KR20080082207A - Finger tab script input device - Google Patents

Abstract

A device for inputting characters with a finger touch by using a tactile sensor is provided to enable a moving or walking user to input characters without fixing a view to a predetermined position in a state not holding or catching an input terminal. A tactile sensor unit(1) comprises a plurality of tactile sensors detecting a finger touch at each finger tip. The tactile sensor is attached to the finger tip by using adhesives, tape and band, or by using a globe or thimble type. A signal converter(2) collects a signal for a finger touch status from the tactile sensor unit in the wired/wireless network, converts the collected signal into a digital code corresponding to a character input code of a digital device, and outputs the digital code through the wired/wireless network. The digital code corresponding to touch operation of fingers touching a predetermined surface is output and used as the character input code for the digital device without assigning finger touch positions in a keyboard style.

Description

Finger touch character input device using tactile sensor {Finger tab script input device}

1 is a finger contact type character input device composed of a tactile sensor unit 1 and a signal conversion unit 2;

Figure 2 is a view attached to the tactile sensor on the fingertips.

3 is a view of generating a character by touching a single or a plurality of fingers on any surface.

4 is a view of generating a character using the contact between the fingers.

5 illustrates a digitally generated signal and character conversion rule case (numbers and arithmetic symbols) according to a finger contact state.

6 illustrates a digitally generated signal and character conversion rule according to a finger contact state.

7 illustrates a digitally generated signal and character conversion rule according to a finger contact state.

The present invention relates to a finger contact type character input device that provides a role of a keyboard used for character input of various digital devices such as a computer, a PDA, a mobile phone, and the like, with two hands free even without an input plate having a specific weight and volume. It is a finger tap type character input device that can input characters.

Conventional text input devices use a computer keyboard, a text input pad of a mobile phone, a number and symbol input button of an electronic calculator, a text input window of a touch panel screen, and the like to move a character by moving a finger or a pen to a text symbol at a designated position. Input method. Such a character input device must essentially have a specific pattern of input panel that designates the position of each symbol during character input.

The keyboard of the computer can be used on a stable surface parallel to the ground and occupies a predetermined volume, making it difficult to input characters while a person is moving or the input panel is shaken.

Since the touch panel screen is located on the surface of the display output device, a contact portion of a finger or a pen is limited to the display surface when inputting characters, and it is difficult to input characters while a person is moving or the input panel is shaken.

The simple character input panel used for portable terminals such as mobile phones and PDAs can be input by finger movement contact while a person is moving or shaking the input panel. It is unnatural and the line of sight is fixed to the terminal, and fast text input and long sentence input are limited.

There is a voice-to-text conversion device using a voice recognition technology as a hands-free type text input device, but there is a disadvantage in that the character recognition rate is limited due to the input error, and the prior recognition training for the speech characteristics of a person is required.

Disclosed technical matters regarding the character input device by a finger gesture are as follows.

"Data input glove having conductive finger pads and thumb pad, and use therefor" disclosed in US Patent US6141643 is a structure in which a conductive pad is installed on a finger and a palm and data is inputted when the fingertip contacts the palm. This is because the contact surface of the finger is confined to the palm, and thus there is a limit to continuously and quickly performing the finger contact operation, so that the character input speed does not reach the conventional keyboard speed.

Wearable armor type character input device disclosed in Korean Patent Publication No. 10-2003-0039648 "designates a plurality of input points on the four finger nodes except the thumb, and moves the thumb to selectively touch the input point to generate a character. Like the form of the keyboard, the position where the thumb touches is previously designated as a plurality of input points corresponding to the knuckles, and since the input character is selected by the thumb movement only, the character input speed is also limited. have.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a novel finger-touch finger tab character input device that provides the role of a keyboard used for character input of various digital devices such as computers, PDAs, and cellular phones.

The present invention is not limited to the general computer working environment, but also in the state of walking or moving, or in an activity or driving a vehicle, with or without an input terminal having a specific volume and weight for performing free text input to a digital device. The present invention relates to a new character input device capable of inputting a character without fixing a gaze to a position.

In order to realize this, a small volume and weight tactile sensor is attached to each finger to keep both hands free, and the desk, wall, floor, body parts, etc. are not touched by a finger to a specific position such as a keyboard. Finger tap type character that generates a signal indicating the contact status information of each finger by the touch action of the finger on an arbitrary surface and an arbitrary position, and converts the signal generated from the sensor into a digital code that can be input to the digital device The input device was configured.

The device attaches a predetermined tactile sensor to each fingertip to detect the contact state of a finger on any surface and provide it as a digital code associated with a particular character.

The device is not a predetermined position or area according to a specific character, such as a keyboard or a touch screen, the part where the finger is in contact is not predetermined, but on any surface, such as a desk, a wall, a floor, a body part such as an arm or a knee, Characters are input by touching a finger at a position.

The apparatus is characterized in that for generating two different signals according to the contact finger combination when two or more fingers are in contact. In other words, when the thumb and the index finger are contacted at the same time, only the thumb and the index finger are in contact with each other, it generates a different signal. For example, if the thumb is touched, "a" of the English alphabet is generated, "b" is generated when the index finger is touched, and "z" is generated when the thumb and index finger are touched simultaneously. Can be.

The device uses one character up to ten fingers to convert a digital combination of contact state information signals according to the contact (ON) and contactless (OFF) of a plurality of fingers to any surface into a character code according to a predetermined conversion rule. The device can convert up to 1024 different character signals.

This device is designed for the combination of up to 32 signals for the contact status of five fingers of one hand with Arabic numerals consisting of 0 to 9, 26 alphabetic characters, 14 Korean consonants and 10 vowels, ENTER, SPACE Keyboard control input codes such as, SHIFT, TAB, ESCAPE, etc., and when using two hands, Japanese, Chinese kanji, Greek, Latin, Latin, international characters, formulas including various Japanese hiragana and katakana Various characters such as symbols, punctuation marks, phonetic symbols, and phonetic symbols can be designated and input up to 1024 characters through a finger contact combination.

The device also detects the contact state of the finger into three states of high contact (HIGH), weak contact (LOW), and non-contact (OFF) according to the strength of the finger press. Up to 59049 characters can be entered. For example, in the case of the Korean alphabet, if the finger touch operation corresponding to the letter "a" is strong, "ㄲ" may be input. In the case of the English alphabet, the finger contact may be weakly lowercase and the uppercase letter may be input.

This device combines the signals provided by the tactile sensor according to the contact state of multiple fingers and converts them into digital codes and generates characters. The digital codes are generated at the input terminals of various digital devices such as computers, PDAs and mobile phones. It may be provided by a wired or wireless means, and may be displayed or printed in text on an output device such as a monitor or a printer of a computer.

According to the device of the present invention, without using a separate character input device having a predetermined weight and volume, such as a keyboard, without using the input position, posture, and activity constraints, the desk, wall, body part, etc. Characters can be input to various digital devices such as computers, PDAs, mobile phones, and the like by just touching them.

Character input device according to the present invention is attached to the tip of the plurality of fingers to detect the contact state of the finger to any surface and the signal from each sensor collects and converts the signal from each sensor into a combined digital signal wireless or The signal conversion unit 2 for outputting a signal via a wire is configured as shown in FIG.

The tactile sensor unit 1 is attached to the contact portion of the pressing finger as shown in [2] and is fixed in such a manner as to not interfere with the operation of the fingers and hands in the form of adhesive, tape, band, thimble, gloves and the like.

In order to mount the sensor of the tactile sensor unit 1 to a finger, an auxiliary fixing mechanism may be used or inserted into the finger skin.

The tactile sensor of the tactile sensor unit 1 is an element that performs a function of providing a contact state of a finger as an analog or digital signal which can be distinguished into a contact (ON) and a non-contact (OFF) state, and the pressure according to the contact state of the finger. Sensors can detect electrical, magnetic, optical, thermal, chemical and biological property changes.

The tactile sensor of the tactile sensor unit 1 also performs a function of providing a contact state of a finger as an analog or digital signal that can be distinguished into a high contact (HIGH), a weak contact (LOW) and a non-contact (OFF) state It is a sensor that can detect changes in pressure, electrical, magnetic, optical, thermal, chemical and biological characteristics according to the contact state of the finger.

The tactile sensor of the tactile sensor 1 may be attached to a plurality of fingers as shown in FIG. 1. They can detect a contact state of a finger on any surface, such as a desk, a floor, a wall, or a body part, as a signal by a finger operation, and provide a signal, or touch between fingers as shown in [4]. By detecting the state of the contact between the tactile sensor can be provided as a signal. At this time, when two fingers are in contact, the detection state of the two corresponding sensors is considered to be ON or it is considered to be HIGH or LOW depending on the strength of the two fingers being pressed. Can be.

The signal converting unit 2 collects signal information on the contact (ON) and non-contact (OFF) state provided from the plurality of tactile sensors and converts the signal information into a combined digital signal.

The signal converting section 2 is characterized in that the digital combination signal output when a plurality of fingers are in contact simultaneously is distinguished from the digital signal output when only a single finger is in contact. For example, the signal converter 2 outputs different digital signals when only the thumb is in contact with the index finger but when the thumb and the index finger are in contact with each other. Thus, when 10 fingers are used, when the contact state of the finger is distinguished from contact (ON) to non-contact (OFF), a maximum of 2 ¹⁰ = 1024 character combinations are used, and the contact state of the finger is weakly contacted with HIGH (HIGH) contact. Up to 3 ¹⁰ = 59049 character combinations can be output when distinguishing between (LOW) and OFF (OFF).

The signal conversion unit 2 may convert signal information according to a finger contact state into digital codes corresponding to standardized character code systems such as ASCII and UNICODE, and output them directly to various digital devices.

The digital combination signal converted and output from the signal conversion unit 2 may be provided to a wired input device such as a keyboard input terminal, a PS / 2 input terminal, a USB input terminal, an IEEE1932 input terminal, a network connection terminal, a mobile phone, and a PDA communication terminal of a computer. Can be.

In addition, the signal converter 2 may be configured together with a wireless transmission device such as a wireless LAN, Bluetooth, and ZigBee to wirelessly transmit the converted digital combination signal to various digital devices.

The signal conversion unit 2 may be attached to the body or worn on clothing in the form of a wrist, a necklace, earphones, headphones, pockets in the form of a portable terminal.

Example 1

The five tactile sensor parts 1 mounted on the rubber band are attached to five fingers, respectively, in a form as shown in FIG. ) Was mounted on the wrist in the form of a band. At this time, each switch element is electrically connected to the signal converter 2 and the flexible conductor to detect the finger contact and transmit the contact signal to the signal converter 2.

The signal conversion unit 2 checks whether or not a signal input is generated from the switch element at a period of 200 ms, and generates a binary combination digital combination of contact state signals from five switch elements when the signal input is generated, and this is standard ASCII. It consists of digital circuits to be converted to Arabic numerals of the keyboard input codes and digital codes corresponding to the operation codes. The output terminals are installed to be wired to the computer standard keyboard input terminals. At this time, the signal conversion rule according to the finger contact operation was determined as shown in [Table 1].

The output terminal of the manufactured device was connected to the keyboard input terminal of the personal computer, the device was mounted on the right hand finger, the computer was turned on, and a simple calculator program made in the BASIC language was run. With the right hand mounted on the character input device lightly placed on the right knee, the finger contact operation was sequentially performed in the following order.

-Press and hold your thumb for about 0.5 seconds.

-Press the index finger and ring finger simultaneously for about 0.5 seconds and remove it.

-Press and hold the index finger for about 0.5 seconds.

-Press the middle finger and ring finger and the ground for about 0.5 seconds and release.

Execution result The characters "1 + 2 = 3" were output in the program window of the computer monitor.

Example 2

The five tactile sensor parts 1 mounted on the rubber band are attached to five fingers, respectively, in a form as shown in FIG. ) Was mounted on the wrist in the form of a band. At this time, each switch element is electrically connected to the signal converter 2 and the flexible conductor to detect the finger contact and transmit the contact signal to the signal converter 2.

The signal conversion unit 2 checks whether or not a signal input occurs from the switch element at a period of 50 ms, and generates a binary combination digital combination of contact state signals from five switch elements when the signal input occurs. A digital circuit including a Bluetooth wireless transmitting device is configured to be input to a computer.

The keyboard input terminal of the computer is configured with a digital circuit including a Bluetooth wireless receiver and a standard keyboard input connector to receive a wireless signal transmitted from the signal conversion unit 2 and convert it to an ASCII code corresponding to a standard Korean keyboard character code code. A signal input device was constructed. At this time, the signal conversion rule according to the finger contact operation was determined as shown in [Table 2].

The output terminal of the prepared signal input device was connected to the keyboard input terminal of the computer, the character input device was mounted on the right hand, the computer was turned on, the wireless communication connection was checked, and the standard Hangul text input program was run on the computer. With the right hand mounted on the character input device lightly placed on the upper left arm, the finger contact operation was sequentially performed in the following order.

Simultaneously press and release thumb, index finger and middle finger for about 0.2 seconds.

-Simultaneously press and release the ring finger for about 0.2 seconds.

-Press your thumb and index finger for about 0.2 seconds and release.

As a result, the letters "Mac" were output in the text input program of the computer monitor.

Example 3

A tactile sensor part (1) consisting of a nonlinear tactile sensor whose electrical resistance value is continuously changed according to the strength of contact pressure is fixedly attached to the fingertip contact area on the right hand glove, and the signal conversion part (2) is attached to the wrist in a band form. It was. At this time, each of the tactile sensor unit 1 and the signal conversion unit 2 are electrically connected to the inside of the glove by a flexible conductor to detect when the finger touches and transmit a signal related to the contact state to the signal conversion unit 2. .

The signal converting unit 2 checks whether an input signal is generated by a change in resistance from the haptic element at a period of 50 ms, and when a signal input occurs, the contact state from the five tactile sensors is converted into a contact (ON) and non-contact (OFF) signal. By dividing the contact (ON) signal into a high contact signal (HIGH) and a weak contact (LOW) signal in detail, to generate a binary code digital form of a combination of contact (ON) and non-contact (OFF) signal The digital circuit was converted to an ASCII code corresponding to a standard English keyboard character code code, and the digital output unit was wired to the signal output unit 30 configured as a standard keyboard input connection terminal. At this time, the signal conversion rule according to the finger contact operation is set as shown in [Table 3]. When the contact strength of the finger is a high contact (HIGH) for the finger contact combination corresponding to the English alphabet, the uppercase alphabetic letters are weak contact ( LOW), lowercase letters are output.

The output terminal of the manufactured device was connected to the keyboard input terminal of the personal computer, the device was mounted on the right hand finger, the computer was turned on, and the standard English text input program was run. With the right hand on which the character input device is mounted lightly placed on the chair, the finger contact operation was sequentially performed in the following order.

-Press and release your thumb, middle finger and your finger for about 0.2 seconds.

-Press your thumb, index finger and middle finger for about 0.2 seconds simultaneously and release.

-Press and release the middle finger and ring finger at the same time for about 0.2 seconds.

-Press your thumb, index finger and middle finger for about 0.2 seconds simultaneously and release.

-Press and hold for about 0.2 seconds to release.

-Press the index finger for about 0.2 seconds and remove it.

-Press the thumb, ring finger, and finger together for about 0.2 seconds at the same time.

-Press your thumb, index finger and middle finger for about 0.2 seconds simultaneously and release.

-Press the index finger for about 0.2 seconds and remove it.

Execution result The letters "McScience" were output in the text input program of the computer monitor.

The finger touch type character input device of the present invention is capable of inputting characters without gaze fixation at a specific position with or without an input terminal having a specific volume and weight even when a person is walking, moving, active or driving a vehicle. It is possible to overcome the environmental limitations of the conventional character input method, so that it is physically free at an arbitrary position and posture and enables fast character input.

Claims (7)

A tactile sensor unit 1 attached to a plurality of finger tips and configured with a plurality of tactile sensors for detecting a surface contact state of a finger as a signal; The signal of the tactile sensor 10 for the contact state of the plurality of fingers is collected by wire or wirelessly, and the plurality of finger contact state information is converted into a digital code of a combined form corresponding to the character input code of the digital device and wired. Or it is composed of a signal conversion unit 2 for outputting wirelessly, Input the characters to the digital device by outputting different digital codes corresponding to the contact action of multiple fingers on any surface such as desk, floor, wall, or body part without specifying the contact position of the finger in the form of a character input keyboard. Characterized in that used as a code, Finger touch character input device using tactile sensor. The method according to claim 1, The tactile sensor of the tactile sensor unit 1, A sensor capable of detecting pressure, electrical, magnetic, optical, thermal, chemical and biological property changes according to the contact state of the finger, Finger touch character input device using tactile sensor. The method according to claim 2, The tactile sensor, Characterized in that the function of outputting the contact state of the finger as an analog or digital signal that can be distinguished between the contact (ON) and non-contact (OFF) state, Finger touch character input device using tactile sensor. The method according to claim 2, The tactile sensor, Characterized in that the contact state of the finger output according to the strength of the finger press (HIGH), weak or low (non) contact (OFF) state can be distinguished by analog or digital signal, characterized in that the output Finger touch character input device using tactile sensor. The method according to claim 1, The tactile sensor unit 10, Characterized in that the tactile sensor is fixed and attached in the form of adhesive, tape, band, thimble, gloves, auxiliary fasteners, intradermal insertion, etc. to the contact of the pressing finger so as not to interfere with the operation of the finger and hand, Finger touch character input device using tactile sensor. The method according to claim 1, The signal conversion unit 2, Distinguish between the case where a single finger is touched and the case where a plurality of fingers are in contact at the same time to output a different digital code, and when a plurality of fingers at the same time to output a different digital code according to the combination of the contact state of each finger Characterized by Finger touch character input device using tactile sensor. The method according to claim 1, The signal conversion unit 2, The digital code output from the signal conversion unit 2 according to the plurality of finger contact states includes numbers, Korean, English alphabets, Chinese characters, Japanese hiragana and katakana characters, Simplified Chinese and Traditional Chinese characters, Greek letters, Latin letters, letters from around the world, Characteristic symbols, punctuation symbols, phonetic symbols, phonetic symbols, keyboard control input symbols, etc., characterized in that corresponding to the character symbols used in the standard character system, Finger touch character input device using tactile sensor.

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