WO2019108129A1

WO2019108129A1 - A system and method for determining a task to be triggered on a mobile device

Info

Publication number: WO2019108129A1
Application number: PCT/SG2017/050593
Authority: WO
Inventors: Lui Kun TAN (Chen Lukun)
Original assignee: Make Studios Pte. Ltd.
Priority date: 2017-12-01
Filing date: 2017-12-01
Publication date: 2019-06-06

Abstract

The present invention provides users with a convenient way to trigger a task on a mobile device. Advantageously, users are able to trigger the task while being able to interface with a physical product. Furthermore, embodiments of the present invention can be carried out without any modification to existing mobile devices.

Description

A SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR DETERMINING A TASK TO BE TRIGGERED ON A MOBILE DEVICE

FIELD OF INVENTION

The present invention relates to a system and method for determining a task to be triggered on a mobile device.

BACKGROUND

Consumer behaviour has changed substantially with the increasing acceptance of online shopping. As such, traditional brick-and-mortar sales channels are realising that engaging the consumer in a desirable manner is one way of retaining the loyalty of the consumer.

Unfortunately, having sufficient staff to provide personalised attention to all consumers at traditional brick-and-mortar sales channels is not a feasible solution. Technology has been harnessed to address the shortfall in staff, for example, using product kiosks, mobile device applications, and so forth. However, the solutions which have been implemented currently do not engage consumers both in an augmented reality environment and in the brick-and-mortar environment. Typically, the product kiosks and mobile device applications are unable to enable the consumer to look-and-feel physical products, and attend to individualized preferences while engaging with the consumer.

There are shortcomings currently at traditional brick-and-mortar sales channels that may lead to a diminished consumer experience at the traditional brick-and- mortar sales channels.

SUMMARY In a first aspect, there is provided a system for determining a task to be triggered on a mobile device. The system comprises at least one data processor configured to:

detect, at the mobile device, three conductive contacts of a base apparatus, the contacts being located on a touch screen of the mobile device;

determine, at the mobile device, a circumcentre of a triangle, the three conductive contacts being located at respective apexes of the triangle;

determine, at the mobile device, a radius of a control circle, the control circle being centred at the circumcentre, and the three conductive contacts being at a circumference of the control circle; and

determine, at the mobile device, a plurality of angles of the three conductive contacts in relation to each other;

wherein the task to be triggered is dependent on the determined radius and the determined plurality of angles.

In a further aspect, there is provided a data processor implemented method for determining a task to be triggered on a mobile device. The method comprises: detecting, at the mobile device, three conductive contacts of a base apparatus, the contacts being located on a touch screen of the mobile device; determining, at the mobile device, a circumcentre of a triangle, the three conductive contacts being located at respective apexes of the triangle;

determining, at the mobile device, a radius of a control circle, the control circle being centred at the circumcentre, and the three conductive contacts being at a circumference of the control circle; and

determining, at the mobile device, a plurality of angles of the three conductive contacts in relation to each other;

Finally, there is also provided a non-transitory computer readable storage medium embodying thereon a program of computer readable instructions which, when executed by one or more processors of a mobile device, cause the mobile device to carry out a method for determining a task to be triggered on a mobile device. The method embodies the steps of:

detecting, three conductive contacts of a base apparatus, the contacts being located on a touch screen of the mobile device;

determining, a circumcentre of a triangle, the three conductive contacts being located at respective apexes of the triangle;

determining, a radius of a control circle, the control circle being centred at the circumcentre, and the three conductive contacts being at a circumference of the control circle; and

determining, a plurality of angles of the three conductive contacts in relation to each other;

DESCRIPTION OF FIGURES

A non-limiting example of the present invention will now be described with reference to the accompanying drawings, in which: -

FIG 1 is a flow chart of an example of a method for determining a task to be triggered on a mobile device;

FIG 2 is a schematic diagram of an example of a system for determining a task to be triggered on a mobile device;

FIG 3 is a schematic diagram showing components of an example mobile device of the system shown in FIG 2;

FIG 4 is a schematic diagram showing components of an example server shown in FIG 2;

FIG 5 is a bottom view of an embodiment of a base apparatus of FIG 2;

FIG 6 is an illustration of contact parameters of the base apparatus of FIG 2;

FIG 7 is a bottom view of possible embodiments of the base apparatus of FIG 2; and FIG 8 is an illustration of a non-conductive contact of the base apparatus of FIG 2.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION Embodiments of the present invention provide users with a convenient way to trigger a task on a mobile device. Advantageously, users are able to trigger the task while being able to interface with a physical product. Furthermore, embodiments of the present invention can be carried out without any modification to existing mobile devices.

An example of a method 100 for determining a task to be triggered on a mobile device will now be described with reference to FIG 1.

For the purpose of illustration, it is assumed that the method 100 can be performed at least in part using one or more electronic processing devices which form part of a mobile device, such as mobile phones, portable computers, tablet computers, wearable devices, or the like. The method 100 relies on the use of a base apparatus which is configured to enable a touch detection on a touch screen of the mobile device. Specifically, the base apparatus is configured to disrupt an electro-static field on a surface of the touch screen when the base apparatus is in contact with the touch screen. In some embodiments, the base apparatus is configured to allow placement/mounting of goods, typically as a pedestal for the goods. Further details of the base apparatus will be provided when describing FIGs 5 to 8 in later paragraphs.

Initially, at step 105, a base apparatus is placed on a touch screen of the mobile device. As the base apparatus is configured to disrupt an electro-static field on the surface of the touch screen, the touch screen is correspondingly able to detect contact by the base apparatus. At step 110, three conductive contacts of the base apparatus are detected at the touch screen of the mobile device. In some embodiments, the detection of the three conductive contacts is helpful in determining if the base apparatus is from an authorised source. In some embodiments, three conductive contacts can be chosen when more than three conductive contacts are detected. For example, three conductive contacts are selectively chosen from four contacts that are detected. Typically, there may be more than three conductive contacts if an improvement in the stability of the base apparatus is desired. When there are more than three conductive contacts, fourth and subsequent conductive contacts are usually located in a position on the base apparatus which shares a radius and a reference angle with another conductive contact. When the radius and reference angle is substantially similar as another conductive contact, the second conductive contact with the substantially similar reference angle is disregarded.

Subsequently, at step 115, a circumcentre of a triangle with apexes at the three conductive contacts is determined. The circumcentre is then used as a centre of a control circle, the control circle having a circumference that passes through respective locations of the three conductive contacts.

For illustration purposes, an example of how the circumcentre is obtained from detection of three conductive contacts will be provided as follows (the coordinates are pixel points on a display panel):

Position of Point A

X: 819

Y: 819

Position of Point B

X: 1092 Y: 751

Position of Point C

X: 955

Y: 615

An equation of a perpendicular bisector of AB is determined as follows: a) Determine a mid point of AB

Mid_AB = ( (A_x + B_x) / 2, (A_y + B_y) / 2 )

Mid_AB = ( (819 + 1092) /2, (819 + 751 )/2)

Mid_AB = (955.5, 785) b) Determine a gradient of AB

Gradient _AB = (B_y - A_y) / (B_x - A_x)

Gradient _AB = (751 - 819) / (1092 - 819)

Gradient _AB = (-68/273) c) Determine a gradient of a perpendicular bisector of AB, m

Gradient of perpendicular bisector is negative reciprocal of slope AB, ie 273/68 d) Determine an equation of the perpendicular bisector of AB

Since

y - 785 = (4.01 )(x - 955.5)

y - 785 = 4.01x - 3831 .56

y = 4.01x - 3046.56 Correspondingly, an equation of a perpendicular bisector of AC is determined in a similar manner, leading to: y = -1 01x + 1716.74 e) Determine an intersection point of the perpendicular bisectors of AB and AC y = 4.01x - 3046.56 (1 )

y = -1.01x + 1716.74 (2) (1 ) = (2)

x = 948.86

Correspondingly, inputting x = 948.86 into equation (2), y = -1.01x + 1716.74

y = -958.35 + 1716.74

y = 758.39

Thus, the circumcentre is at (948.86, 758.39) of the touch screen (as calibrated accordingly).

At step 120, a radius of the control circle is determined. The radius of the control circle is the same as the distance between the circumcenter and any conductive contact position. For illustration purposes, an example (continuing from the above illustration) of how the radius is obtained from detection of three conductive contacts will be provided as follows:

Taking reference to point A:

d_x = 819 - 948.86

d_x = -129.86

d_y = 819 - 758.39 d_y = 60.61

Radius = V(d_{x *} d_x + d_{y *} d_y)

Radius = V ( (-129.86) * (-129.86) + (60.61 ) * (60.61 ) )

Radius = 129.86

Referring to FIG 6, the control circle 600 is shown, and the three conductive contacts are labelled as A, B and C. At step 125, a plurality of angles of the three conductive contacts in relation to each other is determined. For instance, if the three conductive contacts are respectively labelled as A, B and C, the plurality of angles comprise the following angles measured with respect to the centre of the control circle: - angle between A and B;

- angle between A and C; and

- angle between B and C.

For illustration purposes, an example (continuing from the above illustration) of how the respective angles are obtained will be provided as follows: a) Determine an angle between each point and the circumcenter

Point A

angle A = Arc tan2( (758.39 - 819), (948.86 - 819) )

angle A = -0.44 Radians = 5.84 Radians

Point B

angle B = Arc tan2( (758.39 - 751 ), (948.86 - 1092) )

angle B = 3.09 Radians Point C

angle C = Arc tan2( (758.39 - 615), (948.86 - 955) )

angle C = 1.61 Radians b) Sort the angles from smallest to biggest

Sorted angle 1 = 1.61 Radians

Sorted angle 2 = 3.09 Radians

Sorted angle 3 = 5.85 Radians c) Determine a difference in angle between each point

Sorted angle 1 to Sorted angle 2

Angle difference = | (1.61 )— (3.09) |

Angle difference = 1.48

Sorted angle 2 to Sorted angle 3

Angle difference = | (3.09) - (5.85) |

Angle difference = 2.76

CA

For the last angle pair, the difference is determined by 2 x p - Sorted Angle 3 + Sorted Angle 1 , so as to obtain a clockwise angle difference, and not an anticlockwise difference of the angles.

Angle difference = | 2 x p - 5.85 + 1.61 |

Angle difference = 2.04 Once the plurality of angles and the radius of the control circle are both determined, a task which will be triggered at the mobile device is determined at step 130. The task is defined in a look up table, the look up table being stored on either the mobile device or a remote storage device. In some embodiments, storing the look up table on the mobile device enables responsive and quick retrieval of contents from the look up table. The task can include, for example, activating a pre-defined menu at the mobile device, activating pre-defined media content at the mobile device, activating a software at the mobile device, any combination of the aforementioned and so forth. In addition, it should be appreciated that multiple tasks can also be activated simultaneously or sequentially. For illustrative purposes, a sample look up table is provided below.

With the resulting calculation of:

Radius: 129.86 Anglel : 1.48 radians

Angle 2: 2.76 radians

Angle 3: 2.04 radians

With an angle tolerance of + - 0.2 radians, and a radius tolerance of + - 5 pixels, marker #3 is matched. Details are as follows: Marker #1

The radius falls outside the tolerance range of +- 5 pixels.

Conclusion: no match

Marker #2

The radius falls within the tolerance range of +- 5 pixels. There is a match for all the angles (+- 0.2 radians):

Angle 1 matches with Angle B on the table

Angle 2 matches with Angle A on the table

Angle 3 matches with Angle C on the table

But the order of the angles do not match. They do not satisfy any of the 3 conditions above:

(Angle 1 matches Table Angle A) and (Angle 2 matches Table Angle B) and (Angle 3 matches Table Angle C)

(Angle 1 matches Table Angle B) and (Angle 2 matches Table Angle C) and (Angle 3 matches Table Angle A)

(Angle 1 matches Table Angle C) and (Angle 2 matches Table Angle A) and (Angle 3 matches Table Angle B)

Conclusion: no match

Marker #3

The radius falls within the tolerance range of +- 5 pixels.

There is a match for all the angles (+- 0.2 radians):

Angle 1 matches with Angle B on the table

Angle 2 matches with Angle C on the table

Angle 3 matches with Angle A on the table

The order of the angles match:

Conclusion: Match

Finally, the task(s) (for example, associated with marker #3) are initiated at the mobile device at step 135, such that the mobile device is able to carry out an action which is started by placement of the base apparatus on the touch screen of the mobile device. Accordingly, the above described method 100 provides a number of advantages. Embodiments of the present invention provide users with a convenient way to trigger a task on a mobile device, simply by placement of a base apparatus on the touch screen of the mobile device. Advantageously, users are able to trigger the task while being able to interface with a physical product, for example, cosmetics, toys, electronic devices, perishable foods, and so forth. Furthermore, embodiments of the present invention can be carried out without any modification to existing mobile devices. Typically, the method 100 is able to enhance an engagement experience of consumers at a merchant establishment, particularly in relation to finding out about respective products offered by the merchant. Furthermore, the method 100 can also deployed as an transient substitute in place of staff members of the merchant establishment when, for example, an available staff member is unable to speak a common language with the consumer, all staff members are occupied and unable to attend to the consumer, and so forth. In addition, the method 100 can also be used as a tool for teaching, whereby placement of a base apparatus on the touch screen of the mobile device can engage a learner with the use of multi-media content. An example of a system 200 for determining a task to be triggered on a mobile device will now be described with reference to FIG 2.

In this example, the system 200 includes a base apparatus 220, a mobile device 210 with a touch screen 215 running a merchant software application, a communications network 250, and a central server 260. The base apparatus 220 is depicted as being held by user 230.

In some embodiments, the central server 260 is not required in the system 200. For example, the mobile device 210 running the merchant software application is able to carry out all required operations for determining a task to be triggered on a mobile device. In other embodiments, the central server 260 can be configured to carry out some or all of the required operations for determining a task to be triggered on a mobile device, and the central server 260 can be configured to remotely update the merchant software application on the respective mobile devices 210. When the central server 260 is configured to carry out all of the required operations, the merchant software application can be a landing page for an online portal hosted by the central server 260. The merchant software application can be, for example, a software for providing multi-lingual information of products sold by a merchant. The merchant software application can be configured to function exclusively with the base apparatus 220, or can be configured to function without use of the base apparatus 220. Typically, the merchant software application is able to enhance an engagement experience of consumers at a merchant establishment, particularly in relation to finding out about respective products offered by the merchant. Furthermore, the merchant software application can also be an transient substitute in place of staff members of the merchant establishment when, for example, an available staff member is unable to speak a common language with the consumer, all staff members are occupied and unable to attend to the consumer, and so forth.

Mobile Device 210

The mobile device 210 of any of the examples herein may be a handheld computer device such as a smart phone or a tablet computer such as one manufactured by Apple™, LG™, HTC™, Lenovo™, Samsung™ or Acer™. An exemplary embodiment of the mobile device 300 is shown in FIG 3. As shown, the device 300 includes the following components in electronic communication via a bus 306:

1 . a display 302; 2. non-volatile memory 303;

3. random access memory ("RAM") 304;

4. N processing components 301 ;

5. a transceiver component 305 that includes N transceivers; and

6. user controls 307.

Although the components depicted in FIG 3 represent physical components, FIG 3 is not intended to be a hardware diagram; thus many of the components depicted in FIG 3 may be realized by common constructs or distributed among additional physical components. Moreover, it is certainly contemplated that other existing and yet-to-be developed physical components and architectures may be utilized to implement the functional components described with reference to FIG 3.

The display 302 generally operates to provide a presentation of content to a user, and may be realized by any of a variety of displays (e.g., CRT, LCD, HDMI, micro- projector and OLED displays). The display 302 is a touch screen panel which is configured to detect a plurality of contact positions. As such, the display 302 can also be used for input of commands to the mobile device 300. In general, the non-volatile memory 303 functions to store (e.g., persistently store) data and executable code including code that is associated with the functional components of a browser component and applications, and in one example, the merchant application 308. The merchant application 308 can be, for example, software for providing multi-lingual information of products sold by a merchant. The merchant application 308 can be configured to function exclusively with the base apparatus, or can be configured to function without use of the base apparatus. Typically, the merchant application 308 is able to enhance an engagement experience of consumers at a merchant establishment, particularly in relation to finding out about respective products offered by the merchant. Furthermore, the merchant application 308 can also be an transient substitute in place of staff members of the merchant establishment when, for example, an available staff member is unable to speak a common language with the consumer, all staff members are occupied and unable to attend to the consumer, and so forth.

In some embodiments, for example, the non-volatile memory 303 includes bootloader code, modem software, operating system code, file system code, and code to facilitate the implementation of one or more portions of the merchant application 308 as well as other components well known to those of ordinary skill in the art that are not depicted for simplicity. In many implementations, the non-volatile memory 303 is realized by flash memory (e.g., NAND or NOR memory), but it is certainly contemplated that other memory types may be utilized as well. Although it may be possible to execute the code from the non-volatile memory 303, the executable code in the non-volatile memory 303 is typically loaded into RAM 304 and executed by one or more of the N processing components 301 .

The N processing components 301 in connection with RAM 304 generally operate to execute the instructions stored in non-volatile memory 303 to effectuate the functional components. As one of ordinarily skill in the art will appreciate, the N processing components 301 may include a video processor, modem processor, DSP, graphics processing unit (GPU), and other processing components.

The transceiver component 305 includes N transceiver chains, which may be used for communicating with external devices via wireless networks. Each of the N transceiver chains may represent a transceiver associated with a particular communication scheme. For example, each transceiver may correspond to protocols that are specific to local area networks, cellular networks (e.g., a CDMA network, a GPRS network, a UMTS networks), and other types of communication networks. Central Server 260

The central server 260 may be formed of any suitable processing device, and one such suitable device is shown in FIG 4. The central server 260 can be configured to control content and settings for the merchant software application running on the mobile device 210.

In this example, a processing device is provided by a processing system 400 in communication with a database 401 , as shown in FIG 4. The database 401 can be used for storage of the look-up table for determining the task(s) to be carried out on the mobile device 210. In order to enable the mobile device 210 to access the look-up table, the processing system 400 is able to communicate with the mobile device 210, and/or other processing devices, as required, over a communications network 250 using standard communication protocols.

The components of the processing system 400 can be configured in a variety of ways. The components can be implemented entirely by software to be executed on standard computer server hardware, which may comprise one hardware unit or different computer hardware units distributed over various locations, some of which may require the communications network 250 for communication. A number of the components or parts thereof may also be implemented by application specific integrated circuits (ASICs) or field programmable gate arrays.

In the example shown in FIG 4, the processing system 400 is a commercially available server computer system based on a 32 bit or a 64 bit Intel architecture, and the processes and/or methods executed or performed by the processing system 400 are implemented in the form of programming instructions of one or more software components or modules 402 stored on non-volatile (e.g., hard disk) computer-readable storage 403 associated with the processing system 400. At least parts of the software modules 402 could alternatively be implemented as one or more dedicated hardware components, such as application-specific integrated circuits (ASICs) and/or field programmable gate arrays (FPGAs).

The processing system 400 includes at least one or more of the following standard, commercially available, computer components, all interconnected by a bus 405:

1. random access memory (RAM) 406;

2. at least one computer processor 407, and

3. external computer interfaces 408:

a. universal serial bus (USB) interfaces 408.1 (at least one of which is connected to one or more user-interface devices, such as a keyboard, a pointing device ( e.g ., a mouse 409 or touchpad),

b. a network interface connector (NIC) 408.2 which connects the processing system 400 to the data communications network 250; and

c. a display adapter 408.3, which is connected to a display device 410 such as a liquid-crystal display (LCD) panel device.

The processing system 400 includes a plurality of standard software modules, including:

1. an operating system (OS) 411 {e.g., Linux or Microsoft Windows);

2. web server software 412 {e.g., Apache, available at http://www.apache.org);

3. scripting language modules 413 {e.g., personal home page or PHP, available at http://www.php.net, or Microsoft ASP); and

4. structured query language (SQL) modules 414 {e.g., MySQL, available from http://www.mysql.com), which allow data to be stored in and retrieved/accessed from an SQL database.

Together, the web server 412, scripting language 413, and SQL modules 414 provide the processing system 400 with the general ability to allow users of the Internet 250 with standard computing devices equipped with standard web browser software to access the processing system 400 and in particular to provide data to and receive data from the database 401. It will be understood by those skilled in the art that the specific functionality provided by the system 400 to such users is provided by scripts accessible by the web server 412, including the one or more software modules 402 implementing the processes performed by the processing system 400, and also any other scripts and supporting data 415, including markup language ( e.g ., HTML, XML) scripts, PHP (or ASP), and/or CGI scripts, image files, style sheets, and the like.

The boundaries between the modules and components in the software modules 402 are exemplary, and alternative embodiments may merge modules or impose an alternative decomposition of functionality of modules. For example, the modules discussed herein may be decomposed into submodules to be executed as multiple computer processes, and, optionally, on multiple computers. Moreover, alternative embodiments may combine multiple instances of a particular module or submodule. Furthermore, the operations may be combined or the functionality of the operations may be distributed in additional operations in accordance with the invention. Alternatively, such actions may be embodied in the structure of circuitry that implements such functionality, such as the micro-code of a complex instruction set computer (CISC), firmware programmed into programmable or erasable/programmable devices, the configuration of a field- programmable gate array (FPGA), the design of a gate array or full-custom application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC), or the like.

Each of the steps of the processes performed by the processing system 400 may be executed by a module (of software modules 402) or a portion of a module. The processes may be embodied in a non-transient machine-readable and/or computer-readable medium for configuring a computer system to execute the method. The software modules may be stored within and/or transmitted to a computer system memory to configure the computer system to perform the functions of the module.

The processing system 400 normally processes information according to a program (a list of internally stored instructions such as a particular application program and/or an operating system) and produces resultant output information via input/output (I/O) devices 408. A computer process typically includes an executing (running) program or portion of a program, current program values and state information, and the resources used by the operating system to manage the execution of the process. A parent process may spawn other, child processes to help perform the overall functionality of the parent process. Because the parent process specifically spawns the child processes to perform a portion of the overall functionality of the parent process, the functions performed by child processes (and grandchild processes, etc.) may sometimes be described as being performed by the parent process.

Base Apparatus 220

The base apparatus 220 of any of the examples herein can be similar to the base apparatus 500 shown in FIG 5. The conductive contacts are labelled A, B, and C. The base apparatus 500 is configured to disrupt an electro-static field around the touch screen of a mobile device, the touch screen is correspondingly able to detect contact by the base apparatus 500.

The base apparatus 500 can be made from either aluminium or copper. The base apparatus 500 can be chrome plated or have a non-conductive finish for aesthetic reasons.

In some embodiments, the base apparatus 500 can include at least one non- conductive contact 502 for maintaining the stability of the base apparatus 500 during use. FIG 8(a) illustrates instability of the base apparatus 500 during use in the absence of at least one non-conductive contact, while FIG 8(b) illustrates stability of the base apparatus 500 when the base apparatus 500 includes at least one non-conductive contact. It should be appreciated that a product(s) placed on the base apparatus 500 is corresponding unstably placed when the base apparatus 500 is unstable.

Referring to FIG 7, there is provided an illustration of various shapes of the base apparatus, for example, circular 705, squarish 710, rectangular 715 and so forth. FIG 7 also illustrates how each base apparatus is separated into eighteen sectors of 20° each, which allows a buffer/tolerance in the detection of the three contact points to minimise erroneous detections.

Accordingly, the above described system 200 provides users with a convenient way to trigger a task on a mobile device, simply by placement of a base apparatus on the touch screen of the mobile device. Advantageously, users are able to trigger the task while being able to interface with a physical product, for example, cosmetics, toys, electronic devices, perishable foods, and so forth. Furthermore, embodiments of the present invention can be carried out without any modification to existing mobile devices. It is advantageous that the system 200 is able to enhance an engagement experience of consumers at a merchant establishment, particularly in relation to finding out about respective products offered by the merchant. Furthermore, the system 200 can also deployed as an transient substitute in place of staff members of the merchant establishment when, for example, an available staff member is unable to speak a common language with the consumer, all staff members are occupied and unable to attend to the consumer, and so forth. In addition, the system 200 can also be used as a tool for teaching, whereby placement of a base apparatus on the touch screen of the mobile device can engage a learner with the use of multi-media content.

Throughout this specification and claims which follow, unless the context requires otherwise, the word “comprise”, and variations such as “comprises” or “comprising”, will be understood to imply the inclusion of a stated integer or group of integers or steps but not the exclusion of any other integer or group of integers.

Persons skilled in the art will appreciate that numerous variations and modifications will become apparent. All such variations and modifications which become apparent to persons skilled in the art, should be considered to fall within the spirit and scope that the invention broadly appearing before described.

Claims

1. A system for determining a task to be triggered on a mobile device, the system comprising at least one data processor configured to:

2. The system of claim 1 , wherein the task is defined in a look up table, the look up table being stored on either the mobile device or a remote storage device.

3. The system of either claim 1 or 2, wherein the base apparatus is configured for placement of at least one object.

4. The system of any of claims 1 to 3, wherein the base apparatus includes at least one non-conductive contact for ensuring a stability of the base apparatus.

5. A data processor implemented method for determining a task to be triggered on a mobile device, the method comprising:

detecting, at the mobile device, three conductive contacts of a base apparatus, the contacts being located on a touch screen of the mobile device; determining, at the mobile device, a circumcentre of a triangle, the three conductive contacts being located at respective apexes of the triangle; determining, at the mobile device, a radius of a control circle, the control circle being centred at the circumcentre, and the three conductive contacts being at a circumference of the control circle; and

6. The method of claim 5, wherein the task is defined in a look up table, the look up table being stored on either the mobile device or a remote storage device.

7. The method of either claim 5 or 6, wherein the base apparatus is configured for placement of at least one object.

8. The method of any of claims 5 to 7, wherein the base apparatus includes at least one non-conductive contact for ensuring a stability of the base apparatus.

9. A non-transitory computer readable storage medium embodying thereon a program of computer readable instructions which, when executed by one or more processors of a mobile device, cause the mobile device to carry out a method for determining a task to be triggered on a mobile device, the method embodying the steps of:

determining, a plurality of angles of the three conductive contacts in relation to each other; wherein the task to be triggered is dependent on the determined radius and the determined plurality of angles.

10. The storage medium of claim 9, wherein the task is defined in a look up table, the look up table being stored on either the mobile device or a remote storage device.