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All Hands In With New Apple Patent

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A new Apple Patent application (from June 2009) shows off new information that Apple is working on for multi-touch. From what AppleInsider is reporting shows that this isn’t just finger touch, but it looks like you can put use your entire palm to leave greasy palm prints on your screen. From what I’m reading this looks like it is aimed at creating a new way of typing on a virtual keyboard. I may be wrong (after all this is speculation) but this looks like it is aimed for larger than the rumored 10 inch screens on the mythical Tablet.

patent-091001-1

6 Comments

6 Comments

  1. LeeN

    10/02/2009 at 3:03 pm

    I can’t wait till someone comes out with a giant display that can use fingerprint detection and you can have multiple people using the same screen, typing into their own programs, and moving the applications around with out interfering with other users. And could also use the finger print detection as a way of protecting document access, and assign different click behaviors for each of your fingers (index finger is like left clicking the mouse, middle finger for right clicking, etc). So much that can be done, that hasn’t been done yet :)

  2. Joe

    10/02/2009 at 3:07 pm

    I don’t see this working well at all. The only reason that touch-typing works is because you can feel each key, both just touching it, and when you depress the key it gives and you know you’ve pressed it. On a touchscreen, there’s obviously no separate keys, no give, and not even the little nubs on the F and J keys to tell you that you’re on home row.

    There was another cool seeming keyboard that was like this and gave no feedback, and the reason is that pressing on nothing to touch-type just plain doesn’t work:
    https://www.thinkgeek.com/computing/keyboards-mice/8193/

    Maybe Apple’s market won’t care about that, but I just don’t think it’ll improve the virtual keyboard experience. Give me a pen and handwriting recognition over a touch virtual keyboard any day.

  3. Sam

    10/02/2009 at 3:15 pm

    Sounds like cost reduced FingerWorks TouchStream technology (https://www.fingerworks.com/). FingerWorks developed multitouch gesture pads and “keyboards” and was acquired by Apple in 2005, a few years before the iPhone…

    Check out the MacNTouch (https://www.fingerworks.com/MacNTouch_product.html), you replaced your PowerBook keyboard with it, and you then could type on it, mouse with it, use gestures to activate various commands.

  4. Lorie Ghamy

    10/02/2009 at 7:25 pm

    Really new Apple patents ?

    Look like this one from 30-07-2007, isn’t it ???

    https://macbrains.info/2007/11/23/multi-touch-et-vous-pensiez-avoir-tout-vu/

  5. Nameless

    10/04/2009 at 2:22 pm

    Joe: Agreed 110%. Tactile feedback is a MUST. Why else would I be so insistent on things like IBM Model M keyboards?

    Also seconded on the pen + handwriting recognition point. Apple was going somewhere with the last Newton MessagePads, only Steve Jobs had to kill off the entire division and offer no satisfactory replacement.

  6. Chris

    10/05/2009 at 4:13 pm

    What’s the patent number? I personally like the input of the Courier: https://conjuice.wordpress.com/2009/10/05/new-microsoft-courier/

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