KR100339923B1 - Coordinate inputting apparatus using a light and its method - Google Patents

Abstract

The present invention relates to a coordinate input device and a coordinate recognition method using light that can process inputs more naturally than conventional mice when performing tasks such as handwriting input, drawing creation, and picture input when used in a desktop computer or a notebook computer. As an object, this object is provided with a light source, an on / off switch 13 and at least one push switch 14, through which a light generating device and a light emitted from the light generating device emit light in a region to be designated. And dividing the light passing through the light passing portion and at least two light passing portions positioned at a predetermined distance, and divided by the light splitting plate and the light splitting plate provided at least one of the light passing portions. It is equipped with a plurality of optical sensors that sense the amount of light and converts it into current or voltage, It is achieved by a coordinate input system using light, characterized in that the light position is recognized.

Description

Coordinate inputting apparatus using a light and its method

The present invention relates to a coordinate input device and a coordinate recognition method using light, and specifically, the position coordinate can be detected by dividing the light emitted from a constant light source through the incident light splitter and grasping the divided light amount with an optical sensor. The present invention relates to a coordinate input device and a coordinate recognition method using light.

Mouse, digitizer, touch panel, etc. have been used to move the cursor on the computer screen to designate a desired position, to draw a picture on the screen, or to input a user's own handwriting. Types of mouse include wheel mouse, ball mouse, There is a kind of optical mouse. The wheel mouse is to be rotated in close contact with the floor because the small wheels are staggered, and the amount of rotation at this time is measured to convert the moving distance. The ball mouse rotates when the large ball is in close contact with the floor, and calculates the moving distance by measuring the rotation amount of two small rotors in close contact with the big ball. The optical mouse moves the mouse on a pad on which a pattern of a certain shape is drawn, and at this time, the moving number of the pann drawn on the floor is measured by an optical sensor to convert the moving distance. The mouse can input only relative coordinates in terms of moving distance, and there is a disadvantage in that free handwriting input is not possible.

Digitizers, touch panels, and the like are designed so that a pen or finger contacts a panel on which an electrode is installed, and recognizes a resistance or capacitance value at this time to convert the position of the contact point. The digitizer can recognize absolute coordinates and recognize free handwriting, pictures, etc., but it must be operated only on the panel. In addition, there is a disadvantage that the performance is degraded by the wear of the contact surface, there is a possibility of error and the price is expensive.

The present invention is to solve the above problems, to provide a coordinate input device and method that can input absolute coordinate values without the use of a special panel or pad is free to input, such as writing instruments commonly used.

It is still another object of the present invention to provide a coordinate input device and method capable of measuring three-dimensional coordinate values using light.

1 is a block diagram showing a functional block of the present invention;

2 is a system configuration diagram showing the structure of the coordinate input device of the present invention.

3 is an explanatory diagram for explaining a position measurement of light emitted from a light generating device.

4 is an embodiment showing an embodiment of a light generating device.

5 is a block diagram showing the configuration of a light incident angle measuring unit of the three-dimensional position measuring apparatus according to the present invention.

6 is an explanatory diagram for explaining the one-dimensional PSD cross-sectional structure and basic operating principle.

7 is a block diagram of another embodiment of the present invention using a PSD device.

***** Description of the main parts of the drawing *****

10: light generating device 11; 12: LED

13 piezoelectric element 14 push switch

15: on / off cycle controller 16: power

20: light passing section

21: first light passing section 22: second light passing section

30: light splitter plate 31: first light splitter plate

32: second light splitter 40: optical sensor

41: first optical sensor 42: second optical sensor

43: third optical sensor 44: fourth optical sensor

50: light incident angle measuring unit 100: coordinate input device

130,131: PSD (Position Sensitive Device)

200: A / D converter 210: P layer

220: I layer 230: N layer

240: electrode 300: interrupt controller

400: CPU 500: VGA card

The above object of the present invention relates to an input system for inputting position coordinates in connection with a computer or a communication device, comprising a light source and an on / off switch 13 and at least one push switch 14 of the light source, The light generating device and the light emitted from the light generating device for emitting light to the area to be passed through, and divided into at least two light passing portion and the light passing through the light passing portion which is located at a predetermined distance apart, At least one optical splitting plate provided in the light passing portion and a plurality of optical sensors for detecting each light amount divided by the optical splitting plate and converts it into a current or a voltage, thereby providing a Achievable by a coordinate input system using light, which is characterized by recognizing a position.

In addition, the object of the present invention relates to an input system for inputting position coordinates by connecting to a computer or a communication device, comprising a light source and an on / off switch and at least one push switch of the light source, At least two horizontal light passing portions and a vertical light installed at a position orthogonal to the horizontal light passing portions, the light generating device emitting light and the light emitted from the light generating device passing through them, and positioned at a predetermined distance apart from each other. And a plurality of light sensors for dividing the light passing through the light passing portion and the light passing portion, and detecting the amount of light divided by the light splitting plate and at least one light splitting plate provided in the light passing portion. It can also be achieved by the coordinate input system using the light, characterized in that for detecting the position of the light emitted from.

The above object of the present invention relates to an input system for inputting position coordinates of x and y axes by connecting to a computer or a communication device, the light source being on / off switch 13 and at least one push switch 14 of the light source. The first and the light emitting device 10 and the light emitted from the light generating device 10 for emitting the light to the area to be specified, and are located at a distance separated by a predetermined distance (L) and A second light passing portion 20; And a plurality of one-dimensional PSD (Position Sensitive Device) for irradiating light passing through the first and second light passing sections 20 and outputting a predetermined amount of current according to the position at which the passed light is irradiated. This can be achieved by a coordinate input system using light as a feature.

Hereinafter, the present invention will be described in more detail with reference to the accompanying drawings. 1 is a block diagram showing a functional block of the present invention. The coordinate input device 100 includes a light generating device 10 for generating light, a light passing unit 20, a light splitter 30, and an optical sensor 40. The analog signal generated by the coordinate input device 100 is converted into a digital signal using the A / D converter 200 and input to the interrupt controller 300. That is, when the user moves the light generating device or presses a button, the movement information and the button press information are transmitted to the interrupt controller to generate a control signal.

The interrupt controller notifies the CPU by sending an interrupt level, and when an interrupt processing ready signal is received from the CPU, transmits an interrupt vector number through a data line, and the CPU executes the corresponding interrupt service routine using the transmitted interrupt vector number. do. At this time, the position movement information of the cursor and the like may be controlled directly through a separate process chip through the CPU.

2 is a system configuration diagram showing the structure of the coordinate input device of the present invention. Light emitted from the light generating device 10 is incident to the light incident angle measuring unit 50. The light incident angle measuring part 50 includes a light passing part 20, a light splitter plate 30, and an optical sensor 40. The light passing portion 20 includes a first light passing portion and a second light passing portion spaced apart by a predetermined distance L, and the optical sensor includes a first light sensor 41 and a second light sensor 42. And a third optical sensor 43 and a fourth optical sensor 44. The light emitted in the positioning operation region is incident on the light passing portion by forming angles θ1 and θ2 with the first light passing portion and the second light passing portion, respectively, and the incident light is respectively incident on the first light splitter plate and the second light splitter plate. After splitting, the first and second optical sensors and the third and fourth optical sensors are reached. It is preferable that two or more light passing units are installed, and the larger the number, the higher the accuracy, and focuses the light emitted from the light source through a condenser lens or needle hole of various shapes (mainly cylindrical). Do it. The reason for using the cylindrical shape is to make the divided light reaches the optical sensor in a cylindrical shape, so as to more accurately measure the amount of light reaching each optical sensor. In addition, it is preferable to provide a diffuser plate in front of the optical sensor in order to level the incident light to reach the optical sensor. In this case, the position measurement can be performed by using the principle that the amount of light reaching each optical sensor varies according to the angles of θ1 and θ2. Four optical sensors shown in Figure 2 is preferably made of the same material in order to measure the exact amount of light.

3 is an explanatory diagram for explaining a position measurement of light emitted from a light generating device. The ratio of the amount of light detected by the first optical sensor 41, the second optical sensor 42, the third optical sensor 43, and the fourth optical sensor 44 (light amount A / light amount B; light amount C / light amount D) Has a correlation determined by the light passing portion and the incident angles θ1 and θ2 formed. θ1 is an angle formed with the optical axis and the first light passing portion, and θ2 indicates an angle formed with the optical axis and the second light passing portion. As shown in FIG. 3, when the emitted light moves to the left side, θ1 increases and θ2 decreases. When θ1 increases, the light detection amount of the first optical sensor decreases and the light detection amount of the second optical sensor increases. When θ2 decreases, the light detection amount in the third optical sensor is decreased, and the light detection amount in the fourth optical sensor is increased.

When the emitted light moves to the right, θ1 decreases and θ2 increases. When θ1 decreases, the light detection amount in the first optical sensor increases and the light detection amount in the second optical sensor decreases. When θ2 increases, the light detection amount by the third light sensor increases, and the light detection amount by the fourth light sensor decreases. By using the correlation, the incident angles θ1 and θ2 at various positions according to the free movement of the light source can be measured. At this time, the coordinate values (x, y) for an arbitrary position may be calculated by Equation 1 using the obtained distance θ1, θ2 and the distance L between the light passing parts as in Equation 1.

4 is a diagram illustrating an embodiment of a light generating device. The information input from the mouse includes 1) whether to move the coordinates 2) press the left button and 3) press the right button. Therefore, in case of a product using a mouse, there is a necessity of separately inputting such information, and FIG. 4 shows an embodiment of a light generating device according to the same. In the embodiment of FIG. 4, LED lamps 11 and 12 emitting two different colors are presented, and the piezoelectric element is used to grasp the state in which the user presses the end portion 17 of the light generating device 10 to the ground. The element 13 was installed. That is, when using a mouse, there may be a case where the position of the mouse is changed while the button is not pressed, and when the position is changed while the left button is pressed (usually "drag"). The piezoelectric element 13 installed in the present invention is intended to facilitate the "drag" operation, and when the position is changed without pressing a button, the position is changed without applying pressure to the end portion 17 of the light generating device. And the LED 12 is turned on, and when the "drag" operation is performed to change the position while pressing the end portion 17 of the light generating device to the ground, the piezoelectric element 13 provided in this state is pressed By recognizing this, the on / off period of the LED light 12 was changed through the on / off period controller 15 to configure the display of the pressed state. Piezoelectric ceramic materials are widely used as piezoelectric elements.

The push switch 14 is a button corresponding to the right button of the mouse. In the case of FIG. 4, when the push switch is pressed, the LED light 11 may emit light. Alternatively, an appropriate circuit configuration can be used to use only one LED and change the on / off cycle. The configuration of the light generating device 10 shown in FIG. 4 may be variously modified by those skilled in the art. That is, although two LEDs are used in FIG. 4, one LED may be used and various on / off cycles may be set, or three LEDs may be used. When using two or more LEDs, it would be desirable to use an optical sensor that can properly sense the light emitted from each LED. In other words, when using red and blue LEDs, the first optical sensor 41 may be uniformly formed of two optical sensor materials to serve as optical sensors for a plurality of optical wavelengths. As a light emitting source applicable to this invention, it is preferable that it is an LED lamp which has the wavelength of an infrared region or a visible light region.

The light generating device 10 shown in FIG. 4 represents a device having its own power supply unit 16 wirelessly connected to the light incident angle measuring unit 50 or the computer main body (not shown), but may also be configured by wire. . In the case of a wired configuration, the power supply unit 16 and the on / off cycle controller 15 may be added to the computer main body or other components.

5 is a block diagram showing the configuration of the light incident angle measuring unit of the three-dimensional position measuring apparatus according to the present invention. As described above, the (x, y) coordinate detection in which the distance of the light passing angle and the light incident angle measuring unit for detecting the (x, y) coordinate spaced apart by "L" and the distance of the light passing portion is vertically spaced apart by "M" is detected. By additionally installing the light incident angle measuring unit, it was possible to measure the three-dimensional position. The light incident angle measuring unit for detecting (x, z) coordinates may be separately configured as shown in FIG. 5A, or may be configured in parallel with the light incident angle measuring unit for detecting (x, y) coordinates as shown in FIG. 5B. . The measurement method is to detect (x, z) coordinates in the same way as (x, y) coordinate detection.

In addition to the above-described configuration, the present invention may use a semiconductor device (Position Sensitive Device) for sensing a position. The PSD device is a semiconductor device used for auto focus of a video camera or auto focus of a camera. FIG. 6 is an explanatory diagram for explaining a one-dimensional PSD cross-sectional structure and a basic operating principle. As shown in FIG. 6A, the PSD includes a P layer 210, an N layer 230, and an I layer 220, and both ends of the P layer have an output terminal 240, and the P and N layers It is formed of a uniform resistance layer. FIG. 6B is a circuit equivalent diagram of FIG. 6A. When light enters a portion of the PSD cross section, the light passes through a uniform resistance layer and generates currents I1 and I2 at both electrode terminals, respectively. Using the currents I1 and I2 generated in this way, it is possible to determine the proper location of the light. 6C illustrates one embodiment of calculating a location using the current generated in the PSD.

7 is a configuration diagram of another embodiment of the present invention using a PSD device. The difference from FIG. 1 is that the light incident angle measuring unit 50 includes the light passing unit 20 and the PSD element 130. Therefore, there is an advantage that does not need to use a light splitter when using a PSD device. 7 (b) shows the configuration of the two-dimensional optical position measuring device using the PSD element. Light radiated in the positioning operation region passes through the first light passing portion 21 and the second light passing portion 22 and is irradiated to the PSD 130 (131). As described above, since the amount of current output varies depending on the position of the light irradiated to the PSD, the values of θ1 and θ2 can be easily calculated based on the amount of current, thereby measuring the absolute position of the light emitted within the positioning operation region. In FIG. 7, one-dimensional PSD elements are used, but when using two-dimensional PSD elements, two-dimensional absolute coordinates can be measured with only one two-dimensional PSD element. The signal detected by the PSD element can be delivered to the computer using an external jack similar to a mouse or keyboard jack.

According to the coordinate input device and the coordinate recognition method using the light of the present invention, it is possible to improve the user convenience because the position information at any position can be recognized not the relative coordinate but the absolute coordinate.

When the coordinate input device using the light of the present invention is used in a desktop computer, a notebook, or the like, when performing operations such as handwriting input, drawing creation, and picture input, there is an advantage that the input can be processed more naturally than a conventional mouse. In addition, since there is no mechanical movement as in the mouse, there is no need for periodic cleaning or maintenance, and there is no need for a mouse pad and a sliding part, so there is an excellent accuracy.

In addition, the present invention can be used to track the position of the object attached to the object or emits light by itself, and by installing an incident angle measuring unit can be utilized for the three-dimensional position tracking.

Although the present invention has been described with reference to the embodiments shown in the drawings, this is merely exemplary and should be understood by those skilled in the art that various modifications and equivalent other embodiments are possible. . Therefore, the true scope of protection of the present invention should be defined by the technical spirit of the appended claims.

Claims (7)

An input system for inputting position coordinates by connecting to a computer or a communication device, A light generating device (10) having a light source, an on / off switch (13) of the light source and at least one push switch (14), and emitting light to a region to be designated; At least two light passing parts 20, through which the light emitted from the light generating device 10 passes, and which is spaced apart by a predetermined distance L; A light splitter 30 for dividing the light passing through the light passing part 20 and provided at least one of the light passing parts; And By having a plurality of optical sensors 40 for detecting each amount of light divided by the optical splitter 30 and converting it into a current or voltage, the position of the light emitted from the light generating device 10 is recognized Coordinate input system using a light, characterized in that. The method of claim 1, And a light diffusing plate positioned between the optical splitter plate and the optical sensor. The method of claim 1, The light passing section 20 is provided in two, the light splitting plate 30 is provided in the light passing section 20, one each, the optical sensor 40 is respectively provided in the light splitting plate 30 Coordinate input system using light, characterized in that provided by two. The method of claim 1, Coordinate input system using light, characterized in that the light source is an LED (11; 12) having a wavelength in the infrared region or the visible region. The method of claim 1, Coordinate input system using light, characterized in that the light passing portion 20 is provided with a small needle hole or a focusing lens. An input system for inputting position coordinates by connecting to a computer or a communication device, A light generating device including a light source, an on / off switch of the light source and at least one push switch, and configured to emit light to a region to be designated; At least two horizontal light passing parts passing through the light emitted from the light generating device and positioned at a predetermined distance apart from each other; A vertical light passing portion installed at a position orthogonal to the horizontal light passing portion; A light dividing plate that divides the light passing through the light passing portion and is provided at least one of the light passing portions; And And a plurality of optical sensors for sensing the respective amounts of light divided by the optical splitter plate, thereby recognizing a position of the light emitted from the light generating device. An input system for inputting position coordinates of x and y axes by connecting to a computer or a communication device, A light generating device (10) having a light source, an on / off switch (13) of the light source and at least one push switch (14), and emitting light to a region to be designated; First and second light passing portions 20 passing through the light emitted from the light generating device 10 and spaced apart by a predetermined distance L; And And a plurality of one-dimensional PSD (Position Sensitive Device) for respectively irradiating the light passing through the first and second light passing section 20 and outputting a predetermined amount of current according to the position at which the passed light is irradiated. Coordinate input system using light, characterized in that.