If the work of a few U of T computer science researchers bears fruit, click-able graphics may soon be available that can respond not just to a click, but to the amount of pressure that you apply when you click.
Ph.D. candidate Gonzalo Ramos and his associates are hoping to accomplish this through work with pressure widgets, electronic input devices that send commands through pressure. Most of us have seen simple forms of pressure widgets in mobile devices such as pocket PCs and palm pilots. Touch-screens, for example, operate by detecting pressure. But in these instruments, pressure is used in a very simple fashion. The screen only registers the presence or absence of pressure; there is no difference in the response of the gadget to the amount of pressure that you apply.
There are some devices available that use pressure widgets in a more sophisticated way, such as graphics tablets. Visual artists can use a pressure widget, in the form of a pen, in the same way that they might use a brush. They can vary features like line width and opacity by changing how hard they press down with the pen. But there are very few gadgets out there that use pressure in this way.
Ramos is hoping to change all that by developing pressure widgets that can respond to varying levels of pressure. He hopes that his widgets could be used to improve touch-screen current software, and that his work will hopefully lead to more complex and useful gadgets in the future.
He presented his findings recently at a conference in Vienna. As Ramos explains, “The first work we did in pressure widgets is a bit abstract in the sense that instead of investigating the potential applications, we tried to answer questions more concerned with human performance.” They found in their preliminary study that most people can readily identify six discrete levels of pressure, but only if they receive appropriate visual feedback.
The researchers also looked at different ways that users could perform a selection. While current pens for touch screens often have a click-able button on the side, the button is pretty much useless when working with pressure-sensitive devices. Whenever the user tries to click on the side of the pen at the same time as the press down with the pen, the pressure fluctuates rapidly. Ramos explains how difficult it is to click and maintain steady pressure at the same time: “By pressing, your whole hand moves, and by moving it interferes with the amount of pressure you apply.”
Users would need to spend some time learning how to use Ramos’s pressure widgets, but that shouldn’t pose a serious problem as every input device currently available requires that you spend some time mastering it. However, the study of these kinds of pressure widgets is still early in its development, and they probably won’t be widely available for some time.
