14 DAY TRIAL // Apple’s Touch Bar that launched on the new-generation MacBook last year was received with mixed reactions, and while many people called it truly innovative, others considered it to be too little, too late for what was supposed to be a major product release.
In the last few years, Microsoft has become a leading name in terms of innovations, so just like its Cupertino rival, the company is looking into new ways to bring keyboards and display technologies together. And by the looks of things, the software giant has found a completely new way of doing it.
A patent spotted recently shows an e-paper cover that could be used on devices like the Microsoft Surface with several purposes, including a keyboard.
How this cover could work on a Surface
Since it’s based on e-paper tech, it can run a long series of tasks, so while it can be a keyboard and allow typing, the cover can also display other information, such as music artwork or movie information when the main display (the screen of the tablet) is being used for watching videos.
The description of the patent explains in detail how this new cover could work on a device like the Surface:
“The visually static user controls may comprise controls for a music / video player and the visually dynamic user controls may show thumbnails of album art (e.g. for the particular song or album or related / similar songs) or related videos. The visually dynamic user controls may in addition or alternatively comprise other, dynamic, controls for the music / video player such as a slider for scrolling through the track (where the visually static controls are the controls for stop, play, pause, skip, etc.).
“Similarly for gaming, the visually static user input controls may provide the standard user input functionality (e.g. left, right, jump) and the dynamic user input controls may provide user input functionality that is only available at certain points in the game or for which the visual representation changes frequently (e.g. where the control displays the number of lives or bullets that a user has left).”
Obviously, it’s just a patent for the time being, and this is no guarantee that Microsoft plans to push it to production, but on the other hand, it’s living proof that the company is fully committed to developing new technologies for its devices.