On November 18 we posted a report titled "Microsoft invents new Wearables Control System that's driven by Surface Sound & Action Gestures." The report introduced us to Microsoft's work on a possible future smart ring styled wearable device that works as a controlling device for small form factor devices. Patently Mobile has now discovered a second patent application that was published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office last month from Microsoft that reveals more information on this new wearables system.
Microsoft's Patent Background
Increasingly users interact with their mobile devices on the go. Many users continuously utilize various device applications. For instance, users listen to music on mobile devices while traveling, and constantly check E-mails. Shoppers browse through their shopping lists and do price comparisons while shopping, among others.
Interacting with mobile devices on-the-go tends to require the user to enter different gestures to scroll, zoom, flip, and/or enter text on graphical user interface (GUI) elements. The smart phone with its relatively large display has provided a unified and convenient platform for such interactions. However, more recent trends in wearable devices such as glasses, wrist bands, and watches have made such interactions limited and awkward due to the lack of touch real estate and the positioning of the device itself.
While mobile device interfaces continue to shrink, interfaces of remote display devices such as TVs and game consoles are becoming even more complex, requiring extensive maneuvering via simple remote controllers or requiring remote control with full keyboard-like capability. For example, with a conventional remote control, a simple task such as entering text to search for a movie title becomes a monumental task leading to a poor user experience.
Microsoft's Invention
Concepts found in Microsoft's patent filing relate to allowing a user to use their fingers to control a device. The implementations relate to a wearable ring platform (e.g., smart ring) worn on one or more of the user's fingers. The smart ring can detect and interpret various control gestures or actions performed by the user. The smart ring can wirelessly transmit the control gestures to the device.
Microsoft notes that any action that can be performed by one or more fingers can be thought of as a gesture. Thus, the action of touching a surface with the finger can be an example of a gesture. Similarly, touching and sliding the finger on a surface can be a gesture. Moving the finger in the air or bending the finger can be a gesture. Further, the action of waving with one or more fingers can be a gesture. Actions performed by both hands can also be a gesture. In summary, actions can include touch gestures and non-touch gestures and/or single finger gestures and multi-finger gestures.
Microsoft notes that a user wearing an example of pressure sensitive smart ring as noted in patent FIG. 5 above, a user is engaging the digital display of a smartwatch. In this example, the digital display device includes a depth sensor that can be manifest as a red, green, blue, plus depth (RGBD) camera.
The depth sensor can be useful in detecting the presence of a user in front of the digital display device and detecting gestures performed by the user in front of the digital display device.
However, the depth sensor may not be able to accurately detect user actions close to the digital display device. For instance, the depth sensor may not be able to distinguish whether the user is pointing at a location on the digital display device or touching the location on the digital display device. The pressure sensitive smart ring can determine whether the user's finger is touching a surface. Further, the pressure sensitive smart ring can determine that while touching the surface the finger is moving in a downward direction.
Data from the depth sensor and the pressure sensitive smart ring can detect user gestures in front of the digital display device as well as user contact of the digital display device. Thus, the pressure sensitive smart ring and the depth sensor can collectively provide information that can allow the digital display device to function in a manner similar to a touch sensitive display device without actually being 'touch sensitive.'
The gesture component of the invention can treat each character as a combination of multiple primitive shapes called "strokes". Microsoft's patent FIG. 7 shows examples of stroke gesture primitives. In this example, 12 strokes are used for text entry in this implementation. The strokes can include directional and/or rotational movements. The gesture component can identify these strokes, and can also measure inter-stoke latencies which can help identify strokes belonging to a single character. The stroke identifiers and inter-stroke latencies can be used to identify the individual characters at a remote device.
Microsoft's patent FIG. 6 shows a gesture detection system. For purposes of explanation, the system includes a pressure sensitive smart ring, digital display device #304, depth sensor #306, smart glasses #402, smart watch #502, and a smart phone #602. Any of these devices can communicate over one or more networks.
The finger band #636 can be formed of various materials such as plastics, polymers, and/or natural materials such as jade or other minerals. The pressure sensitive smart ring can also include ornamental aspects such as precious stones to mimic a traditional jewelry ring.
Microsoft filed their patent application back in May 2014. Considering that this is a patent application, the timing of such a product to market is unknown at this time.
Of course Microsoft isn't alone in trying to devise a smart ring device. A published Google patent filing was revealed back in 2012 (originally filed in 2011) and reported on in our report titled "Google Reveals Video Glasses Working with Magic Rings & Invisible Tattoos." So the race is on as to who will be first to launch a smart ring device.
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