lags the pulse-train from output terminal 15b. The time adjustment is effected by using the calculating means 10, in the case of normal rotation, to add said adjustment value to the digit of the time counting circuit 2 indicating the time in minutes and, in the case of reverse rotation, to subtract said adjustment value from the digit of the time counting circuit 2 indicating the time in minutes. Further the other digits indicating the time may be adjusted by using the carry or borrow associated with the addition or subtraction performed on the digit indicating the time in minutes.

As described above, the speed of time adjustment increases in an exponential manner as the speed of rotation of the rotatable shaft 11 increases. Further, since the adjustment of the current time is carried out by the calculating means 10 through the addition or subtraction of adjustment values, the relationship between the speed of rotation and the speed of time adjustment can be arbitrarily set by varying the adjustment values corresponding to the count values.

Moreover, since the calculation can be carried out in very short period of time, it is possible to set wideranged and large adjustment values allowing adjustment of the displayed time to be accomplished rapidly.

Although the pulse generating means 1 is formed as a stem switch in the above embodiment, this invention is not limited thereto and any means such as a pushbutton generating pulses through manual operations may be used.

In the above-described embodiment, a ROM table is used as the specifying means 7 in which the adjustment values are stored and from which the adjustment values corresponding to the count values calculated by the counting means 6 are read out. However, the present invention is not limited thereto, and each adjustment value may be calculated in a predetermined manner from the count value calculated by the counting means 6. Fig. 6 shows a further embodiment of this invention. In the figure, the parts having the same function as parts already described in relation to Fig. 1 are designated by the same reference numeral. In such a configuration, the correct adjustment value is calculated by the calculating means 10 using the count value obtained by the counting means 6. For example, an adjustment value may be calculated according to the formula "y=2x" where the count value and adjustment value are represented by x and y, respectively. In this case the adjustment value increases linearly relative to the count value. The calculation of the required adjustment value is performed each time a count value is obtained by the counting means 6 and the result of the calculation is stored as the adjustment value in a storage circuit 71 such as a register. The value is subsequently added to or subtracted from the time by the calculation means 10 to adjust the time. The adjustment value in the storage circuit 7' is updated each time a new count value is calculated.

According to the described embodiments of the present invention, a display value is adjusted through the addition or subtraction of adjustment values which adjustment values vary in accordance with the speed at which the pulse generating means is operated. As a result, the relationship between the speed of the operation of the pulse generating means and the speed of the adjustment of the display value can be arbitrarily set. For example, an arrangement wherein the display value is changed by an amount which increases in an exponential manner as the speed of the operation of the pulse generating means is increased will make it easy to carry out a wide-range adjustment of the display value. Further, since the calculation is performed in a quite short period of time, it is possible to set large adjustment values which allow the time required for the adjustment to be greatly reduced.

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Claims

1. A device for altering the value displayed by an electronic display, the device comprising:

adjustment means operable to indicate a required change in the value displayed by the electronic display; control means to form an adjustment value, the magnitude of which is determined by operation of the adjustment means; and alteration means to alter the value displayed by the electronic display by an amount equivalent to the magnitude of the adjustment value.

2. A device for altering the value displayed by an electronic display as claimed in claim 1 wherein the device further includes means to determine the sign of the required change in the value displayed by the electronic display and wherein the alteration means adds the adjustment value to, or subtracts it from, the value displayed by the display device in accordance with the sign of the required change.

3. A device for altering the value displayed by an electronic display as claimed in claim 1 or 2 wherein the adjustment means comprises a pulse generating mechanism.

4. A device for altering the value displayed by an electronic display as claimed in claim 3 when dependent on claim 2 wherein the pulse generating mechanism generates two pulse trains which are related to one another in a first manner when the value displayed is to be increased, and which are related to each other in a second manner when the value displayed is to be decreased.

5. A device for altering the value displayed by an electronic display as claimed in claim 4 wherein the two pulse trains are time shifted with respect to each other.

6. A device for altering the value displayed by an electronic display as claimed in one of claims 3, 4 or 5 wherein the pulse generating mechanism comprises an electrode and contact means, said contact means being caused by the operation of the adjustment means to interact intermittently with the electrode so causing a pulse train to be produced.

7. A device for altering the value displayed by an electronic display as claimed in claim 6 wherein the pulse generating mechanism further includes a second contact means and a second electrode, said second contact means being caused to interact intermittently with the second electrode during operation of the adjustment means so causing a second pulse train to be produced.

8. A device for altering the value displayed by an electronic display as claimed in one of claims 3-7 wherein the pulses are generated by a rotational motion of the adjustment means.

9. A device for altering the value displayed by an electronic display as claimed in claim 8 when dependent on claim 6 or 7 wherein the adjustment means further comprises a rotatable shaft and an armature arm attached to the rotatable shaft wherein the or each contact means is mounted on the armature arm and interacts with the or each corresponding electrode as the shaft is rotated.

10. A device for adjusting the value displayed by the electronic display as claimed in one of claims 3 to 9 wherein the frequency of the pulses is proportional to the required change in the value displayed as determined by operation of the adjustment means.

11. A device for altering the value displayed by an electronic display as claimed in claim 10 wherein the control means comprises count means for determining, as a count value, the number of pulses i generated by the pulse generating mechanism in a predetermined interval.

12. A device for altering the value displayed by an electronic display as claimed in claim 11 wherein the control means further comprises calculation means to calculate the adjustment value from the count value.

13. A device for altering the value displayed by an electronic display as claimed in claim 12 wherein the control means further comprises a storage means which stores the adjustment value corresponding to each count value, and the adjustment value is determined by the calculation means from said storage means.

14. A device for altering the value displayed by an electronic display as claimed in claim 12 or 13 wherein the adjustment value increases more rapidly than the count value.

15. A device for altering the value displayed by an electronic display as claimed in claim 14 wherein the adjustment value is related to the count value in an exponential manner.

16. A device for altering the value displayed by an electronic display as claimed in any preceding claim wherein the adjustment means is manually operable.

17. A device for altering the value displayed by an electronic display substantially as herein described with reference to Figures 1 to 5 of the accompanying drawings.

18. A device for altering the value displayed by an electronic display substantially as herein described with reference to Figure 6 of the accompanying drawings.

19. A device for adjusting an electronic digital value comprising: pulse generating means for generating pulses according to manual operations, counting means for counting the number of pulses generated by the pulse generating means in predetermined time intervals, specifying means for specifying adjustment values to be used for the adjustment of an electronic digital display value in accordance with the count values of the counting means, and calculating means for adding or subtracting the adjustment values specified by the specifying means to or from said electronic digital display value.