Patent applications are interesting in a sense that we sort of find out what our favorite brands are supposedly working on for future products. Not all of them of course result in commercially viable features or products, but it’s still a good way to look at what they’re interested in developing. A patent application by Samsung from last year and now published show that they may be looking at different ways of executing a pressure sensitive display, including the ability to squeeze your phone.
The patent application was actually filed back in April 2017 in South Korea and the title is Electronic Device And Method Of Controlling the Electronic Device Based On Touch Input. There are several implementations described in the patent. In fact, one of them is already something that we’re seeing in the Galaxy S8 and Galaxy S9 series. This is the virtual, pressure sensitive home key.
This may mean that the other ways indicated in the patent application may actually be implemented in future products that they will release. It says that different levels of pressure will be able to trigger different actions. It goes on to describe how pressure on both edges of a display or squeezing it will be detected by the device and a subsequent action can be implemented if you squeeze hard enough.
We’ve seen squeezable devices before like HTC’s U11. But what makes this different is that you don’t actually squeeze the frame but only the screen. This can work if Samsung maintains the bent dual-edge display of their flagship devices. There is also a possible pressure sensitive key and depending on how hard you press, an action will be triggered.
Again, despite this being an actual patent application, it doesn’t always mean we’ll see in future Galaxy smartphones. But it would be interesting if they will be able to actually do this and the possibilities of implementation with volume keys, virtual buttons, etc, are endless.
VIA: SAM Mobile
