4 ms·
I recently bought Samsung Galaxy add on keyboard, on a whim, to see if it would work with my iPhone. It sits over the screen where the onscreen keyboard is situ
by afandian 3y ago
I recently bought Samsung Galaxy add on keyboard, on a whim, to see if it would work with my iPhone. It sits over the screen where the onscreen keyboard is situated. On eBay it said “Bluetooth” but had no obvious signs of charging. Didn’t work with the iPhone. Next hypothesis was something clever with NFC.
Nope. Zero electronics. The reverse of the PCB has pads that fit over regions on the screen. On the front of the PCB, tactile dome switches short each pad through to a plane, presumably capacitively coupled to the hand.
(Edited for detail)
Why won’t anyone do this for iPhones? (Patents or market?)
- sleepybrett 3y agoMy guess is 'you didn't look hard enough' or 'there were some but noone bothered to buy them and everyone stopped making them'. I was an avid sidekicker until the iphone2. I might have (lo 15 years ago) been interested in a slide out horizontal keyboard case for the iphone. Never happened, adapted and now with 'slide' keyboards never going back to chicklets.
- afandian 3y agoI’ve seen various phone keyboards over the years but never recalled one that used capacitance.
- sleepybrett 3y agoI've certainly had little stick on joysticks (suction cup) that use capacitance, they sucked. I think I remember seeing similar keyboards at the time.
- I_Am_Nous 3y agoSo it's basically a membrane keyboard with plungers hitting the "contacts" which are the keys on the touchscreen? My first concern would be tolerances - enough press to feel good, but not so far that you have to press too hard. Too short and you might accidentally press keys you didn't mean to.
- zamadatix 3y agoDo you have a model/name/link of this? I'm having a hard time following the description but it sounds like it sits on top of part of the screen? What happens when you fullscreen a video or otherwise don't have the keyboard up?
- osamagirl69 3y agoSeems to be this https://wonderfulengineering.com/samsung-unveils-a-qwerty-keyboard-case-that-attaches-on-top-of-your-screen/ https://wonderfulengineering.com/samsung-unveils-a-qwerty-ke...
- afandian 3y agoThis, or similar. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=mjwAqDS6EcU https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=mjwAqDS6EcU It clips on the front of the phone. Has a small magnet that presumably triggers the onscreen keyboard to show and resize the visible screen.
- chedabob 3y agoI'd be surprised if Sony Ericsson didn't have a patent on it, because that was exactly how the numeric keypad worked on their early smartphones. They were resistive displays though, so they just required something hard on the back to register a touch.