Patently Mobile has covered Samsung's wide body of intellectual property on the subject of future smartphones with flex and/or multiple displays for many years now. We've even created a special archive to keep track of Samsung's progress. A new Samsung patent filing recently published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office reveals a new round of smartphone concepts with multiple displays including the integration of a least one transparent display that has special functionality.
Samsung's invention relates to an electronic device and a method for controlling displaying of information in the electronic device. More particularly, the present invention relates to an electronic device and a method for forming a transparent display area on at least one display among a plurality of displays and performing a control to allow at least part of information to be displayed on another display to be shown or hidden by using the transparent display.
Samsung's patent FIG. 1C noted below is an overview of the system and more specifically illustrates a hardware structure for a processor and a display control module of an electronic device.
Samsung's patent FIG. 2E noted below is a view illustrating a pogo connection type electronic device; FIG. 3C is a view illustrating an electronic device having a plurality of displays with a front and back surface transparent area.
Samsung's patent FIGS. 4A and 4B noted below are views illustrating a three-step display. In FIG. 4B, the additional component 422 may include at least one of an audio output module (for example, a thin film speaker), an energy harvester (for example, a solar cell), a storage, a sensor (for example, a bio information recognition sensor (for example, a fingerprint sensor, an electrocardiogram sensor, a temperature sensor, a pulse sensor, an oxygen saturation sensor, a body fat measurement sensors, a skin humidity measurement sensor, and a HRM sensor), a touch sensor, a pressure sensor, an antenna, a communication module (for example, RF, Wi-Fi, NFC, cellular communication, BT, and BLE communication), a camera, or a battery (for example, a thin film battery).
Samsung's patent FIG. 10J is a view illustrating information display depending on a user's position. The display control module may determine a user's position or gaze of a display and may display specified information through a display (for example, the display 1012) corresponding to the user's position or gaze among the plurality of displays.
The display control module may display a variety of information through the surface corresponding to a user's position or gaze among the both surfaces (for example, a back #1015 and a front #1016) of the transparent display area #1014 in the display #1012. When the back of the display #1012 is disposed toward the user direction (for example, the front #1016 of the display faces the user at the same time), the display control module performs a control on the transparent display to allow an object #1070 (for example, another user or object) positioned at the outside of the electronic device to be transmitted through the back and seen or the information #1072 (for example, watch information or schedule information) to be displayed.
Samsung's patent FIG. 10K noted above is a view illustrating a display status or information adjustment depending on a display opening angle. The display could present the user with information and/or a user interface and with a simple hand gesture change the display to being completely or partially transparent as noted in the patent figure above.
In Samsung's patent FIG. 8A below we're able to see that the display could also be changed to a mirror.
Samsung notes that the smartphone could include various types of sensors such as: a touch sensor, a digitizer, a gesture sensor, a proximity sensor, an image sensor, and a 3D depth sensor and others.
Samsung further noted that the input module may include a touch panel, a (digital) pen sensor, a key and/or an ultrasonic input device. The touch panel may recognize a touch input through at least one of capacitive, resistive, infrared, or ultrasonic methods, for example. Additionally, the touch panel may further include a control circuit. In the case of the capacitive method, both direct touch and proximity recognition are possible. The touch panel may further include a tactile layer. In this case, the touch panel 1852 may provide a tactile response to a user.
Samsung filed their U.S. patent application back in Q1 2015. Considering that this is a patent application, the timing of such a product to market is unknown at this time.
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