Last month the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office published a patent application from Microsoft that revealed their continuing work on a smart ring. We covered their original patent filings on this device back in November and December 2015. The timing of this latest invention is interesting as it now marks a trend in the industry. Patently Apple just filed a series of patent filings from Apple relating to the interpretation of tendon movements being interpreted as gestures to control any number of devices including future versions of the Apple Watch, iPhone and/or iPad. To understand Microsoft's direction for their smart ring requires you to review their previous patents in addition to this current filing. In this particular invention, Microsoft covers a system for a smart ring that uses a least one flexion sensor or 'bend sensor' secured to the smart ring in a manner that is able to detect a distance between the at least one flexion sensor and a second segment of a users' finger to control aspects of a device. In one scenario the user is able to wear multiple rings on their hand and use them in sync to control a virtual mouse that could perform regular right or left clicks. That feature alone has the potential of being a killer app.
Microsoft Invention: Smart Ring
Computing devices are being manufactured in ever more form factors. Many of these form factors do not lend themselves to traditional user input technologies, such as keyboard and mouse. For example, wearable devices such as glasses, wrist bands, and watches tend to have limited input options. For instance, small wearable smart devices may have a small interface with a lack of touch real estate, or the positioning of the device itself may make interaction difficult.
The present concepts from Microsoft relate to a smart ring that could allow a user to use their finger to control a companion device. Implementations relate to a smart ring (e.g., smart ring device, wearable ring device, finger-worn device) worn on a user's finger. The smart ring could detect a pose of the finger (e.g., finger pose, position).
In some cases, the smart ring could also define a coordinate system relative to the finger, and detect the finger pose relative to one or more axes of the coordinate system.
The smart ring could also detect and/or interpret movement of the finger and/or fingertip (e.g., change in finger pose) relative to the coordinate system. The smart ring can wirelessly transmit information related to the pose and/or movement of the finger to control the companion device.
Below in patent FIG. 1 we're able to see how the ring can directly control movement on a tablet display. The user could wear a single ring or multiple ring to control a device with more complex gestures. In some implementations, one or more smart rings could be used to approximate a virtual computer mouse (e.g., to mimic computer mouse actions). For example, the finger pose shown in Instance 2 can be detected by the smart ring and used to alert the companion device to receive virtual computer mouse control input. The smart ring could then be used to detect subsequent control input that mimics computer mouse use, such as moving a cursor or clicking right or left mouse buttons, for example.
In summary, the smart ring could sense finger pose and/or fine-grained subtle fingertip motion from the finger base, which enables readily-available finger control input with a device that looks and feels like an ordinary ring. The smart ring could sense finger pose and/or track subtle fingertip movements from the finger base without requiring instrumentation of the fingertip (e.g., without the user wearing something on his/her fingertip). This keeps normal hand function of the user intact and allows for a socially acceptable appearance.
To summarize patent FIGS. 2 and 3: in some implementations a smart ring could be used to detect a pose of the finger upon which the smart ring is worn. In some cases, the smart ring can detect a change in the pose of the finger. Furthermore, a coordinate system for movement of a fingertip of a user could be defined. The smart ring could then be used to track movement of the fingertip relative to the coordinate system. For example, the smart ring could track subtle fingertip movements in an x-y plane of any surface.
As one example, Microsoft points to the ring working with a smartphone. The user receiving a phone call may wish to decline taking the call without taking it out of their pocket. The user could simply perform a gesture with their index finger and the ring would detect that gesture and decline taking the call automatically.
The system is designed so that a user's hand doesn't have to be in front of a device to control it. A user's arm could be resting on the arm of a chair and still control the activity on a display. As noted in FIG. 9 above, the ring will eventually be able to work with a smartwatch, a smart TV, glasses / HoloLens, tablet and/or Kinect devices.
In Patent FIG. 5 we're able to see a user scratch their jeans in a given way to decline a phone call. In FIG. 8 we see the ring being used to control the tiny screen of a smartwatch without having to touch the display.
In Microsoft's FIG. 6 we're able to see use case scenario #600 involving an example smart ring #602 worn by a user. In this case a user is engaging a digital display device. In this example, the digital display device includes a depth sensor #610 such as a tiny Kinect device. In some implementations, the Kinect device could be manifest as a red, green, blue, plus depth (RGBD) camera. Various types of visible light, non-visible light, and/or sonic depth sensors, among others, could be employed.
The Kinect device could further be useful in detecting the presence of a user in front of the digital display and detecting large-scale gestures that include arm movements performed by the user in front of the digital display device. However, the depth sensor may not be able to accurately detect user control inputs close to the digital display device. For instance, the depth sensor may not be able to distinguish fine-grained, subtle fingertip motions (e.g., stroke input). This is where the smart ring could come into play because it's able to detect subtle fingertip motions, such as stroke input in a downward direction as indicated by arrow #612 in FIG. 6.
Data from the Kinect device and the smart ring could detect large-scale user gestures in front of the digital display device as well as smaller-scale, subtle fingertip motions at the digital display device.
Microsoft's FIG. 7 differs from FIG. 6 in that the user is also working with smartglasses or a HoloLens device on. In this example, the smart glasses can 'see' content on the digital display device and work hand and hand with the smart ring to control content and the movement of content on a display. The ring is able to interpret input from gesture components in both 2 and 3D.
Microsoft filed their patent application back in September 2014. Considering that this is a patent application, the timing of such a product to market is unknown at this time.
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