Would it be possible to have a physical keyboard on a smartphone while keeping the touchscreen intact? The Future Interfaces Group (FIG) from Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) seems to think so as the researchers recently demonstrated such a keyboard can exist via inflatable buttons on an OLED screen.
This type of technology is called Flat Panel Haptics and has been in the works at CMU for the past 15 years (opens in new tab). The new breakthrough is that FIG has been able to develop a Flat Panel Haptics board five millimeters thick by developing an Embedded Electro-Osmotic Pump or EEOPs. According to the demo video (opens in new tab), the EEOPs can manipulate a special pumping fluid by running an electrical current through it. The pumps sit between a reservoir of this fluid on the bottom and a flexible surface on top. Running electricity through the stack allows the pumps to inflate a rigid button on top up to five millimeters in height.
FIG published an accompanying paper (opens in new tab) explaining this tech in detail and revealing that the group used soft silicone as the top layer in the initial prototypes. While current AMOLED screens aren’t as flexible as that silicone, they're apparently flexible enough to accommodate transforming portions of the screen into a full-fledged QWERTY keyboard. The buttons “can reveal [themselves] when needed and sink back when [they’re] not.” FIG was also able to repurpose the EEOPs for other things like pumping an app icon in and out whenever you have pending notifications. Large buttons can be created, too, for the Snooze bar on alarms. They, too, can be animated or stay “inflated until pressed.”
Real-world applications
An inflatable keyboard isn't just cool, it could have real-world applications. First, it can help blind people use the best phones better as the keyboard can provide a physical indicator for on-screen content alongside help from AI assistants like Siri (although Siri is falling behind). Plus, the tactile feedback may lead to more immersive mobile gaming as players can receive physical feedback through the buttons. Digital controls don't hold a candle to something physical, speaking from experience.
But will phone companies be interested in inflatable buttons? It's hard to say. All the way back in 2008, there was the BlackBerry Storm which had its touchscreen double as a physical button. This feature was widely panned in initial reviews as it made writing texts way more difficult than it needed to be. Since then, phone manufacturers have avoided like the plague physical buttons on touchscreens, but FIG’s Flat Panel Haptics could change that attitude. Devices would have a full keyboard instead of one big button.
There’s still plenty of work to do for FIG as you can imagine. In the paper, the researchers recognize several limitations like the shaky durability of these buttons and how much power it would take to run everything. Plus, it would make phones more bulky so perhaps tablets are a better fit. We'll just have to wait and see.
Speaking of tablets, check out TechRadar’s latest roundup of the best iPad deals for April 2023.
English
Arabic
Belarusian
Bengali
Bosnian
Bulgarian
Chinese (Simplified)
Croatian
Czech
Danish
Dutch
Estonian
Filipino
Finnish
French
Georgian
German
Greek
Gujarati
Hausa
Hebrew
Hindi
Hmong
Hungarian
Igbo
Indonesian
Italian
Japanese
Javanese
Kazakh
Korean
Kurdish (Kurmanji)
Kyrgyz
Lao
Latvian
Lithuanian
Macedonian
Malagasy
Norwegian
Persian
Polish
Portuguese
Punjabi
Romanian
Russian
Serbian
Slovak
Slovenian
Spanish
Swedish
Thai
Turkish
Ukrainian
Vietnamese
Yoruba