JPH01268224A - Coordinate input device - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To improve the resolution of the title coordinate input device by providing scanning type light transmitting-receiving means on a square coordinate plane and at, at least, two nearly corner sections of the coordinate plane and light regressive reflecting bodies along, at least, two sides of the coordinate plane and detecting a coordinate position on the coordinate plane from the photodetecting output signals of at least two of the light transmitting-receiving means. CONSTITUTION:When the light beam which are emitted from scanning type light transmitting-receiving means 35a and 35b toward a light regressive reflecting body 36 applied or provided on the inside surface a frame body 24 surrounding the four sides of the coordinate plane 37 of a display device 9 and totally reflected by the reflecting bodies 36 in a normal way to the photodetecting element are intercepted by an instruction, when the instruction performs coordinate indication on the coordinate plane. Since the X- and Y-coordinates of the point indicated by the finger are found by detecting the intercepted states of the light beam, only two sets of light emitting and receiving elements can manage necessary light emission and reception and the resolution can be decided by the diameter of the spherical surface of the light regressive reflecting surface. Thus a coordinate input device which is simple in constitution low in cost, but high in resolution is obtained.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION [Field of Industrial Application] The present invention relates to a coordinate input device suitable for use in a touch panel.

[Summary of the invention]

The present invention relates to a coordinate input device suitable for use in a touch panel, and includes a quadrilateral coordinate plane, scanning light transmitting/receiving means disposed at at least two substantially corners of the coordinate plane, and at least one corner of the coordinate plane. and a light recursive reflector provided along two sides, and the light receiving output signals of at least two scanning light transmitting/receiving means
A coordinate input device that detects the coordinate position on a coordinate plane has high resolution, is unaffected by surrounding noise, has a simple structure, and is inexpensive.

[Conventional technology]

2. Description of the Related Art Various touch panel devices have been proposed as coordinate input devices, which can be used as keyboards or digitizers and allow input by simply touching a screen with a finger. Figure 6~
FIG. 12 is an example of each.

In other words, Fig. 6 shows the resistor sheet method, and Fig. 7 shows the resistance sheet method.
This figure schematically shows the structure of the J-sock type, and the basic structure is as shown in FIG. In Figure 8, (1) is a film electrode, (2) is a glass electrode, and the film electrode (1) is a transparent film (3).
It consists of a hard code layer (4) provided on one side of this film (3) (the side pressed by a finger), and a transparent electrode (5) such as a nether provided on the other side of the film (3), The glass electrode (2) consists of a filter or glass substrate (6), a transparent electrode (7) provided on the film or glass substrate (6) so as to face the transparent electrode (5), and the transparent electrode (7). ) and a minute dot-like dot spacer or film insulator (8). The film electrode (1) is on the side to be pressed with a finger for input, that is, the movable electrode, and the glass electrode (2) is on the display side, that is, the fixed electrode side. Film electrode (1
) and a glass electrode (2) are mounted on a cathode ray tube (CRT) (9) as shown in FIG. In Figures 6 and 7, (10a) is the lead that brings out the transparent electrode (7), (10b) is the lead that brings out the transparent electrode, and (11) is the lead that connects these leads (10a) and (10b) to the outside. This is the connecting part.

Then, when the hard code layer (4) on the front surface is pushed toward the film substrate or glass substrate (6) on the back side with a finger or a pen, the transparent electrodes (5) and (7) come into contact and the pair of electrodes becomes electrically conductive. . The X-Y coordinates of the point of contact are provided to a host computer (not shown) for position determination.

FIG. 10 schematically shows the structure of the optical system (Carroll method), which is disclosed in US Pat. No. 4,267,443. A plurality of light emitting diodes (13) arranged on the printed circuit board (12) to be located around the periphery of the display screen emit infrared beams, and arranged on the printed circuit board (14) on the opposite side thereof. A plurality of phototransistors (15) receive light, and a plurality of light emitting diodes (13) arranged on a printed circuit board (16) emit an infrared beam, and a printed circuit board on the opposite side emits an infrared beam. (17) A plurality of phototransistors (15) arranged above receive light and form a grid of infrared beams. Each phototransistor (15
) and the light emitting diode (13) are assigned individual addresses. Each light emitting diode (1
3) and the paired phototransistor (1
5) by sequentially switching which light emitting diode (
13) emits light, and which phototransistor (
15) is supposed to detect that light.

When you touch the display screen with your finger or pen, this blocks the infrared beam. The X-Y coordinates of the interrupted light beam are
It is sent to a computer and the location is determined. Note that the sense surface (optical lattice surface) is a flat surface because the structure is such that the beam is blocked by placing a finger on the optical lattice surface created by the infrared beam. Further, (18) is a switching circuit IC for selecting a light emitting diode (13) and a phototransistor (15) to be made conductive.

FIG. 11 schematically shows the structure of the inductive method (capacitive method), in which the surface of the glass substrate (19) is subdivided into independent regions, and a transparent electrode (20) is formed in each region. Then, when a finger touches one of the regions, the capacitance of the human body is added to the circuit, and the control section detecting the capacitance change identifies the location of the region.

Figure 12 schematically shows the structure of the surface wave method (acoustic method), in which a sound wave generator (2
2) and a sound wave receiver (23), which is a sound wave generator.

(22) sends out surface acoustic waves onto the glass substrate (21), and when a finger touches the glass substrate (21), the surface waves are reflected and return to the acoustic wave receiver (23). The touch position is calculated by measuring the time it takes for the touch to return.

[Problem to be solved by the invention]

By the way, the above-mentioned conventional touch panel devices each have the following various drawbacks. In other words, in the case of the resistive sheet method and the matrix method, the light is scattered by the spacer or the film injector (8), making it impossible to obtain uniform translucency and high transparency.
The color reproducibility was poor, the filter was susceptible to scratches, the filter was easily stained, and the touch was poor. In addition, in the case of the Carroll method, when attempting to make the optical lattice plane finer, the light emitting diode (13), phototransistor (15), amplifiers and switching I/Os that drive these light emitting and light receiving elements are required.
Since the number of C(1B) becomes very large and the costar rep has a large divergence angle of the light emitting diode (13), many transistors with large amplifier gain are required on the phototransistor (15) side, which makes it difficult to control the screen. As the size increases, the resolution decreases, the sensitivity deteriorates, malfunctions are more likely to occur due to external noise, and CR
Printed circuit boards (12
), (14), (16), (17) depth d
Not only does this make the overall shape of the display device worse in terms of design, but the face of the CRT moves toward the back, making it difficult to touch the screen. I can't get anything sexual. or,
Since the CRT surface is curved, it has the disadvantage of causing parallax.

In addition, in the case of the inductive method, touch detection is limited to conductive objects such as human fingers, and it is impossible to manually touch it with gloves on or the tip of a pencil, and furthermore, the number of bats is limited. ,
It has the disadvantage of being damaged. Furthermore, the surface wave method cannot find the center of a large object such as a finger, and arranging transducers close together to achieve high resolution is expensive, increases sensitivity to dirt, and increases reading errors. has.

The present invention was devised in view of the above-mentioned drawbacks, and its main purpose is to provide a coordinate system that has high resolution, is unaffected by noise, has a simple structure, and is inexpensive.

[Failure to solve the problem]

An example of the coordinate human power device of the present invention is shown in FIG.
) scanning type optical transmitting/receiving means (35a), (35b) disposed at at least two substantially corners of the coordinate plane (37); ), and at least two scanning optical transmitting/receiving means (35a>
.

(35b) The coordinate position on the coordinate plane is detected by the received light output signal.

[Effect]

The coordinate human-powered device of this invention has a scanning type optical transmitting/receiving means (35a)
, (35b), the coordinate plane (3
7) The light emitted toward the light-recurring reflector 36) coated or placed on the inner surface of the frame body (24) arranged to surround the four sides of the frame body (24) is totally reflected and returned to the light-receiving element. When the optical beat indicates a location chart with a finger on the coordinate plane of the display device (9), the reflected beam is blocked by the finger. Since this state is detected and the X and Y coordinates are determined, only two sets of light-emitting and light-receiving elements are required, and the resolution is determined by the spherical diameter of the recursive reflecting surface. A coordinate human powered device is obtained.

〔Example〕

Hereinafter, the case where the coordinate input device of the present invention is applied to a touch panel device will be explained with reference to FIG.

In Fig. 1, the frame body (hereinafter referred to as bezel) provided on the front surface of the CRT (9) is arranged so as to surround the face surface of the CRT (9), that is, the four sides of the coordinate plane (37) at the top, bottom, left and right. Ru. A light return reflector (36) is formed on the right inner surface (24R) and the upper inner surface (240) of the inner periphery of this bezel (24). This light-recurring reflector (36) is, for example, a transparent micro sphere (40) made of glass or acrylic made of a spherical lens with a diameter of about 70 μm, and a bezel (24) as shown in FIG.
) right inner surface (24R) and upper inner surface (2411)
It is uniformly adhered to the transparent adhesive layer (38) 1 applied above, so that the light beam (39) incident from the direction of the dora will also be substantially reflected in the direction of incidence.

Scanning type optical transceivers (35a) and (35b) are disposed at the lower corner of the bezel (24) of the coordinate input device of this example.

In the example shown in the first diagram, movable mirrors (25a), (25b)
is placed. Movable mirror (25a), (25
b) It is also possible to arrange a polygon mirror or the like instead of. The movable mirrors (25a) and (25b) are made of fiber optics (26a) and (26b), for example.
via a laser diode or LED (28
a), (28b) and the light beam emitted from these light emitting elements, (39) is a movable mirror (25a
>.

(25b) and passes through the planes of the right inner surface (24R) and upper inner surface (24, U) of the bezel (24) at an angle θ3. Scan at θ5.

The movable mirrors (25a,), (25b) that are moved to scan the light beam (39) in this way are controlled by the mirror control circuit (32) based on the clock signal from the clock generation circuit (33). Movable mirrors (25a) and (25b) provided at the lower left and right ends of the bezel (24) are driven synchronously. Light emitting elements (28a), (28b)
The light beam (39) reaches the light recursive reflector (36) from
) is reflected to the movable mirror (25a) as shown in Figure 2.
), (25b) reaches the position, but when you touch the coordinate plane (37) of the CRT (9) with your finger to input coordinates, the light beam is blocked and does not reach the optical line reflector (36). For this reason, the light beams (39) are interlaced. The movable mirror (25a) reflects or intersects with the optical line reflector (36).

(25b) Fiber obtex (2
6a).

(26b) A light receiving element (27a) consisting of a photodiode or a phototransistor, etc. (27b)
The received light output is sent to the amplifier circuit (30a), (3
0b) After amplification, the coordinate conversion circuit (31a), (3
1b) into the coordinate axes, and the interwoven coordinates are calculated in the arithmetic circuit (34) so that the face surface (
37) The X and Y coordinates of the indicated point can be found.

Note that (29a) and (29b) are light emitting elements (28a)
, (28b) is a control circuit that controls light emission,
The amplifier circuits (30a) and (30b) are controlled by a mirror control circuit (32). Also, the X and Y coordinates are the scanning angle θ6. It can be determined as a function of tan of θ.

In the above example, the coordinate plane (37) of the CRT (9) is considered to be a flat plane, and the scanning optical transceivers (35a) and (35b) are provided at two locations at the lower left and right ends of the bezel (24). If the surface (37) forms a curved surface, the two scanning optical transceivers (35a) and (35b) at the lower left and right ends
One or two scanning type optical transceivers may be disposed between them to divide the scanning area and share the task.

Furthermore, in the upper part, a case was explained in which transparent microspheres (40) were attached on the adhesive layer (38) to constitute the optical line reflector (36), but as shown in FIG. A film on which transparent microspheres (40) are coated with a binder in advance on a substrate (41) shaped like , is cut to a predetermined size and a bezel (
24).

In the above example, the angle information θ6. The X and Y coordinates were determined from θ, and the optical line reflector (36) is shown in FIG. 3B.

As shown in C, if the position information is coded using a barcode (42), the light receiving elements (28a), (28b)
Since the reflected beam obtained at 2 is code-transformed, there is no need to perform coordinate transformation using the coordinate transformation circuits (31a), (31b>, etc.), so that angular coordinate transformation becomes easy.

Fig. 3B shows a case in which a barcoded optical line reflector is formed along the longitudinal direction of the side surface of the bezel (24), while Fig. 3C shows a case in which a barcoded optical line reflector is formed along the longitudinal direction of the side surface of the bezel (24). Since the barcode (42) was formed in the width direction, the optical beat (39)
), it is necessary to perform main scanning and sub-scanning such as wobbling (43).

The one shown in the third diagram has a plurality of light beams (39) (two light beams (39a), (39b) in the third diagram), and the barcodes (42a), (42b) are connected to the bezel (
24) are arranged side by side on the inner surface to perform simultaneous scanning.

In the case of such a barcode, it is preferable to provide the optical line reflector of this example in the white stripe portion of a normal barcode, but it may also be provided in the black stripe portion. FIG. 4 is a perspective view of the bezel (24) used in the coordinate input device of the present invention, seen from the back side. For example, the right inner surface (24R) of the bezel (24) has sin θ.

By forming an optical line reflector consisting of non-uniformly spaced scales that vary by cos θ, and by forming an optical line reflector on the upper inner surface (240) with non-uniformly spaced scales that vary by cosθ, the position coordinates are sinθa+ It is possible to extract a reflected beat that has been converted in advance to coordinates determined by a function of CO8θb.

Fig. 5 shows another embodiment of the scanning type optical transceiver (35i), (35b) provided at the corner of the bezel (24), which has a central hole in the center of the turntable (42).
The motor shaft (45) is also hollow. A prism (43) is placed on the center hole of the turntable (42), and the turntable (42) is rotated in the direction of the arrow by a motor (44) and scanned by an angle θ. Light emitting element (2
The light from 8a) is fiber obtex (26a)
The prism (43) is incident from the bottom through the 45° angle.
The light beam (39) is reflected by the inclined surface of the prism (43) and emitted from the vertical surface, and enters, for example, the transparent microsphere (40) constituting the optical line reflector (36).
), is reflected by the 45° inclined surface, and reaches the light receiving element (27a) from the bottom surface via the fiber optic (26a). In the case of such a scanning type optical transceiver (35a), a turntable (42) and a prism (43) are arranged at the corner of the bezel (24), and a motor (4
4), light receiving element (27a), light emitting element (28a)
It becomes extremely easy to arrange the outside of the bezel (24).

Since the coordinate input device of this example is constructed in a similar manner, the resolution is determined by the diameter of the transparent microspheres (40). For example, if microspheres of 70 μm are used, a touch panel with extremely high resolution can be obtained. Furthermore, since the light is transmitted and received by two sets of scanning type optical transmitters and receivers, an inexpensive edge panel can be obtained with a simple configuration. Furthermore, since the depth of the inner surface of the side surface of the bezel only needs to be shallow, it is possible to choose a design freely. Furthermore, since most of the light beam is reflected by the light-recurring reflective surface, the light-receiving element achieves detection reliability with high sensitivity and reduces malfunctions due to ambient noise.

Therefore, a coordinate input system suitable for large-sized CRTs can be obtained. In addition, it has many advantages, such as the fact that it is easy to convert the positional information into coordinates in advance by converting the light-recurring reflector into a bar code or into a sign scale.

In the two series of embodiments, the case where this embodiment is applied to a touch panel has been described, but it goes without saying that it can also be applied to a keyboard or a digitizer.

Further, in each of the above-described embodiments, a case has been described in which transparent microspheres are formed on the bezel as a light-returning reflecting surface, but a ply eye lens, a rendicular lens, or the like may be used in place of the transparent microspheres.

Note that the present invention is not limited to the embodiments described above, and various modifications can be made without departing from the gist of the present invention.

〔Effect of the invention〕

According to the present invention, it is also possible to provide a high-resolution coordinate input device in which the grid pitch of the coordinate plane is 1 mm. or,
Since a scanning type optical transmitter/receiver with two sets of light emitting and light receiving elements is sufficient, the number of light transmitting and receiving elements is reduced, and even with a low power light emitting element, most of the light beams 1 are reflected by the light recursive reflector and reach the light receiving element. A coordinate input device with a simple structure that has a large detection output for returning and is not easily affected by surrounding noise can be obtained.

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

FIG. 1 is a system diagram showing an embodiment of the coordinate system of the present invention, FIG. 2 is a schematic diagram of a light recursive reflector, and FIG. FIG. 4 is a perspective view showing another embodiment of the coordinate human-powered device of the present invention, FIG. 5 is a schematic diagram of a scanning mechanism, and FIGS. 6 to 12 are views showing an example of a conventional device. (9) is a CRT, (24) is a bezel, (24R) is the right inner surface of the bezel, (2411) is the upper inner surface of the bezel, (35a). (35b) is a scanning type optical transceiver, and (36) is a light recursive reflector. Agent Moka Ito
Hide Matsukuma M Menaga Q mouth

Claims (1)

[Claims] A quadrilateral coordinate plane, an operable light transmitting/receiving means disposed at at least two substantially corners of the coordinate plane, and a light beam disposed along at least two sides of the coordinate plane. A coordinate input device comprising: a recursive reflector, and configured to detect a coordinate position on the coordinate plane based on the received light output signals of the at least two scanning light transmitting/receiving means.