Tap On, Tap Off — The Tapper
from the as-seen-on-TV dept
Instead of moving things around on a vibrating table using calculated oscillations, how about turning almost any surface into a touch-sensitive interface by measuring vibrations and back-calculating the location of where they originated. By using time-reversal techniques, sounds and vibrations that are picked up by a few sensors can detect, for instance, where someone is tapping on a desktop. This could be used for such applications as switching on/off different devices (watch out, Clapper!). Similar techniques, using several well-placed microphones, could detect where a sniper is shooting from. The computation to do these tasks in real-time is still a bit beyond practical. At the same time, the accuracy (and filtering out interfering sounds) probably needs to be improved, but the technique certainly could eventually be applied to a lot of interesting applications.
Comments on “Tap On, Tap Off — The Tapper”
Wax On Wax Off Daniel-san
What about the same technique in reverse, which takes advantage of well-placed vibrations that harmonize into a giant rogue wave? Then sky scrapers, bridges, and highway overpasses can be brought down with a few well-placed speakers by scr1pt k1dd3s.
As it is, rogue waves can happen spontaneously at sea, if waves overlap the right way.
http://www.enviroliteracy.org/article.php/257.html
Re: Wax On Wax Off Daniel-san
As the link says, supertankers can be brought down at sea, based on a sensitive dependence on initial conditions — if it can be computed, tossing a few tennis balls into the ocean at the right places can cause tsunamis that will bury cities.
Already patented
If I’m not mistaken this was patented some years ago. Certainly there is a touch screen technique that relies on this technology.
Re: Already patented
So this is basically “Touch” without the “Screen” – a step backwards
Where’s the tactile response? Oh yeah, no one wants that anymore, that’s why “Touch Screens” have taken over the world – Not!
Finding snipers
As far as locating snipers (gunshots), this system already exists.