Apple Researching Keyboards With Adaptive Displays on Each Key (macrumors.com) 225
Apple is researching keyboards with small displays on the keys to dynamically change the label on each key, according to a newly-granted patent filing. From a report: The filing is titled "Electronic devices having keys with coherent fiber bundles" and was granted to Apple by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office on the final patent day of this year. The patent explains how each key on a keyboard could have "an associated key display" connected to "control circuitry in the keyboard" via a "coherent fiber bundle." Apple proposes that each key would be "formed from a fiber optic plate" with "opposing first and second surfaces." While the patent stipulates that each key would need to contain a small display to provide the label, of which any compatible pixel array would work, the foremost technology put forwards by Apple is OLED. The key may be made from materials such as glass, ceramic, metal, or polymer, or even crystalline materials such as sapphire.
so apple systems can't take the bar test anymore? (Score:2)
so apple systems can't take the bar test anymore?
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Ha, that may very well be an unintended consequence.
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or will this force the bar test to move to an testing center system? Say if pc laptops start copying apple?
Here's two better ideas for apple (Score:2)
1. Minimalist: don't label the keys at all. You can touch type right?
2. just replace it with two keys, and a predictive typing software. You push the left key to accept the predicted letter or word, and the right key to advance to the next predicted letter.
the last one isn't (entirely) a joke. Ever see the Dasher predictive typing interface form JC MacKay? it was meant for iphones etc. letters fly in from the right spread out vertically, you tap the one you want. The letter fly in order of the most
hook it to the camera (Score:2)
so you can just use eye-pointing to select the next letter. Even faster than typing.
repair cost $500 apple return pricing! (Score:2, Insightful)
repair cost $500 apple return pricing!
Been done already (Score:5, Informative)
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Exactly. The patent should be rejected. It's a good idea, but it's not Apple's good idea.
The idea has been around a lot longer, but needed the technology to catch up to bring it to practicality. Even the blank buttons on the side of an ATM display with the display itself providing labels is an early approximation of the fundamental idea.
In GUIs, the changing labels on various clickable elements is also an implementation, including the ubiquitous play button that becomes a pause button once the media is play
Re: Been done already (Score:5, Interesting)
I know this is Slashdot, but you should really RTFA.
The parent is not for the concept of display on keys or for sticking a display in a transparent plastic key as the Art Lebedev design.
The patent is for creating a key where the surface of the key is the visible endpoint for fibers that are connected to the to the actual light emitting elements. Theoretically this means the whole device would be much more cost effective and power efficient as all the display electronics are on a single board much as current keyboards.
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Yeah, but if I RTFA I can't flaunt my knowledge of only tangentially related trivia and I can't bitch about patents and Apple.
Although in all seriousness, I wonder why some variation of the "keycap is a screen" concept hasn't gotten more traction. I still use an old PS/2 IBM branded buckling spring keyboard and there's plenty of real estate for at least definable/screen-based F-keys.
I suppose the big stumbling block is that defining the key appearance boils down to an application-by-application basis, whil
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The big stumbling point was the cost and reliability of OLED at the time. They're better and cheaper now, but Apple didn't do that.
Considering that I have pointed out instances of coherent fiber optics being used to embed a display in something dating back to the '90s, no, I was not just jumping to criticize Apple or Patents. I was rightly pointing out that we have seen all of this before. It's no more innovative that using a masonry hammer to crack a coconut.
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So what's your *actual* gripe, that Apple is looking for a patent or that they're actually gluing it all together to try and make a product?
I mean, I've seen helicopters, but if an unmanned one lands in my back yard and can take me across town, I'm still gonna call it innovative even if everything about it was done elsewhere by someone else before.
The thing that seems to drive people nuts is that Apple makes previously existing ideas *work well* and then makes mountains of money, even if working well someti
Re: Been done already (Score:4, Informative)
The legal threshold is non-OBVIOUS to a person skilled in the art. Often obvious things still require a non-trivial amount of work to reduce them to practice. Building a two story house is an obvious solution to needing more living area but not wanting a larger footprint (or not having enough room on the property). The design and construction techniques for that are well understood but you still have to actually come up with detailed blueprints and then actually build the thing, but that's not patent worthy either.
Notably here, there's nothing to reverse engineer, it exists only on paper (it has not been reduced to practice). The few drawings in TFA are nowhere near a detailed design that can actually be manufactured. They may have one, but we haven't seen it.
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I saw a coherent fiber bundle used to embed a display in a block of sidewalk back in the '90s. Light pipes for indicator LEDs are a degenerate form of the same idea. The angel on my Christmas tree uses fiber optics to illuminate her wings in a color pattern determined by a filter disk rotating in front of a halogen bulb in the base. It doesn't use OLED because OLED wasn't usable when it was made. It is an OLD idea.
Apple didn't make the change that caused this old idea to become practical(-ish), that happene
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You should really stop talking. The only thing you've made clear is that you know nothing about how patents work.
"Apple didn't make the change that caused this old idea to become practical(-ish), that happened because cheaper and higher performance OLEDS now exist."
People who know infinitely more about this than you disagree, and all of them have al least read the patent at issue. You clearly have not.
RTFA your-self ! (Score:5, Informative)
I know this is Slashdot, but you should really RTFA.
...and you should really read the whole wikipedia page that was pointed above :-D
Jokes about RTFM aside: There were multiple keyboards released by Art Lebedev.
The parent is not for the concept of display on keys or for sticking a display in a transparent plastic key as the Art Lebedev design.
Only the Art Lebedev's original Optimus Maximus [artlebedev.com] (and similar Optimus Mini Three [artlebedev.com] keypads and also a few concepts of keypards), did rely on mini OLED screens inside each individual keys.
The problem is that to fit the mini screens, the key needed to be larger than normal.
The mecanism was a bit shabby, (a mobile screen as part of the key itself would have been a too easy point of failure due to repeated mechanical stress. Instead the mini-screen is imobile, and the key "wraps around" it to press the switch right behind).
This complexity not only made it horrendously expensive, but also quite shitty in practice [youtu.be].
Theoretically this means the whole device would be much more cost effective and power efficient as all the display electronics are on a single board much as current keyboards.
The next iteration of keyboards designed by Art Lebedev was the Optimus Popularis [artlebedev.com], basically a transparent keyboard stacked over a regular screen.
Indeed a single screen made the price drop a lot.
The patent is for creating a key where the surface of the key is the visible endpoint for fibers that are connected to the to the actual light emitting elements.
You would think that, using fibers to transport the image would be the only actual new thing on the table.
(The hope being that you have a pretty standard boring screen underneat, a pretty standard boring key switch on top and fibers guiding the picture from one to the other. Would bring the cost of manufacturing even further down by using standard key mecanisms).
Except that no.
Even for that they were beaten by another company: Logitech's Romer-G based keyboard [deskthority.net]. Even if the final commercially released product don't use them (they just have an empty channel in the middle of the key stalk to let the light through), the original prototype (and corresponding patent) did include provisions for light guide [deskthority.net] in the middle to channel the light to the key.
Apple is literary combining idea that have already existed in keyboard for quite some time, with zero new elements.
Also it's Apple. Of "butterfly keyboard" fame.
You know they are absolutely going to fail at designing this thing and the fiber transmitting the image is going to be a giant point of failure due to some mechanical stress.
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My question is, how will users see the symbol on the key without lifting their fingers off the keyboard?
How do users currently see the symbol on the key without lifting their fingers off of the keyboard?
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I love how the troll(s) of this particular poster come off as so consistently ignorant. It's though that are incapable of understanding a post, much less a sequence of them.
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Re: Been done already (Score:5, Funny)
My question is, how will users see the symbol on the key without lifting their fingers off the keyboard?
If you make the light source strong and focused enough...
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Apple got away with putting a magnet on a power charger. We had used magnets as methods of making a temporary connection between things before, just not on a Computer Power Charger.
I have seen patents for things like putting in LED lights into a product where they use to be incandescent bulbs before. The Patent System in my opinion needs a lot of reform, because they are many obvious things being created, that probably shouldn't be approved that is approved.
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I have an old countertop deep fryer with a magnetic power cord so the broader category of power connection is prior art, so Apple's patent is just a variation of the old "with a computer" scam.
You would think people would have taken notice when that guy in Australia managed to patent the wheel.
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Says the guy who doesn't know how patents work and doesn't read them before commenting.
What precise "deep fryer" are you referring to, where is the proof of its first public disclosure, and what intellectual property are you claiming is "prior art" for?
Would it surprise you to learn that magnetic power connectors, even ones "with a computer" scam, have been granted patent protection AFTER Apple's MagSafe connector? How can that me? Perhaps they should have consulted you and your fryer.
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I know how they work, how they are supposed to work, and that the difference between those routinely costs our economy billions a year at least.
The fryer is an ancient Presto with a magnetic power cord coupling (just like the Mac, but it's line current). I've had it since before the MagSafe connector was a thing.
Since patents aren't supposed to issue for obvious variations on a theme, perhaps they SHOULD have consulted me and my fryer.
When you look at a hammer, do you see a custom crafted specialized nail d
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Are you really trying to argue that the patent system isn't a load of shit? It's current status today is little more than a legally enforced game of "dibs".
Re: Been done already (Score:4)
The Magsafe connector is a complete system, and it just takes one look to see that the only thing in common with deep fryer connector is that it is held by magnets. The way pins make contact, the way it self centers, the type of magnet, that it transmits data and low power rather than no data and high power. There is significant R&D behind it, and a patent is deserved.
And that patent can be used against someone who copies Apple design, but if someone comes up with another magnetic connector design, there is not much Apple can do (except ruin the other party with legal fees...).
I don't remember the details of the wheel patent in Australia but it is not a real patent. If I remember well, it is a system where you can file anything, and it is reviewed only if further legal action is taken. Obviously, the author would have been laughed off the court if he tried to enforce his "patent".
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The Patent System in my opinion needs a lot of reform, because they are many obvious things being created, that probably shouldn't be approved that is approved.
That doesn't require "a lot of reform". It barely requires any reform at all, just better enforcement of the requirememt that an invention be non-obvious.
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As though doing that is obvious. Reforms predicated on redefining on a slippery slope will always fail.
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The "even if not specifically for a keyboard" I precisely why you are wrong. The patent claims specifically where "each key includes a movable key member formed from a coherent fiber bundle, a support structure, and a key display that is interposed between the support structure and the coherent fiber bundle".
"Patent should be rejected."
It would really be good if morons who knew nothing of what they are talking about stopped making ignorant statements of fact.
Also, patent was not rejected because the patent
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My new Android phone has a feature when selecting text. It enlarges the text under my finger and displays it in a box just above my finger. Really makes it easy to select exact text.
(Don't know how long this has been part of Android... I only change phones every 5 to 10 years.)
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Exactly. The patent should be rejected. It's a good idea, but it's not Apple's good idea.
The patent is not for keyboards with displays on the keys.
It is for a specific implementation using fiber bundles.
99.99% of the time, outrage generating articles on Slashdot about "Company X patents Y" are wrong. Company X is actually patenting a tweak to Y or a new way of doing Y.
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Scanning the patent their claimed innovation is basically a fancy lens. They have a small display that doesn't compromise the keycap as much as previous efforts, and then a bunch of fibres that magnify the image to a usable size. Naturally their keys are flat, low travel types, so the primary benefit seems to be that they can be thinner.
Re: Been done already (Score:2)
Which nobody asked for, ever.
At what point does iNorexia become a just plain mental illness?
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Coherent fiber bundles are not new. Not even close. I've even seen them embedded in concrete to turn a segment of a sidewalk into a durable display device.
The only thing that kept this fairly obvious idea from being implemented a thousand times over was cost/benefit. The drop in cost for OLED that changed the analysis is not something Apple did.
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Coherent fiber bundles are not new.
Irrelevant, since Apple is not patenting coherent fiber bundles.
They are patenting a specific way to use fiber bundles to illuminate keys.
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So a patent for hitting a nail with a hammer, a patent for hitting a rock with a hammer, a patent for hitting a piggy bank with a hammer, a patent for hitting a coconut with a hammer, ad nauseam.
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So a patent for hitting a nail with a hammer, a patent for hitting a rock with a hammer, a patent for hitting a piggy bank with a hammer, a patent for hitting a coconut with a hammer, ad nauseam.
There is prior art for all of these. They are also obvious to any practitioner in the art of swinging hammers.
Most piggy banks have holes on the belly for the non-destructive removal of coins.
Hammers don't work well on coconuts. The husk is too spongy and absorbs the blows. A machete works better.
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Coherent fiber bundles do not need to be new for the patent to be valid since the patent is not merely claiming coherent fiber bundles...which you would know if you understood anything about what you are claiming.
Also, what does the "drop in cost of OLED" have to do with this patent? It is entirely irrelevant, although apparently it factors into your ignorant take on what Apple has claimed.
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Re: Been done already (Score:2)
Also no one needs more than 640k and GTF off my lawn.
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I can't see a situation where I'd ever want the letter keys to actually be redefined
I'm not sure how useful I would find it - but there are plenty of cases for screens on the keys even where no functionality of the keys is redefined.
Going back and forth between multiple input languages. Showing icons for keyboard shortcuts (specific app with focus) while holding the modifier keys. Showing caps lock is on by showing uppercase key labels. OK. Maybe an emoji keyboard mode would actually be useful to the masses these days. Something that the iPhone screen can do easily.
Re: Been done already (Score:2)
Likely the reason you canâ(TM)t see when youâ(TM)d want the letter keys to be redid ones is because you donâ(TM)t fit into a use case where such redefinitions are common. Iâ(TM)d bet that most of your work is done typing text into an editor, and so characters on the keys make perfect sense.
But what if you got to redefine your keyboard on a per language basis? What if you got to have actual Cyrillic keys when you switch system language to Russian, and Latin keys when you went to English
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I don't know about that. A thin LCD/e-ink strip above the function keys, or perhaps some large function keys (Commodore 64 style!) with this on I can see a use for, but I see this as yet another bit of complexity to go horribly wrong if applied to the entire keyboard. I can't see a situation where I'd ever want the letter keys to actually be redefined - it's annoying enough when it's a laptop keyboard with some dual use keys to provide a "numeric keypad" you never want and only ever activate accidentally. This is just asking for trouble.
I guess though Gentoo will be able to make use of it so they can optimize the key layout for every application so it's 5-10% faster to type ;-)
I can think of a few useful situations:
CAD or other specific applications where the keyboard is used more as a large control panel than for typing.
Gaming. Put arrows or BFG symbols or something on the keys when in an FPS game. The game would also be able to do things like dim or highlight icons for tools/weapons you don't have, that need reloading, can be upgraded, etc.
In certain modes, for instance when a menu has been activated, the letters that are usable can be highlighted, and/or icons for their func
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Where do you get that this requires that all keys be redefinable? The patent does not require that a SINGLE key be redefinable.
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Trying not to sound like an Apple Fan Boy. However you can patent a better mousetrap, while someone else already has a mouse trap. The details is how the mousetrap works, and how the details are worked out.
The Optimus Keyboard, is over 13 years old. And mainly created to fit on a Desktop PC Keyboard layout. While Apple design seems to be setup for a much smaller form factor, where I expect there are some important differences and technologies in use.
The US Patent may decide it is too close to Optimus an
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You're right. Apple patented round corners on their phone so they must be right.
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Quite true, I would have thought it would had been a Trademark issue vs a patent.
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That was a DESIGN (which covers the way something looks) patent, completely different from a UTILITY patent. You do know the difference, right?
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No.
All patents are evil.
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None of the elements of the new keyboard are at all surprising or non-obvious. The only thing that really changed is OLEDs getting cheaper and brighter. It's a Green Eggs and Ham patent. "Would you could you in a boat?" (pat. pend.) "Would you could you with a goat?" (pat. pend.).
Another difference with the Optimus keyboard is that one was actually made, not just sketched out and hand-waved.
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How would you know? You know absolutely nothing about the patent, you've never even looked at it. Keep telling us about OLEDs, that really makes you look informed. Also concrete sidewalks and Christmas tree decorations, that's clearly prior art. You also missed one, swimming pool lighting.
"Another difference with the Optimus keyboard is that one was actually made, not just sketched out and hand-waved."
Another difference compared to what? You haven't even read the patent, you cannot possibly know.
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Another total idiot.
Not only does the patent office "google", the patent process requires applicants to search for and report related art. It's hard to overstate how much "googling" occurs. Google offers a very good service for reviewing patents.
Nowhere is it more clear just how stupid /. posters are than when it comes to commenting on patents.
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Interesting. That Wiki article says:
A patent application filed on March 13, 2007 suggests that Apple Inc. may be working on a similar dynamically changeable organic light-emitting diode (OLED) keyboard.
Presumably we're talking about implementation-specific differences.
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After the Optimus Maximus, Art Lebedev released the Optimus Popularis keyboard which was much less expensive.
Instead of a screen per key, it has a shared screen under transparent keys with the butterfly-scissor mechanisms in the screen borders.
There have been several low-profile keyboards with similar technology as the Optimus Popularis. a href="https://gizmodo.com/only-students-will-get-to-use-microsofts-lcd-screen-key-5612121]Microsoft experimented[/url] with one at one time, but most implementations have
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Reminds me of an old Monty Python game. They changed the keys on the fly just to keep you guessing.
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Let's talk about optimus maximum.
The product has been made in 2007, that's 13 years ago. It has been sold in a handful of units, and it has been in "sold out" for basically 10 years. The homepage says "patent pending" since 2007.
I'm all for innovation, but these people at artlebedev have had all the time in the world to make a realistic, affordable product or to get a patent and license it to other companies such as Apple to make it reach the general public. Instead, they vanished in thin air and are comple
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Huh? In your opinion patent eligibility should be based on how well you market your product? Talk about an easy loophole for companies to exploit.
Re: Been done already (Score:2)
Patents arenâ(TM)t on ideas, theyâ(TM)re on implementations. This keyboard implements similar functionality, but it does so in a different way. The patent isnâ(TM)t on putting a display in a key cap, itâ(TM)s on using fibre optics as the mechanism to have the key display images, rather than embedding the display directly under a clear key cap.
Not a unique idea. (Score:2)
This isn't a unique idea, I'd be shocked if there were no patents here already or even implementations.
That said, as an old it probably wouldn't interest me much but if done well it can probably be useful for the youngsters. Put a little strip up top and you could have autocomplete suggestions like on a phone, or maybe you start bolding and dimming letters unlikely to be used next to assist typing. If I type "mito" maybe the C bolds and if you hold it down for 1 second it autofills "mitochondria".
I'm too o
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Now that many systems can actually handle unicode, it might be time to add sticky meta keys for additional code pages that actually display on the keys. I say sticky meta keys so we don't go back to needing your nose for a quadruple bucky.
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Put a little strip up top and you could have autocomplete suggestions like on a phone, or maybe you start bolding and dimming letters unlikely to be used next to assist typing./quote.
Apple already has that in their Touchbar laptops (the autocomplete part, at least). The bar is touch sensitive, reconfigurable per app, etc.
It sucks and I hate it. I'm always triggering the damn thing, there's no haptic guides or feedback and for me it's completely useless. Thank goodness they brought back the Escape key. It also replaced the F keys so now you have to use it to adjust brightness or volume.
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It doesn't have to be a 'unique idea'. You can not patent 'ideas' (dynamically changing keyboard). You patent specific methods of implementing ideas.
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So basically you're saying that there should only be one patent for any machine, of any type, that is operated by cams (because cams are not new technology)? There should only be one patent for anything involving a transistor? Only one patent for anything using any kind of RF?
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You patent specific methods of implementing ideas.
You're only supposed to be able to patent inventions. Not obvious methods involving combinations of well-known technologies that are not a novel discovery to make, but have simply not been executed due to lack of marketplace demand or previous consumer interest in the result.
Like, yes... obviously you can design a Keyboard that way just like you can design ANY surface or control panel where the display service is connected to emitting elements using li
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What a pile of crap. Virtually all inventions are combinations of previously existing stuff. Was the sewing machine an 'invention'? According to your idiotic definition, no. Sewing was not new. Using a needle and thread was not new. Using shafts and cams was not new. What was new was the arrangement of those previously existing technologies into a useful machine.
Your understanding of 'obvious' is also way off. First of all, 'obvious' means 'plainly visible' and 'without thinking'. So if, prior to t
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Also, lots of things are obvious in hindsight. But didn't exist until someone had the foresight.
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Virtually all inventions are combinations of previously existing stuff. Was the sewing machine an 'invention'? According to your idiotic definition, no. Sewing was not new.
Well: You're making idiotic strawman arguments there. If a Sewing machine was merely a combination of existing inventions "Needle" plus "Camshaft", then It would absolutely not be an invention, But guess what... the sewing machine is Not merely a combination of those two things - The combination of a Needle plus some mechanism is o
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What, exactly, do you think the 'novel mechanisms' are in a sewing machine? They are arrangements of shafts, cams, and levers. None of that is new, yet nobody with half a brain would say that the sewing machine was not an invention.
Why the hell would that be the question? Because it is the only way you could make it seem 'obvious'?
Art Lebedev? (Score:4, Informative)
https://www.artlebedev.com/opt... [artlebedev.com]
That came out, like, a decade ago... Apple researching... hehehe
And, they'll be the first to claim they invented it...
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No you don't understand. The innovation here is the combination of the OLED screen with the frigging horrible garbage spring mechanisms of Apple keyboards. That makes it unique ... because it's actually an improvement over the Optimus Maximus. :-/
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That keyboard was crap as well: https://youtu.be/qj7GYU-wedo [youtu.be]
There are so many issues with this idea. For a start it compromises the key caps and the switches. It also tempts developers to screw with your keyboard, changing the function of keys you have decades of muscle memory for.
It might make some small amount of sense for F keys, but I'd still prefer a separate screen above them.
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https://www.artlebedev.com/optimus/maximus/
That came out, like, a decade ago... Apple researching... hehehe
And, they'll be the first to claim they invented it...
Or for that matter the first patent [google.com] for the idea, filed in 1996 and granted in 1998. Written so generically it covered practically any implementation. It has expired now.
Old Apple would have perfected it, or refused to release it if it couldn't be perfected. The Maximus had problems, from glare off the keycap covers to burn in of the OLEDs to crappy Cherry ML switches to oversized keys to unpredictable mild binding of the keycaps as they move down around the OLED screens. Not to mention the extraordinar
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Aren't they patenting the way to uncouple the display hardware from the actual keys? Have one or a couple of OLED screens generating the key graphics and then route the pixels to individual keys by fiber optics.
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The first word on your link says "Optimus Tactus does not have physical keys,"
The apple keyboard is physical keys with a fiber bundle leading back to an on-membrane OLED if I'm understanding right. Nothing in common at all other than both using OLED in some way with a keyboard.
Re:Yet another questionable patent (Score:5, Informative)
Having now watch a video on how the Optimus keyboard implemented displays within keys, the Apple method in this patent is actually quite a bit different. (Although the Apple patent references other patents that do the same damned thing, just not as a keyboard, I guess. It's not like "fiber optics can transmit light and create displays if arranged in an array" is a new idea.)
But basically: Optimus placed a display behind a clear keycap. You type pressing the clear keycap, and the display behind it doesn't move. Instead the entire keycap moves around the display.
Apple's version uses fiber optics to essentially embed the displays directly in the keycaps. Because they're part of the keycaps, Apple can allow the keycaps to curve (you know, like a regular keyboard does and Apple's keyboards - er, don't) without distorting the display, and the display moves along with the keycap. It's not a separate clear key built around a display, it's a display literally embedded within the actual keycap.
They're basically two different methods of accomplishing the same basic idea: a key with a variable display. So no, the Optimus keyboard wouldn't be prior art, because it does what it does in a different way.
Re: Yet another questionable patent (Score:4, Interesting)
You do not understand patent law.
Apple has not obtained a patent for displays on keys. Apple has obtained a patent for a specific implementation of displays on each key where the terminus of a fiber is embedded in the key while the other terminus of this fiber is connected to a circuit board that emits the light. This approach allows all the electronics to live on a single circuit board much like any other keyboard today.
Re: Art Lebedev? (Score:2)
It is, in fact, one its leadership principles : great artists steal.
In this case though nothing is being stolen because this patent isnâ(TM)t about little monitors on each key but rather how one would implement key displays.
TL;DR: (Score:4, Funny)
Apple sets out to break keyboards next.
Re: TL;DR: (Score:2)
Implying that Apple usees use keyboards ...
[Insert joke about Apple usees, in the style of "Water? You mean like from the toilet?".]
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Have you even tried any recent Apple keyboard? They are already broken!
They had to stop putting their "Butterfly" keyboards in MacBooks because they were too sensitive to dust and broke too easily. The replacement, the "Magic Keyboard" that had been used for stationary Macs have very little key travel.
The "Smart Keyboard" that was once Apple's only option for the iPad Pro is one of the worst keyboards I have even tried. Rubbery and the long keys are not even properly stabilised!
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They broke their keyboards 5 years ago. This is the first year since late 2015 where you could buy a Mac laptop with scissor switches.
Cool but Minimally Useful (Score:2)
This is something that if done right has a really high cool factor, but it isn't all that useful. For the most part, you don't want to be looking at your keyboard at all. The little bumps on the F and J to tell you that you have your hands in the right place is all you need. Where this comes in handy is the function keys, as they can now be labeled on a per-application basis, and changing as you press meta keys. This would be perfect for Word Perfect from the late 80s where everyone had a template taped
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If they do it with a color eInk display or something like that where it only uses power to change the label, then imagine your Roku remote (or similar) where one month you have a Netflix button, and the next month it changes to Hulu. Yuck. (Though in fairness, if you actually use the services that have the buttons, they're nice--too bad you can't reprogram or swap them out.)
Re: (Score:2)
It's not useful at all anymore. I don't want to look at my keyboard at all. Just put on an on-screen reminder of what which F-key does in which situation, so I don't have to look down at my hands. If you tell me F4 is X, then I know where to find F4...
Death knell to the usable interfaces. (Score:2)
Obligatory Snowclone (Score:2)
Optimus Maximus (Score:2)
I wonder if they licensed this from Optimus Maximus, or just stole the idea?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Buy it now (Score:2)
https://www.artlebedev.com/opt... [artlebedev.com]
Way to innovate, dipshits. (Score:2)
This from the company that didn't start putting lower case letters on its on-screen keyboard until, what, seven years after the first release of iOS?
For those who don't remember, the letters on the keyboard in older versions CHANGED COLOR instead of displaying proper case.
Hopefully they are making the keys out of Diamonds (Score:2)
Because the way a lot of people use their apple products, they wear out normal keyboards less than every two or so years.
Next stupid laptop I buy will at least have a backlighted keyboard. It's dark in the basement... /s
I bet this is about cost. (Score:2)
Like these keyboards? (Score:2)
Oh, like these keyboards?
https://www.oled-info.com/oled... [oled-info.com]
Re: (Score:2)
Elgato devices are not a picture-per-key though. They're a single, larger LCD (7in I do believe for one of their models) that just so happen to have entirely clear keys on top, that press into a touch-screen. Its a really ingenious yet stupid design at the same time, that have extremely high markup and marketing behind them to sell like hotcakes and print money/