JPH11212716A - Electrostatic capacity coupling system foot type mouse without cable - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To improve operability and also to eliminate the needs of cleaning and maintenance by providing a mouse body with a foot receiving part, making a foot move on a mouse pad and controlling it with a switch on a switch board. SOLUTION: A mouse 4 to which a foot receiving part is attached is moved on an input area 3 of a pad board 2 which is connected to a personal computer with a cable 1. Thus, a cursor is adjusted to a desired position on a screen of a display device that is connected to the personal computer. A switchboard 15 is connected with a cable 14 from the top face of the board 2 so that a foot that operates the mouse 4 on the board 2 and a foot that operates a switch are different. The board 15 is provided with a foot placed base and an operator presses a push button by bending the big toe of a foot without lifting his foot.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a mouse used for a personal computer or the like and most widely used as a pointing device, and more particularly to a mouse used by a foot and having no cable. It is about things.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art Normally, a mouse is arranged next to a keyboard on a desk, and is used for selecting a menu, confirming, inputting characters, specifying a coordinate position, drawing a picture, etc. in work of a personal computer or the like. The operator had to use a keyboard and a pointing device such as a mouse while holding it with one hand.

[0003] The most widespread mouse used on a desk is a method in which a ball on the bottom surface is rotated by sliding on a plane, and a rotary encoder is rotated by the rotation of the ball to obtain a moving amount. It is.
In addition, a method in which the amount of movement is determined by optically reading the grid by moving the grid on a board on which a grid is formed vertically and horizontally by printing or the like, and Japanese Patent Application No. 7-100766 filed by the present applicant. Discloses a capacitance-less mouse without a cable.

A patent has been filed for a foot-type mouse as a pointing device. As a method for detecting the coordinates of a foot-operated mouse, a method using a rotary encoder (Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 62-37731), a method using a foot switch (Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 5-224812), and a method using an optical sensor (particularly Kaiping
No. 8-272518) has been filed.

[0005]

As described above, when the operator uses the keyboard and the mouse while holding it with one hand, he or she hits a key with the keyboard when inputting characters, and selects and confirms a menu. The mouse is used to specify the coordinates and coordinate position. For this reason, the operation efficiency was extremely poor.

[0006] Since the foot-operated mouse is used on the foot of the operator, dirt adheres to the rotary transmission system of the rotary encoder. In an optical sensor, dirt adheres to the optical system, and cleaning and maintenance are required more regularly than a mouse on a desk. Further, since the mouse itself is connected to a computer or the like by a cable, the cable is entangled with the foot or hinders the operation.

[0007]

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION The present invention has been made in view of the conventional problems, and comprises a mouse that moves on a coordinate input device with one foot of an operator and a switch panel that is operated with the other foot. The present invention relates to a foot mouse without a capacitance-coupling type cable, wherein a foot accommodating portion is provided in the mouse main body, the mouse is moved on a mouse pad by a foot, and no capacitance-coupling type cable is controlled by a switch on the switch panel. This is to propose a foot mouse.

[0008]

According to the present invention, the operator inserts his / her foot into the foot receiving portion of the mouse and moves the mouse in the input area on the pad board of the operator's foot. Selection and confirmation are made by pressing the switch on the switchboard with the other foot.

[0009]

Embodiments of the present invention will be described below with reference to the accompanying drawings. FIG. 1 is an external perspective view of a mouse and a switch board of the present invention. By moving (moving and sliding) a mouse 4 provided with a foot accommodating portion in an input area 3 of a pad board 2 connected to a personal computer (not shown) by a cable 1, a display device ( The cursor on the screen (not shown) points the mouse 4 to the input area 3
Move an amount proportional to the distance moved in the direction corresponding to,
Move the cursor to the desired position.

Here, the coordinate detection of the pad board 2 and the mouse 4 provided with the foot accommodating portion is performed as follows. As shown in FIG. 2, there is an oscillator 5 oscillating at a constant frequency in the mouse 4, and its output is a transmitting electrode 6 near the bottom of the mouse 4.
It is connected to the. On the other hand, the pad board 2 is provided with a plurality of sense electrodes 7 and 8 in the X-axis direction and the Y-axis direction orthogonal to each other as shown in FIG.
Is connected to the input of the multiplexer 9. The output of the multiplexer 9 enters the amplifier 10, and the output of the amplifier 10 passes through the band-pass filter 11 and the AM detector 12,
Connected to the A / D converter input of PU13. Then, the CPU 13 also outputs a selection signal to the multiplexer 9 for determining which multiplexer input is to be selected.

When the mouse 4 is placed on the pad board 2, a capacitive coupling occurs between the transmitting electrode 6 in the mouse 4 and the sense electrodes 7 and 8 in the pad board 2. 4
Is applied to the sense electrodes 7 and 8. The signal induced at the electrode selected by the CPU 13 is amplified by the amplifier 10, noise other than the signal induced from the transmission electrode 6 is removed by the bandpass filter 11, and the signal is induced by the AM detector 12. The signal is converted into a DC signal indicating the magnitude of the signal, and is input to the A / D converter of the CPU 13.
3, the magnitude of the induced signal is obtained.

Since the capacitance coupling is stronger as the distance between the electrodes for transmitting and receiving signals is smaller, a larger signal is induced in the sense electrode closer to the transmitting electrode 6. Thereby, CPU1
Numeral 3 indicates which of the sense electrodes the transmitting electrode 6 is closest to, and the pad based on the ratio of the magnitude of the signal induced to that electrode to the magnitude of the signal induced to the electrodes on both sides of the electrode. It is possible to know at which position on the panel 2 the transmitting electrode 6 is placed. By performing this on each of the X-axis direction electrode 7 and the Y-axis direction electrode 8, it is possible to know at which coordinate position on the pad board 2 the transmitting electrode 6 is located.

An ordinary mouse has one to three switches for deciding a selection or a decision. FIG. 1, which is an embodiment of the present application, shows an embodiment in which there are two switches. It is very difficult to perform the operation of moving the cursor and the operation of determining and selecting with one foot. Therefore, a switch board 15 connected by a cable 14 is separately provided so that a foot for operating the mouse 4 and a foot for operating the switch on the pad board 2 can be performed by separate feet. A switch board 15 is connected from the upper surface of the pad board 2 by a cable 14.

FIG. 4 is a longitudinal sectional view of the switch board 2.
Reference numeral 16 denotes a footrest of the switch board 2 for placing a foot. Further, a push button 18 having a circular recess 17 so that the operator can easily press the switch without looking directly at the operator.
There is. Since the footrest 16 and the push button 18 are at the same height from the floor, the thumb 19 of the foot is held in the recess 17 as shown in FIG. 4, and the operator does not lift the foot,
The push button 18 can be pressed by bending the thumb 19 of the foot.

The structure of the push button 18 will be described. The push button 18 has a column 20 and a hole 2 on the side of the footrest 16.
1, the inside of the housing is provided, and a hole 22 is opened substantially at the center of the column 20. A rib 23 protruding from the footrest 16 fixes the shaft 24. Push button 1 on its axis 24
Eight columns 20 have holes 22 therein. The push button 18 operates with the hole 22 as a fulcrum. Also,
A circular spring rib 25 is provided at the end of the support column 20, and a spring 26 is inserted into the rib 25. This rib 2
5 is on the same axis as the switch 28 attached to the substrate 27. Therefore, when the operator places his / her foot on the footrest 16 and pushes down the push button 18 with the thumb 19 of the foot, the spring rib 25 of the support post 20 on the opposite side of the push button 18 with the axis 24 symmetrical. The substrate 27 is pushed up.
Is pressed. A push button 18 is provided on the support 20 in a direction opposite to the spring rib 25 so that the push button 18 is not further lifted by the force of the spring 26.
9 is attached. The rib 29 is not lifted by the lower plate 31 to which the rubber foot 30 is attached.

On the left side of the footrest 16 in FIG. 4, there is a rail-shaped groove 32. Each operator has a different foot size. Thus, the groove 32 near the operator's heel 33 comes so that the thumb 19 of the foot can be firmly placed in the recess 17 of the push button 18.
A heel holder 34 having a convex shape as shown in FIG. The heel holder 34 may have a shape 35 in which an arc shape is added so that the heel fits more closely to the convex shape as shown in FIG.

[0017]

According to the present invention having the above-described structure, the operator can operate without inserting his / her hand from the keyboard by inserting the foot into the foot receiving portion of the mouse and operating the mouse. Mouse operation and switch operation of the switchboard can be used with either left or right foot depending on the operator's preference. Further, by using a mouse without a cable of the capacitive coupling type, the operability is remarkably improved since there is no cable in the mouse body, and the necessity of cleaning and maintenance is eliminated.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is an external perspective view of a mouse and a switch panel.

FIG. 2 is a mouse configuration diagram

FIG. 3 is an electrical block diagram of a pad board.

FIG. 4 is a vertical sectional view of a switch panel.

FIG. 5: Heel holder 1

FIG. 6: Heel holder 2

[Explanation of symbols]

 DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 Cable 2 Pad board 3 Input area 4 Mouse 5 Oscillator 6 Transmitting electrode 7 X-axis direction sense electrode 8 Y-axis direction sense electrode 9 Multiplexer 10 Amplifier 11 Band pass filter 12 AM detector 13 CPU 14 Cable 15 Switch board 16 Footrest 17 recess 18 push button 19 toe 20 support 21 hole 22 hole 23 rib 24 shaft 25 rib 26 spring 27 substrate 28 switch 29 rib 30 rubber foot 31 lower plate 32 groove 33 heel 34 heel holder

Claims (3)

[Claims] 1. A capacitively coupled cableless foot mouse having a mouse that moves on a coordinate input device with one foot of an operator and a switch board that is operated with the other foot, wherein the mouse body is A foot mouse without a cable of a capacitive coupling type, wherein a foot accommodating portion is provided, the mouse is moved on a mouse pad by a foot, and control is performed by a switch on the switch board. 2. The cableless foot mouse of claim 1 wherein the push button switch of the switch board and the footrest are at the same height. 3. The cableless foot mouse of claim 1, wherein a position of the heel holder can be changed by an operator's heel on a footrest of the switch board.