Input device-adaptive human-computer interface
AssigneeIntel Corporation
InventorJiming Sun
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A computer user interface and method for its operation are disclosed. The interface uses a new architecture that allows it to adapt readily to the type of input device being used to operate the computer. The look and feel of the interface depends on which input device is selected as primary. Thus, when mouse/keyboard is the primary input device, the interface-controllable elements such as scrollbars, buttons, icons, menus, lists, and dialog boxes may appear as with a conventional GUI. When a different physical input device is primary, such as pen or speech recognition, the look and feel of these elements can change to be more appropriate for that device. This change is virtually transparent to the applications utilizing the user interface.
Claims16
A method for interfacing a computer with a user, the method comprising:
- translating input from a physical input device to one or more logical device inputs, the logical device inputs representing a set of logical devices that can be shared concurrently by multiple physical input devices having respective device types corresponding to different ones of a plurality of possible physical input device types;
- generating one or more logical events corresponding to the logical device inputs;
- operating a user interface in response to the logical events;
- configuring a selected physical input device type as a primary input device;
- and
- adapting the display generated by the user interface depending on the type of the primary input device.
A computer user interface comprising:
- a first logical device mapper capable of accepting input from a first physical input device, the mapper translating input from the first physical input device into one or more logical device inputs representing a set of logical devices that can be shared concurrently by multiple physical input devices;
- an event generator to construct logical events corresponding to logical device inputs;
- and
- an adaptive user interface to respond to the events and update a display output based on the events, the adaptive user interface having different display modes keyed to different physical input device types, the adaptive user interface configuring a selected physical input device type as a primary input device, and adapting the display generated by the user interface depending on the type of the primary input device.
An apparatus comprising a computer-readable medium containing computer instructions that, when executed, cause a processor to perform a method comprising:
- translating input from a physical input device to one or more logical device inputs, the logical device inputs representing a set of logical devices that can be shared concurrently by multiple physical input devices having respective device types corresponding to different ones of a plurality of possible physical input device types;
- generating one or more logical events corresponding to the logical device inputs;
- operating a user interface in response to the logical events;
- configuring a selected physical input device type as a primary input device;
- and
- adapting a display generated by the user interface depending on the type of the primary input device.
A method for interfacing a computer with a user, the method comprising:
- translating a single input from a physical input device to a plurality of logical device inputs, the logical device inputs representing a set of logical devices that can be shared concurrently by multiple physical input devices having respective device types corresponding to different ones of a plurality of possible physical input device types;
- generating one or more logical events corresponding to the logical device inputs;
- operating a user interface in response to the logical events;
- configuring a selected physical input device type as a primary input device;
- and
- adapting the display generated by the user interface depending on the type of the primary input device.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.