The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Aug. 05, 2003
Filed:
Oct. 07, 1999
Newton James Smith, Jr., Austin, TX (US);
James Patrick Bowman, Austin, TX (US);
Herman Rodriguez, Austin, TX (US);
International Business Machines Corp., Armonk, NY (US);
Abstract
A keyboard that may be utilized as a pointing device for disabled users is presented. The keyboard has one or more large buttons that allows the keyboard to be toggled between two different states. The first state corresponds to using the keyboard as a pointing device. A movement sensor is activated that may detect movement of the keyboard. The detected movement of the keyboard is then used by a computer system to control the movement of a cursor about a display screen. Additionally, one or more keys on the keyboard are grouped together to form compound keys that correspond to the pointing device buttons. The second state of the keyboard corresponds to that of standard keyboard operation in which a user may utilize the keyboard to type in letters, numbers, and commands in the typical fashion.