Edge touchpad input device
AssigneeInternational Business Machines Corporation
InventorsBarton A. Smith, Shumin Zhai
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A touchpad input device is provided that is disposed about at least a portion of at least one outside edge of an electronic device housing. The present invention also provides electronic devices comprising the present touchpad input device. Furthermore, the present invention provides a method of sensing user input about an outside edge of an electronic device housing, wherein the user input is detected by a user input detector that relays a signal to a control circuit to be acted upon appropriately.
Claims34
An electronic device comprising:
- a housing having at least one outside edge;
- at least one touchpad disposed along at least a portion of the at least one outside edge;
- and
- a user input detector, electrically coupled to the touchpad, for detecting user input from the touchpad along at least a portion of the outside edge.
A method comprising the steps of:
- touching about the outside edge of a housing;
- detecting the touching;
- and
- transmitting an electrical signal upon detecting the touching to a control circuit, wherein the control circuit acts upon the electrical signal.
A touchpad input device comprising:
- a touchpad disposed along at least a portion of at least one outside edge of a housing;
- a user input detector, electrically coupled to the touchpad, for detecting user input from the touchpad and transmitting input signals;
- and
- a control circuit electrically coupled to the user input detector;
- wherein the control circuit acts upon the input signals from the user input detector.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.