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Showing posts with label screen. Show all posts
Showing posts with label screen. Show all posts

Sunday, April 5, 2009

Use A Touchscreen's Keypad Without Looking

                                

I've always thought that touchscreen phones were one of the greatest ideas ever thought of, but one thing every phone lacks, is the physical buttons.  Without actual buttons being there, it is impossible to type things without looking at the screen, like a person's phone number for instance.  Well people at Google have been working on an idea to solve that problem.  This idea started when they realized that there were many visually impaired people that used touchscreen phones everyday and that there needed to be more accessible controls towards them.  
So the concept is that wherever you touch the screen, it turns into a five.  Next just press/hold the screen and slide up for 2, or right for 6, or diagonal to 1 or 3, etc.  The phone will not only recognize the input, but also read out the number so you can make sure it's the correct number.  It sounds like a fairly easy thing to do for me and as long as you know the number keypad configuration you will be set (I'm sure everyone already knows it).  
I like how they are making sure that there phone can be used by anyone.  As far as I know Google is the only company working on concepts like this, but who knows Apple could be working on something like this behind closed doors.  I'm not sure if this feature will be coming out anytime soon, or if at all, but if it does I want to be one of the first to try it out.  Check out the video above to see it for yourself.


Thursday, March 26, 2009

One Of Mother Nature's Best Friends



The Samsung "Blue Earth" phone looks like your average touch screen phone from the front, but on the back is a solar panel! First thing I thought was how would you charge it if it's in your pocket most of the time and that's one thing about it. To use the solar panels on the back it needs to be facing down, in direct sunlight. The specs on how long it will take to charge is still unknown and still has no release date, but I assure you that it will be on the news for awhile when it does come out. An additional eco-friendly thing about the phone is that it is made up of recycled water bottles. I hope all phones are made this way in the future, just the thought of never having to worry about my phones battery gets my heart pumping. Sorry I can't go into more detail, but this phone is still in the making and I will create a new story as soon as it comes out (also I hope it is available for T-Mobile users)