DE-102012010966-B4 - Use of a device as an input device for touch-sensitive, capacitive displays

Abstract

Use of an input device for capacitive, touch-sensitive displays, wherein the device is a simple pen, the simple pen being designed to be sharpened, characterized by that the device is in the form of a mine with a coating, or that the device is a mine with a casing, or that the device has a mine, a casing and a coating, that the mine, the casing and/or the coating is/are electrically conductive and that there is no direct contact or immediate electrically conductive transition or contact between the conductive lead, casing and/or coating and the hand of a user.

Inventors

• Rilke Dix

Assignees

• STAEDTLER SE

Dates

Publication Date

20260513

Application Date

20120529

Claims (7)

1. Use of a device as an input device (1) for capacitive, touch-sensitive displays, wherein the device (1) is a simple pen, wherein the simple pen is designed to be sharpened, characterized in that the device (1) is in the form of a lead (112) with a coating (118), or that the device (1) is in the form of a lead (112) with a covering (113), or that the device (1) has a lead (112), a covering (113) and a coating (118), that the lead (112), the covering (113) and/or the coating (118) is electrically conductive and that there is no direct contact with an immediate electrically conductive transition between the conductive lead (112), covering (113) and/or coating (118), and the hand of a user.
2. Using a device after Claim 1 characterized in that the covering is made of plastic and/or wood substitute, such as WPC.
3. Using a device after Claim 1 characterized in that the lead is designed as a lead, a paint, a cosmetic or an eraser lead.
4. Using a device after Claim 1 , 2 and 3 characterized in that the mine, the casing and/or the coating contain conductive components or additives and that the additives as graphite, carbon fiber, conductive carbon black, metal fibers, carbon nano tubes, copper pigments, silver-plated copper pigments and/or silver powder.
5. Using a device after Claim 4 characterized in that the mine, the casing and/or the coating contain antistatic agents as an additive.
6. Using a device after Claim 4 characterized in that the conductive coating is present as a paint layer or as a film layer.
7. Using a device according to one of the Claims 1 until 6 , for capacitive, touch-sensitive displays of tablet computers or smartphones.

Description

The invention relates to the use of a device as an input device for so-called capacitive, touch-sensitive displays, according to the preamble of claim 1. Input devices for such displays are generally known. For example, input styluses are known which consist of an electrically conductive shaft, with a soft, conductive, elastically designed contact plug for the display or the surface of the display at one end. A disadvantage of such styluses is that they are too expensive as a pure input stylus and also do not fulfill any writing or command function. Furthermore, there are styluses which have a writing organ or applicator at one end and an electrically conductive arrangement in the form of a contact plug at the other end, which enables or triggers an input function when touching the capacitive display. However, the well-known styluses listed above have a number of disadvantages. These types of styluses are therefore expensive to manufacture. Almost all of these state-of-the-art styluses are ballpoint pens, which severely limits the user's choice. Furthermore, simple pens or leads are known from the state of the art, the purpose of which lies exclusively in the area of writing, drawing and/or painting. Simple pencils consist of leads with casings made of wood or wood substitutes. Such simple pencils may also have a surface coating, as is the case, for example, with... DE 20 2008 009 751 U1 , DE-AS 2 203 635 and AT 412 627 B is known. As an example of mines that are coated with a surface layer, consider the DE 10 2005 004 176 A1 listed below. Further, from GB 418,502 Simple writing pencils are known to consist of a lead and a metal casing to prevent lead breakage. The object of the invention is therefore to provide a device as an input device for use with capacitive, touch-sensitive displays that does not have the aforementioned disadvantages and is, in fact, very inexpensive to manufacture. Furthermore, it is an object of the invention that the input device remains available to the user in the usual manner as a fully functional writing, drawing, painting, or cosmetic device and does not have any additional elements for triggering an input function. This problem is solved by the features according to claim 1. The input device for use on displays is a simple, sharpenable writing, drawing, painting, cosmetic or erasing device, wherein the sharpenable device consists of at least one lead for creating smears or one lead for removing smears. The devices covered by this regulation can include, for example, a solid mechanical pencil or a lead encased in wood, plastic, and/or wood-plastic composite (WPC). The lead itself can be made of lead, colored lead, cosmetic lead, or eraser lead. Furthermore, it is irrelevant whether the solid lead pencil or the coated lead has an additional coating or alternative decorative top layer, for example in the form of a foil. It has been surprisingly shown that such a simply constructed and inexpensive device can be used as an input device if the mine material and/or the mine casing and/or the coating of the pointable device is/are designed to be conductive by adding conductive components or additives to the mine, the mine casing and/or coating. Sharpenable devices – as described above – include devices which can be sharpened or re-sharpened by the user with a commercially available sharpener, hand sharpener or other sharpening device to maintain their usability. In devices whose mine is encased in a wood substitute, the wood substitute can be made of plastic or so-called WPC (wood-plastic composite). Such devices, encasements, or components for the encasements are manufactured using extrusion, co-extrusion, or injection molding processes. The device can also have a non-marking lead. The lead can be, for example, an eraser lead, which can be a solid lead eraser pencil or a lead/strand with a casing, also known as an eraser pencil. In this case, too, the eraser material and/or the casing is mixed with substances/additives—as already mentioned—giving the eraser material conductive properties. The use of an eraser lead also has the advantage that the eraser material leaves no residue on the display when it comes into contact with it. Comfortable, smooth contact with the display is possible because the eraser material is soft and flexible. As stated, the mine and/or mine casing and/or coating must be designed to be conductive, as exemplified below. It should be noted that with the pen according to the invention, an input function can be triggered both with the tip and with the end opposite the tip. If an input function is to be triggered with the tip, the lead must be conductive, since only it touches the display. In this way, a pinpoint-precise input function is enabled. A lubricating coating may be applied to the side of the input device opposite the tip, allowing it to glide smoothly across the display. This coating may be conductive, but it doesn't have to be. In the case of conductiv