[edit] Ergonomics and usage

[edit] Finger stress

An ergonomic problem of touchscreens is their stress on human fingers when used for
more than a few minutes at a time, since significant pressure can be required and the
screen is non-flexible. This can be alleviated with the use of a pen or other device to add
leverage, but the introduction of such items can sometimes be problematic depending on
the desired use case (for example, public kiosks such as ATMs). Also, fine motor control
is better achieved with a stylus, a finger being a rather broad and ambiguous point of
contact with the screen.

[edit] Fingernail as stylus

These ergonomic issues of direct touch can be bypassed by using a different technique,
provided that the user's fingernails are either short or sufficiently long. Rather than
pressing with the soft skin of an outstretched fingertip, the finger is curled over, so that
the top of the forward edge of a fingernail can be used instead. (The thumb is optionally
used to provide support for the finger or for a long fingernail, from underneath.)

The fingernail's hard, curved surface contacts the touchscreen at a single very small point.
Therefore, much less finger pressure is needed, much greater precision is possible
(approaching that of a stylus, with a little experience), much less skin oil is smeared onto
the screen, and the fingernail can be silently moved across the screen with very little
resistance, allowing for selecting text, moving windows, or drawing lines.

The human fingernail consists of keratin which has a hardness and smoothness similar to
the tip of a stylus (and so will not typically scratch a touchscreen). Alternately, very short
stylus tips are available, which slip right onto the end of a finger; this increases visibility
of the contact point with the screen. Oddly, with capacitive touchscreens, the reverse
problem applies in that individuals with long nails have reported problems getting
adequate skin contact with the screen to register keystrokes (note that ordinary styli do
not work on capacitive touchscreens nor do gloved fingers).

The concept of using a fingernail trimmed to form a point, to be specifically used as a

stylus on a writing tablet for communication, appeared in the 1950 science fiction short
story Scanners Live in Vain.

[edit] Fingerprints

Touch screens also suffer from the problem of fingerprints on the display. This can be
mitigated by the use of materials with optical coatings designed to reduced the visible
effects of fingerprint oils.

[edit] "Gorilla arm"

Gorilla arm was a side-effect that destroyed vertically-oriented touch-screens as a
mainstream input technology despite a promising start in the early 1980s.[8]

Designers of touch-menu systems failed to notice that humans are not designed to hold
their arms in front of their faces making small motions. After more than a very few
selections, the arm begins to feel sore, cramped, and oversized -- the operator looks like a
gorilla while using the touch screen and feels like one afterwards. This is now considered
a classic cautionary tale to human-factors designers; "Remember the gorilla arm!" is
shorthand for "How is this going to fly in real use?".

Gorilla arm is not a problem for specialist short-term-use devices such as ATMs, since
they only involve brief interactions which are not long enough to cause gorilla arm.

Gorilla arm also can be mitigated by the use of horizontally-mounted screens such as
those used in Tablet PCs, but these then have the problem that the user's need to rest their
hands on the device increases the amount of dirt deposited on the screen, and occludes
the user's view of the screen.

HOW DOES TOUCH SCREEN WORKS ?

Touchscreens, touch screens, touch panels or touchscreen panels are display overlays
which are typically either pressure-sensitive (resistive), electrically-sensitive (capacitive),
acoustically-sensitive (SAW - surface acoustic wave) or photo-sensitive (infra-red). The
effect of such overlays allows a display to be used as an input device, removing the
keyboard and/or the mouse as the primary input device for interacting with the display's
content. Such displays can be attached to computers or, as terminals, to networks.

Applications

The Nintendo DS uses a touchscreen as a primary controlling deviceTouchscreens have

become commonplace since the invention of the electronic touch interface in 1971 by Dr.
Samuel C. Hurst. They have become familiar in retail settings, on point of sale systems,
on ATMs and on PDAs where a stylus is sometimes used to manipulate the GUI and to
enter data. The popularity of smart phones, PDAs, portable game consoles and many
types of information appliances is driving the demand for, and the acceptance of,
touchscreens.

The HP-150 was among one of the world's earliest commercialized touch screen
computers. It actually does not have a touch screen in the strict sense, but a 9" Sony CRT
surrounded by infrared transmitters and receivers which detect the position of any non-
transparent object on the screen.

Touchscreens are popular in heavy industry and in other situations, such as museum
displays or room automation, where keyboards and mice do not allow a satisfactory,
intuitive, rapid, or accurate interaction by the user with the display's content.

Historically, the touchscreen sensor and its accompanying controller-based firmware

have been made available by a wide array of after-market system integrators and not by
display, chip or motherboard manufacturers. With time, however, display manufacturers
and System On Chip (SOC) manufacturers worldwide have acknowledged the trend
toward acceptance of touchscreens as a highly desirable user interface component and
have begun to integrate touchscreen functionality into the fundamental design of their
products.

There are a number of types of touch screen technology:

Resistive: A resistive touch screen panel is coated with a thin metallic electrically
conductive and resistive layer that causes a change in the electrical current which is
registered as a touch event and sent to the controller for processing. Some resistive panels
can estimate the area (and hence the pressure) of a touch based on calculations from the
resistances. Resistive touch screen panels are generally more affordable but offer only
75% clarity and the layer can be damaged by sharp objects. Resistive touch screen panels
are not affected by outside elements such as dust or water and are the most commonly
used today.

Surface wave: Surface wave technology uses ultrasonic waves that pass over the touch
screen panel. When the panel is touched, a portion of the wave is absorbed. This change
in the ultrasonic waves registers the position of the touch event and sends this
information to the controller for processing. Surface wave touch screen panels can be
damaged by outside elements. Contaminants on the surface can also interfere with the
functionality of the touchscreen.

Capacitive: A capacitive touch screen panel is coated with a material, typically indium tin
oxide that conducts a continuous electrical current across the sensor. The sensor therefore
exhibits a precisely controlled field of stored electrons in both the horizontal and vertical
axes - it achieves capacitance. The human body is also an electrical device which has
stored electrons and therefore also exhibits capacitance. When the sensor's 'normal'
capacitance field (its reference state) is altered by another capacitance field, i.e.,
someone's finger, electronic circuits located at each corner of the panel measure the
resultant 'distortion' in the sine wave characteristics of the reference field and send the
information about the event to the controller for mathematical processing. Capacitive
sensors must be touched with a conductive device being held by a bare hand or a finger,
unlike resistive and surface wave panels that can use anything that can point, such as a
finger or stylus. Capacitive touch screens are not affected by outside elements and have
high clarity.

Infrared: An infrared touch screen panel employs one of two very different
methodologies. One method used thermal induced changes of the surface resistance. This
method was sometimes slow and required warm hands. Another method is an array of
vertical and horizontal IR sensors that detected the interruption of a modulated light beam
near the surface of the screen.

Strain Gauge: In a strain gauge configuration the screen is spring mounted on the four
corners and strain gauges are used to determine deflection when the screen is touched.
This technology can also measure the Z-axis. Typical application falls in protecting new
touch-screen railway ticket machines from vandalism.

Optical Imaging: A relatively-modern development in touch screen technology, two or

more image sensors are placed around the edges (usually the corners) of the screen.
Infrared backlights are placed in the camera's field of view on the other sides of the
screen. A touch shows up as a shadow and each pair of cameras can then be triangulated
to locate the touch. This technology is growing in popularity, due to its scalability,
versatility, and affordability, especially for larger units.

Dispersive Signal Technology: This is the newest technology, introduced in 2002. It uses
sensors to detect the mechanical energy in the glass that occur due to a touch. Complex
algorithms then interpret this information and provide the actual location of the touch.
The technology claims to be unaffected by dust and other outside elements, including
scratches. Since there is no need for additional elements on screen, it also claims to
provide excellent optical clarity. Also, since mechanical vibrations are used to detect a
touch event, any object can be used to generate these events, including fingers and
styluses. The technology is still quite new and is not currently widely available.

[edit]
Touchscreen deployment
Virtually all of the significant touchscreen technology patents were filed during the
1970's and 1980's and have expired. Touchscreen component manufacturing and product
design are no longer encumbered by royalties or legalities with regard to patents and the
manufacturing of touchscreen-enabled displays on all kinds of devices is widespread.

With the growing acceptance of many kinds of products with an integral touchscreen
interface the marginal cost of touchscreen technology is routinely absorbed into the
products that incorporate it and is effectively eliminated. As typically occurs with any
technology, touchscreen hardware and software, has sufficiently matured and been
perfected over more than three decades to the point where its reliability is unassailable.
As such, touchscreen displays are found today in airplanes, automobiles, gaming
consoles, machine control systems, appliances and handheld display devices of every
kind.

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Will the touch screen work with any software ?

August 31, 2008 Contact UsHome Page

 FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
Commonly asked questions about APG, MMF, Logic Controls and cash drawers in
general
•
o 12.1" Soloist Touch screens in general
II
o 15.1" Soloist Commonly asked questions about the Sheba, Cimple, and Crusader Computers
o 15.1" Soloist Commonly asked questions & troubleshooting of LCD monitors
II
o Tek- Commonly asked questions about ELO Touch Screens
795/797/79 Miscellaneous
9
o 17.1" MM Tek-465
Soloist
o Tek-875/877 Tek-365

•
o Tek-465
o Tek-365 Commonly asked questions about APG, MMF, Logic Controls and cash
drawers in general
• Q. I have a cash drawer with a 12 (24) volt solenoid and a phone jack connector on
o Vaya II the end of the cable. How does this connect to my point of sale system?
o Nomad
TabletPC A. The solenoid driven electronic cash drawers are individually and specifically
o Origami configured for a receipt printer interface. They are non-intelligent drawers,
UMPC totally dependent upon the printer to "pop" them open when a receipt is printed.

Q. Are Logic Controls cash drawers programmable?

•
o 12.1" A. The cash drawers are "programmable" in two ways. (1) Signal Protocol. (2)
Slimage Security Code. If your cash drawer is hooked up via the COM port, you have
o 13.3"
two options. The first option allows you to change the security code to any ONE
Slimage
o 14.1" of the 255 ASCII characters. The second option allows you to have the cash
Slimage drawer open up with ANY character sent to it.
o 15.1"
Slimage If your cash drawer is hooked up with parallel interface, you also have the
o 17.1"
option to change the security code to any ONE of the 255 ASCII characters.
Slimage
o 19.1" Parallel connection does not have option to let ANY character to open the
Slimage drawer.
o 15.1"
Slimage 714 Q. Can I change the baud rate setting for the cash drawer?
A. Yes, for CR3001, the baud rate is user selectable via DIP switches located inside
• the cash drawer. The default baud rate setting for CR3001 is 9600 bps, no
o Sprite parity, 8 data bits, 1 stop bit. The baud rate is selectable from 150 bps up to
19.2K bps. The data bits are selectable between 7 and 8 bits string.
•
o Thermal For CR3002, the drawer is able to work with baud rates from 150 bps up to
printer 19.2K bps automatically. No setting is necessary.
o Table Mount
o Wall Mount Q. Can I order additional replacement keys for my cash drawer?
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