Computer Engineering Commons^™

Using Triz To Design The Future Keyboard, Umakant Mishra

Umakant Mishra

A keyboard is the most common and widely used input device for a computer. Using the keyboard is often vital to interact with a computer. There are several aspects of a keyboard such as size, key layout, convenience and ergonomic features etc., which are continuously under improvement by keyboard designers and manufacturers. TRIZ is an efficient methodology in product designing. Using IFR and Trends we can well predict the directions of the future keyboards and using Contradictions and Principles we can overcome the current limitations. This article analyses the critical features of a keyboard, does a functional analysis, derives the …

An Ideal Computer Keyboard- A Case Study Of Applying Ideality On Keyboard Evolution, Umakant Mishra

Umakant Mishra

Any product or system moves towards its ideality. If we know the Ideal Final Result (IFR) it becomes easy to predict the future generation of the product or system. The author made a study of over 100 patents on computer keyboards. Each of these inventions tries to achieve some new feature or functionality. But what is the ultimate keyboard? This article makes an attempt to find the features of an Ideal Keyboard.

Inventions On Computer Keyboard- A Triz Based Analysis, Umakant Mishra

Umakant Mishra

Every stage of evolution takes a product towards its ideality. This also happens in case of the Computer Keyboard. Today’s keyboards are outcome of hundreds of inventions in past. This article analyzes some interesting inventions on computer keyboard from TRIZ perspective. The inventions improve various aspects of computer keyboards like increasing operating (typing) efficiency, reducing size, improving ergonomic features and so on. This article was first published in TRIZ Journal (http://www.triz-journal.com/archives/2003/11/) in November 2003.

10 Inventions On Key Guides And Keyboard Templates, Umakant Mishra

Umakant Mishra

A keyboard has many function keys and each function key can have multiple functions when used with control, shift and alt keys, it is difficult for a user to remember the functionality of the function keys. We need a mechanism to indicate the operations assigned to each function key for different software programs. A keyboard guide or template is used for this purpose.

This article illustrates 10 inventions on keyboard key guide and function key templates selected from US patent database. Various mechanisms of keyboard templates have been proposed, including static, dynamic, manual, mechanical, onscreen display and others.

10 Inventions On Ergonomically Developed Computer Accessories, Umakant Mishra

Umakant Mishra

The height, shape and habit of every human being are different. In large workplaces, the construction of computer furniture and accessories cannot be of that user. The major made according these peculiarities of every human being. As a result every computer user has to work on standard computer furniture and standard computer accessories that may not match with his physical construction and peculiarities physical problems caused by prolonged computer usage can be categorized as neck pain and stiffness, low back pain and stiffness, and strain of the wrists. These problems are caused by chairs, computer desks, and keyboard support stands …

Inventions On Integrating Pointing Devices With Computer Keyboard, Umakant Mishra

Umakant Mishra

A keyboard is the most essential input device for the computer. Although a keyboard contains navigation keys, in most cases we use a pointing device like mouse to operate the cursor. There are many kinds of pointing devices like mouse, track ball, touch pad, touch stick, joy stick and so on each used for different purposes. Although each of these pointing devices have specific advantages, the disadvantages of using all these pointing devices is that they occupy lot of desk space, clutter the table by using several cables and makes the place messy. Many inventors have tried to integrate one …

10 Inventions On Keyboard Key Switch Mechanism, Umakant Mishra

Umakant Mishra

The key switches of the keyboard of a computer system are generally comprised of a key cap having a plunger, conductive rubber disposed above a membrane circuit and compressed by the plunger to trigger the membrane circuit causing it to produce an electric signal to the computer. Some key switches use springs. Some other keyboards use rubber domes or a dome sheet, which do the function of springs. When the user depresses the key button the spring or domes collapse. The key switch depresses the key stem, which actuates the button on the membrane circuit. When the user releases the …

10 Inventions On Laptop Keyboards, Umakant Mishra

Umakant Mishra

A desktop keyboard has several sections like character key section, navigation key section, numeric key section, and function key section etc. each consisting of several number of keys. However, a laptop computer does not have so much of space to accommodate all these keys into the keyboard. There are several considerations while designing a laptop keyboard.

This article illustrates 10 inventions on keyboards for laptop and portable computers. The inventions are selected from US patent database. The inventions try to improve various aspects of a laptop keyboard, such as reducing size, folding and concealing, ergonomic features, improving quality and reducing …

10 Inventions On Special Type Of Keyboards, Umakant Mishra

Umakant Mishra

A keyboard is the most important input device for a computer. It is used with various types and sizes of computer. But the same standard keyboard will not work efficiently with different types of computers at different environments. There is a need to develop special keyboards to meet special requirements.

This article illustrates 10 inventions on special types of keyboards. The special keyboard are used in special computers or computers used for special purposes. A special keyboard is to be understood as a keyboard having features beyond a normal keyboard. The example of special keyboards are, a children’s keyboard which …

Keyboards For Inputting Chinese Language: A Study Based On Us Patents, Umakant Mishra

Umakant Mishra

As the structure of Chinese characters are very different, it is very difficult to input Chinese characters into computer quickly and conveniently. The conventional keyboard does not support the pictorial characters in Chinese language. There are 3000 to 6000 commonly used pictorial Chinese characters (Hanzi).

There are a few existing systems which include "PinYin" (phonetic) system, a combination of the PinYin system and character form techniques, whole character encoding, stroke input encoding, and stoke form encoding. Each of the methods have their own advantages and disadvantages. This article describes two inventions on inputting Chinese language through a standard keyboard.

Avoiding Repetitive Stress Injuries By Using Ergonomically Improved Keyboards, Umakant Mishra

Umakant Mishra

Most conventional keyboards are designed keeping their technical efficiency in mind and not human comfort or ergonomic aspects. This leads to various physical problems by keyboard users and more seriousness to the prolonged users.

The major physical problems caused by prolonged keyboard usage can be categorized as neck pain and stiffness, low back pain and stiffness, and strain of the wrists. These problems are caused by chairs, computer desks, and keyboard support stands that are unsuitable for the particular computer user.

Carpal tunnel syndrome (CTS) is a debilitating injury to the wrist joint which has been frequently attributed to long …

Keyboards For Inputting Japanese Language: A Study Based On Us Patents, Umakant Mishra

Umakant Mishra

The most commonly used Japanese alphabets are Kanji, Hiragana and Katakana. The Kanji alphabet includes pictographs or ideographic characters that were adopted from the Chinese alphabet. Hiragana is used to spell words of Japanese origin, while Katakana is used to spell words of western or other foreign origin.

Two methods are commonly used to input Japanese to the computer. One, the “kana input method” that uses a keyboard having 46 Japanese iroha (or kana) letter keys. The other method is “Roma-ji input method”, where the Japanese letters are composed of English input from a standard QWERTY keyboard. Both the methods …

10 Inventions On Collapsible Keyboards, Umakant Mishra

Umakant Mishra

Although a bigger keyboard is often comfortable to work with, they cannot be fit into laptop and small size computer boxes. The portable and handheld computers need small size keyboards. So there is a need to reduce the size of the keyboard to fit into the laptop box. There are various mechanisms to reduce the size of the keyboard; collapsible keyboard is one of them.

Although different inventions intend to achieve the same objective of reducing the keyboard size, they all differ in their mechanism. For example, some invention uses a compression mechanism, some invention uses a folding mechanism, and …

10 Inventions On Modular Keyboards, Umakant Mishra

Umakant Mishra

As a standard keyboard is quite spacious many inventions try to use the space of keyboard to use for various activities. A modular keyboard is designed in such a way that the components of the keyboard can be attached and detached as per the need. This article illustrates 10 inventions on modular keyboard from US patent database. The objective of these inventions is to make a keyboard modular, so that the same keyboard can be made smaller by detaching some of its components and larger by attaching additional attachments. Some modular keyboards provide slots for external attachments like mouse, telephone, …

10 Inventions On Reducing Keyboard Size, Umakant Mishra

Umakant Mishra

A conventional computer keyboard consists of as many as 101 keys. The keyboard has several sections, such as text entry section, navigation section, and numeric keypad etc. and each having several keys on the keyboard. The size of the keyboard is a major inconvenience for portable computers, as they cannot be carried easily. Thus there are certain circumstances which compels to reduce the size of a keyboard. Reducing the size of a keyboard leads to several problems. A reduced size keyboard may not contain all the keys available on a full size keyboard; a reduced size keyboard may not be …

Inventions On Reducing Number Of Keys On A Computer Keyboard, Umakant Mishra

Umakant Mishra

A computer keyboard consists of several sections and each section consists of several numbers of keys. The text entry section contains the standard character keys, navigation section contains cursor movement and page control keys, numeric keypad contains numeric keys and function keys section contain function keys and special keys. Although the increased number of keys helps smooth interaction with a computer there are situations where it is necessary to reduce the number of keys. The need for reducing number of keys in a keyboard creates a technical contradiction. Generally more number of keys can support more number of functions and …

Inventions On Soft Keyboards, Umakant Mishra

Umakant Mishra

The soft keyboards are onscreen representation of physical keyboard having alphanumeric characters and other controls. The user operates the soft keyboard with the mouse, a stylus or other pointing device. The soft keys don’t have any mechanical component. The soft keyboards are used in many public places for informational purpose, educational systems and financial transactional systems. A soft keyboard is convenient in some cases where a hard keyboard is difficult to manage. The soft keyboard is a substitute of a physical keyboard and is displayed on the screen. It displays the same type of alphanumeric and control keys like the …

Inventions On Keyboard Illumination: A Triz Based Analysis, Umakant Mishra

Umakant Mishra

The conventional computers are not usable in dark, as the user cannot see the keyboard to operate properly. But there are many situations where the user may like to work on his computer under low light conditions, such as, during nights, while traveling in flights/ trains having low lights, working in the garden during evening etc. So it is necessary to provide some light to the laptop to operate the keyboard under low light situations.

Luminescence of the keyboard is a desirable feature for portable computers. There may be several methods to illuminate the keyboard, the most crude may be …

10 Inventions On Improving Keyboard Efficiency: A Triz Based Analysis, Umakant Mishra

Umakant Mishra

A keyboard is the most important input device for a computer. With the development of technology a basic keyboard does not want to remain confined within the basic functionalities of a keyboard, rather it wants to go beyond. There are several inventions which attempt to improve the efficiency of a conventional keyboard. This article illustrates 10 inventions from US Patent database all of which have proposed very interesting methods for improving the efficiency of a computer keyboard. Some interesting inventions include, adding toolbar buttons on the keyboard, power saving method, keyboard-cooling mechanism, robust keyboard for public use, keyboard enhancement for …

10 Inventions On Keyboard Key Layout: A Triz Based Analysis, Umakant Mishra

Umakant Mishra

The standard QWERTY keyboard was developed in the late 1800’s for the typewriters. As people were acquainted with that the same layout was retained for the computer keyboards. Many people feel that the QWERTY layout is not very efficient layout and there have been many inventions on different layouts of character keys.

In order to improve the key arrangement, two major issues should be addressed. (i) The improved key arrangement should offer significantly improved productivity. (ii) The training time for learning the improved key arrangement should be minimized.

This article analyzes 10 inventions from US patent database each of which …

10 Inventions On Keyboard Attachments: A Triz Based Analysis, Umakant Mishra

Umakant Mishra

Although the primary objective of the keyboard to input data into the computer, the advanced keyboards keep various other things in mind, such as, how to use the same keyboard for various other purposes, or how to use the same keyboard efficiently by using various other attachments to the keyboard. This objective led to various inventions on keyboard attachments, some of which are illustrated below in this article. This article illustrates 10 inventions on various keyboard attachments from US patent database. Each different attachment improves the usability of the keyboard in some way or other. Some attachments illustrated are template …