Tap Tech Brings Touch To Dumb Phones

nk497 writes "A Cambridge-based firm has come up with a way to bring touch interfaces to phones without touchscreens. According to TouchDevice, the system uses the microphone to turn any surface on a handset into a touch-sensitive input panel by analysing sound signatures. 'For example, where icons are displayed on a non-touch screen display, you could tap on there and it would activate the application,' said founder Mike Bradley. TouchDevice believes there are two markets for the technology: firstly to augment input potential in touchcreen smartphones, and secondly as a way of adding touch to 'dumb' displays. The system should be making its way into devices by early next year."

Comments

A boon for the touch phone knock off makers.

[Kenja]

Cant wait to see the 10$ iPhony cell phones that use this rather then an actual touch screen.

Re:A boon for the touch phone knock off makers.

[Jurily]

Cant wait to see the 10$ iPhony cell phones that use this rather then an actual touch screen.

Could we just let the whole touchscreen idea die instead? Please?

Re:A boon for the touch phone knock off makers.

[lalena]

Companies (Elo Acustic Pulse Recognition) are already using this technology. They can detect the location of the touch, and they do an OK job with finger drag. They cannot detect when you take your finger off the surface.
If these limitations are OK, they you get a cheap touch screen that lets you use a scratch resistant glass surface.

Re:A boon for the touch phone knock off makers.

[shri]

And I cant wait to see what happens to those iPhonys at a Stomp concert. :)

Re:A boon for the touch phone knock off makers.

[mcgrew]

Why just phones? I'd like this tech on my netbook. I hope it's open source; I'd install it on my netbook - at least if it works better than the speech recognition. But it seems it may have the same drawback, which is any sound confuses the speech engine. I'll bet this won't work anywhere there are percussive sounds; it has to be pretty damned quiet for the speech engine to work.

Sounds like a dump idea at first...

[Locke2005]

But with multiple microphones, sounds will come in out of phase. It should be possible to compute the delay time of the signal coming in on each microphone, which when combined with knowledge of the speed of sound should allow it triangulate the position of the tap. Yes, with a single microphone, this would be an abhorrent kludge. With multiple microphones, it works like the audio gunshot detection systems already in use in some cities.

Re:Sounds like a dump idea at first...

[adolf]

TFA talks about doing this with exactly one pre-existing microphone, which is rather unique.

Triangulating touch position using multiple "microphones" (in this case, peizoelectric widgets mounted to the glass surface, but the concept is the same) has been done before, and isn't particularly new. (More info and whitepaper.)

Re:Sounds like a dump idea at first...

[treeves]

I suspect it doesn't use time delays, but just the difference in the audio spectra between tapping in the corner close to the mic, tapping in the middle, and tapping in the opposite corner. Different frequencies will resonate and/or be attenuated depending on where you tap. Have you ever played a guitar and noticed how the sound (timbre) changes depending on whether you pluck the string over the neck, over the sound hole, or close to the bridge? Same idea here, I imagine, just using a cell phone as the resonator instead of a guitar.

New excuse for drunk-dialing your ex...

[Locke2005]

"I dropped my phone, and the microphone-based touch detection interpreted as calling your number!"

Other aplications

[He who knows]

It seems like this can be aplied to computer moniters quite easilly. I would like a cheap touch screen laptop.

I should have waited...

[gsarig]

2 weeks ago I said goodbye to my 4 year old Sony Ericcsson K750i, and bought an iPhone... If I knew about that device, I would have waited... :P

Re:neat but no.

[by (1706743)]

If you are screaming in an argument, then you have already lost.

NOT TRUE!!! SCREAMING IN AN ARGUMENT MAKES YOU MORE RIGHT!!!

(This bit down here is to appease /.'s filters, as it thinks I'm yelling...no sense of humor at all.)

Re:Sounds flakey

[vux984]

You are wearing gloves.
You tap with your fingernail, pen, etc

er... these also don't even work on state of the art touch devices -- androids / iphones / blackberries. Go ahead... try using your iphone with mittens on, or tap one with your fingernail.

So I guess modern smartphones are just a hack to you?

Ramifications

[TheCouchPotatoFamine]

Lets think this through, using some out there guessing as to what this is/can do: Microphones on the inside of the case don't require an external sound port, and can actually be conducted onto the plastic case itself. Good: The magnitude of a direct finger tap opposed to an external click or thump filters out error from the environment. Good: Multi touch may not be perfectly possible with two mics but it is using three mics; gives you triangulation, makes simultaneous events seperable. Anyone want to make the case two mics is practical for that? Bad: Can't detect dragging. Good: cell phones are an exception to this, but music players and other digital devices can now be waterproof easily, if induction charging and wifi are used so that a simple gasket can be used to seal it What did I miss?