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Re: $20 key-glove

From: "R. Paul McCarty" <rpmc@troi.cc.rochester.edu>
Date: Mon Jun 22 14:41:53 1998
Newsgroups: comp.sys.wearables

legacy@ieighty.net wrote:
> 
> One thing I've also been thining about it using something like the Nintendo
> Powerglove.

Isn't this just a joystick style input? i.e. it only encodes a small
number of inputs; up, down, left, right, etc.? I've seen the gloves but
I've never used one, or looked at it too closely; how does it sense the
hand position?

> Another wierd idea (yes, i do have a lot of free time.. I'm a network tech)
> is something similar.  Its hard to describe, but it involves running lines
> down the back of the fingers (like tendons), and have them hooked up to some
> sort of spreing loaded contacts.  So when you curl your index finger you get
> an 'L' or something.  If you were to wire one up, perhaps even one on each
> hand, you could have the same idea as a 'twiddler', but you wouldn't actually
> be holding anything in your hand.  I actually tried something like this a few
> years ago in HS.  I hooked to fingers up to two potentiometers, and my
> curling or extening my fingers I could control things like the dimmer for my
> desk lamp or the volume of my stereo.

I'm not sure by your description, but are these on/off switches or
variable resistance? A beter approach would be some sort of variable
resistance, so the more you curled your finger you would get less/more
resistance and you could measure the resistance and convert it into
multiple signals so you would get say 'a' with a little curl, 'b' with a
bit more, 'c' with a bunch, and 'd' when your finger is curled up so it
touches your palm.  Then add sensing the finger move the other
directions.  Aren't there pizoelectic materials that generate current
when they are stretched? Maybe you could just make a whole form fitting
glove with contacts scattered throughout and measure currents between
contacts and convert them into characters for each.

-Paul

-- 
R. Paul McCarty / DARS Coordinator / rpmc@troi.cc.rochester.edu / x52059
317 Lattimore Hall, University of Rochester, Rochester, NY 14627
Computers don't make errors; what they do, they do on purpose.-Dale/KOTH

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