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ACM User Interface Software and Technology Symposium (ACM UIST 2013)
FingerPad: Private and Subtle Interaction Using Fingertips
Liwei Chan1 Rong-Hao Liang1, 2 Ming-Chang Tsai2 Kai-Yin Cheng2 Chao-Huai Su2
Mike Y. Chen2 Wen-Huang Cheng1 Bing-Yu Chen2
1Academia Sinica
2National Taiwan University
liweichan@ntu.edu.tw

FingerPad enables touchpad function through pinch gesture. The user can (a) enter passwords to the private glass display (b) by drawing numbers with the thumb tip on the index fingertip. (c) The proposed technology is realized through magnetic tracking by adding a magnet and Hall sensor grid on the fingernails.
We present FingerPad, a nail-mounted device that turns the tip of the index finger into a touchpad, allowing private and subtle interaction while on the move. FingerPad enables touch input using magnetic tracking, by adding a Hall sen- sor grid on the index fingernail, and a magnet on the thumb- nail. Since it permits input through the pinch gesture, Fin- gerPad is suitable for private use because the movements of the fingers in a pinch are subtle and are naturally hidden by the hand. Functionally, FingerPad resembles a touchpad, and also allows for eyes-free use. Additionally, since the nec- essary devices are attached to the nails, FingerPad preserves natural haptic feedback without affecting the native function of the fingertips. Through user study, we analyze the three de- sign factors, namely posture, commitment method and target size, to assess the design of the FingerPad. Though the results show some trade-off among the factors, generally participants achieve 93% accuracy for very small targets (1.2mm-width) in the seated condition, and 92% accuracy for 2.5mm-width targets in the walking condition.
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BibTex
@inproceedings{Chan:2013:FPS:2501988.2502016, author = {Chan, Liwei and Liang, Rong-Hao and Tsai, Ming-Chang and Cheng, Kai-Yin and Su, Chao-Huai and Chen, Mike Y. and Cheng, Wen-Huang and Chen, Bing-Yu}, title = {FingerPad: Private and Subtle Interaction Using Fingertips}, booktitle = {Proceedings of the 26th Annual ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology}, series = {UIST '13}, year = {2013}, isbn = {978-1-4503-2268-3}, location = {St. Andrews, Scotland, United Kingdom}, pages = {255--260}, numpages = {6}, url = {http://doi.acm.org/10.1145/2501988.2502016}, doi = {10.1145/2501988.2502016}, acmid = {2502016}, publisher = {ACM}, address = {New York, NY, USA}, keywords = {eyes-free interaction, finger-mounted device, instant-available, nail device, private input, subtle interaction}, }