Saw this touchpad prototype news:

http://www.hackaday.com/2008/07/31/u...uch-prototype/

Made me think about that on the *back* of the device. You could move the mouse pointer around with it and press harder to get the click.

But then I was thinking, I'd like to have some buttons on the back, say for scrolling the windows. To me, it would be more natural, while holding, to access and couple of buttons for scrolling on the back of the device rather than on the front, or messing with scroll bars.

Just thinking

hmm, buttons on the back. sounds like the elonex one, or whatever its original name is...

anyways, interesting development. now, can this work with eink displays? say having this as the keyboard area of a laptop? maybe with some way to put bumps and ridges on it? i think both nokia and apple have some patent applications in for that sort of stuff...

Not entirely related to that technology specifically, but I toyed with the idea a few months ago of installing a Phidgets touch interface on the backpanel of my N800; at the time although I had the software running and things the biggest disadvantage was that the USB connector with adapter and things was too annoying to have sticking out a few inches on the side of the device, but I may revisit the idea soon as I've got a new solution to the USB problem that might end up making a very slick little "addon" device...

The original idea though anyways was to have a simple touch sensor that you could through software use to do any number of things such as act as mouse buttons, move the cursor (though this ties into the mouse support problem), or most importantly just scroll/tab around simply by pressing or moving your fingers over the back panel of the device. The only catches with the phidgets stuff is that A) I'm not sure what effect it would have on the battery life of the device and B) they're not based on pressure sensors, but rather proximity sensors, so you couldn't do things like press harder to double click/etc... but it's still an interesting starting point and a lot more viable/practical/cost effective than trying to build a true touch film layer and controller in...

-Rob

wouldn't this be even easier?

http://www.ergonomictouchpad.com/ergonomic_touchpad.php

It's very tiny and thin, hooks up to usb.

Now that's pretty interesting, I'll have to get one and see how well it works; the only catch is that if it's acting like HID device then we're going to run into all those blummen mouse support problems to tackle again... and that 6' cord will have to go of course ;o)

-Rob