Patent Publication Number: US-2019179474-A1

Title: Control method, electronic device, and non-transitory computer readable recording medium

Description:
CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION 
     This application claims the priority benefit of Chinese application serial No. 201711328329.0, filed on Dec. 13, 2017. The entirety of the above-mentioned patent application is hereby incorporated by reference herein and made a part of specification. 
     BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 
     Field of the Invention 
     The present invention relates to an electronic device, and more particularly, to a dual-screen electronic device. 
     Description of the Related Art 
     Recently, Dual-screen is gradually and widely applied to various electronic products such as notebook computers to provide better user experience. A dual-screen electronic device often includes a main screen for output and another screen for touch operation. 
     BRIEF SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION 
     According to a first aspect, an electronic device is provided herein. The electronic device includes a display screen, a touch screen, and a processor. The touch screen is configured to output touch information in response to a touch behavior. The processor is electronically connected to the display screen and the touch screen, and configured to receive the touch information and determine whether the touch behavior relates to a user interface instruction or a trackpad operation instruction according to the touch information. When the processor determines that the touch behavior relates to the user interface instruction, the processor controls an application program that displayed on the display screen is in controlled by the processor according to the touch information. 
     According to a second aspect of the disclosure, a control method applied to an electronic device is provided herein. The electronic device includes a display screen and a touch screen. The control method includes the steps of: receiving touch information output by the touch screen in response to a touch behavior; determining whether the touch behavior relates to a user interface instruction or a trackpad operation instruction according to the touch information; and controlling an application program displayed on the display screen according to the touch information when the touch behavior relates to the user interface instruction. 
     According to a third aspect of the disclosure, a non-transitory computer readable recording medium is provided herein., The non-transitory computer readable recording medium records at least one program instruction that applied to an electronic device. The electronic device includes a display screen and a touch screen. The electronic device that loaded with the program instruction performs the following steps of: receiving touch information output by the touch screen in response to a touch behavior; determining whether the touch behavior relates to a user interface instruction or a trackpad operation instruction according to the touch information; and controlling an application program displayed on the display screen according to the touch information when the touch behavior relates to the user interface instruction. 
     In view of the above, in the present disclosure, data transmission is performed through firmware and drivers based on a standard transmission protocol, thereby accelerating a data transmission speed. A communications transmission protocol can be an Inter-Integrated Circuit (I2C) transmission protocol in an embodiment, but the present disclosure is not limited thereby. Furthermore, in the present disclosure, different touch information is respectively provided to corresponding interactive service modules or drivers to perform a subsequent operation, thereby simplifying a touch information transmission flow and enhancing a transmission speed. Intercommunication between a display screen and a touch screen can be realized only through one operating system. 
    
    
     
       BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS 
         FIG. 1  is a schematic diagram showing an electronic device according to some embodiments of the present disclosure. 
         FIG. 2  is a schematic diagram showing a data transmission architecture according to some embodiments of the present disclosure. 
         FIG. 3  is a flowchart showing a control method of an electronic device according to some embodiments of the present disclosure. 
         FIG. 4  is a schematic diagram showing an electronic device according to other embodiments of the present disclosure. 
         FIG. 5  is a flowchart showing a control method of an electronic device according to other embodiments of the present disclosure. 
     
    
    
     DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE EMBODIMENTS 
     The following describes the present disclosure in detail according to the embodiments and the accompanying drawings, so that the embodiments of the present disclosure can be more comprehensible. However, the embodiments provided herein are not intended to limit the scope of the present disclosure, and the description about structural operation is not intended to limit the performance sequence. Any structure formed by combining elements again and any device having equivalent effects all fall in the scope of the present disclosure. Furthermore, according to standards and common practices in industry, the drawings are only for auxiliary illustration and are not made according to original sizes. Actually, the sizes of various features can be enlarged or reduced randomly for convenient illustration. In the following illustration, same elements will be marked as same reference numbers, so as to be more comprehensible. 
     Referring to  FIG. 1 ,  FIG. 1  is a schematic diagram showing an electronic device  100  according to some embodiments of the present disclosure. In some embodiments, the electronic device  100  is a personal computer, a notebook computer, or a tablet computer having two screens. In an embodiment shown in  FIG. 1 , the electronic device  100  includes a display screen  120 , a touch screen  140 , and a processor  160 . The display screen  120  is configured to provide an image output interface required when an application program is executed. The touch screen  140  is configured to enable a user to perform various touch input operations. 
     In an embodiment, the touch screen  140  provides one part of area as a user interface area to display a user interface for a user to perform an operation, and provides the other part of area as a trackpad operation area that is used to control a cursor on the display screen  120  or support a multi-touch gesture of user operation. In other words, the touch screen  140  is configured to provide a user interface area and a trackpad operation area, and output touch information D 1  in response to a touch behavior of a user. 
     In specific, as shown in  FIG. 1 , in some embodiments, the touch screen  140  includes a touch information retrieval unit  142  and a bus controller unit  144  that are coupled to each other. When a user performs a touch behavior, the touch information retrieval unit  142  retrieves corresponding touch information D 1 . In an embodiment, the touch information D 1  includes coordinate information or strength information of the touch point. When performing a subsequent operation, the processor  160  determines a position and strength of a user touch according to the touch information D 1 , so as to perform a corresponding operation. 
     When retrieving corresponding touch information D 1 , the touch information retrieval unit  142  outputs the touch information D 1  to the processor  160  electronically connected with the touch screen  140  by a corresponding bus interface controlled by the bus controller unit  144 . In some embodiments, the bus controller unit  144  includes a communications transmission controller unit (for example, an Inter-Integrated Circuit (I2C) controller unit), so as to transmit the touch information D 1  through an I2C interface but is not limited thereby. In other embodiments, the touch screen  140  transmits the touch information D 1  through various wired or wireless communications interfaces such as a Universal Serial Bus (USB), a Wireless Universal Serial Bus (WUSB) or Bluetooth. 
     Structurally, the processor  160  is electronically connected with the display screen  120  and the touch screen  140 . The processor  160  receives touch information D 1  from the touch screen  140 , and determines whether the touch behavior of the user relates to a user interface instruction or a trackpad operation instruction according to the touch information D 1 . When the processor  160  determines the touch behavior of the user relates to the user interface instruction according to the touch information D 1 , an application program APP that displayed on the display screen is in controlled by the processor  160  according to the touch information D 1 . In some embodiments, the processor  160  includes a first driver module  162 , an interactive service module  164 , a second driver module  166 , and a display instruction processing unit U 3 . 
     The processor  160  executes the first driver module  162  to receive the touch information D 1  from the touch screen  140 , and determines whether the touch behavior of the user relates to a user interface instruction or a trackpad operation instruction according to the touch information D 1 . When the first driver module  162  determines that the touch behavior relates to the user interface instruction, the first driver module  162  provides corresponding instruction code D 2  to the interactive service module  164  according to the touch information D 1 . The processor  160  executes the interactive service module  164  to control an application program APP displayed on the display screen  120  and update an action interface displayed on the touch screen  140 . 
     In specific, the instruction code D 2  includes application program control information or a gesture instruction corresponding to the application program APP. The application program control information is used to control the corresponding application program APP to make the application program APP perform a corresponding operation, and the part of the gesture instruction will be described with reference to the accompanying drawings in subsequent embodiments. 
     In an embodiment, when the user clicks a button area marked as “Increase Brightness” on the touch screen  140 , the first driver module  162  determines that the touch behavior relates to the user interface instruction according to coordinate information or strength information in the touch information D 1 , and provides instruction code D 2  corresponding to “Increase Brightness” to the interactive service module  164 . The interactive service module  164  controls to increase of brightness of a frame of the application program APP displayed on the display screen  120 . In some embodiments, the instruction code D 2  can be set according to the touch strength, so that when the user touches the button area with more strength, adjustment of brightness of the frame is accelerated. 
     In some embodiments, the display instruction processing unit U 3  is electronically connected with the interactive service module  164  and touch information retrieval unit  142  of the touch screen  140 , and is configured to convert an interface display instruction Cmd 2  output by the interactive service module  164  into a display instruction Cmd 3  that can be received by the touch screen  140 , so as to control the touch screen  140  to display a user interface. 
     It should be noted that, the aforementioned operation is only exemplary, and is not used to limit the present disclosure. User interface instructions can be various different instructions, and designed according to requirements of different application programs APP. In an embodiment, when the application program APP is a video and audio playback program, the corresponding user interface instructions include relevant instructions about video and audio playback, such as fast forward or rewind. In another aspect, when the application program APP is a document processing program, the corresponding user interface instructions include document editing instructions of adjusting a font, a font size, and a color. 
     As shown in the figures, the first driver module  162  includes a touch behavior determining unit U 1  and a user interface setting unit U 2 . The touch behavior determining unit U 1  is coupled to the user interface setting unit U 2 , and is configured to determine whether the touch behavior relates to a user interface instruction or a trackpad operation instruction according to the touch information D 1  and the user interface layout information in the user interface setting unit U 2 . 
     In an embodiment, the user interface setting unit U 2  stores user interface layout information, the user interface layout information includes information such as the area in which part of the touch screen  140  serves as the user interface area, the area in which part serves as the trackpad operation area, and whose user interface instructions respectively corresponding to each coordinate range of the user interface area. In some embodiments, the setting of the user interface setting unit U 2  can be dynamically adjusted according to operation states of different application programs APP. 
     As shown in  FIG. 1 , the interactive service module  164  outputs an interface setting instruction Cmd 1  to the user interface setting unit U 2 . The user interface setting unit U 2  records and transmits user interface layout information corresponding to the interface setting instruction Cmd 1  to the touch behavior determining unit U 1 , so that the touch behavior determining unit U 1  knows a current user interface layout. 
     Thus, the touch behavior determining unit U 1  compares the coordinate information or strength information of the touch information D 1  with user interface layout information received from the user interface setting unit U 2 , so as to determine a touch behavior. When the touch behavior determining unit U 1  determines that the touch behavior relates to a user interface instruction, the first driver module  162  provides corresponding instruction code D 2  to the interactive service module  164  by the touch behavior determining unit U 1 . The processor  160  performs the interactive service module  164 , so as to perform relevant operations on the application program APP. 
     In another aspect, when the touch behavior determining unit U 1  determines that the touch behavior relates to a trackpad operation instruction, the first driver module  162  provides trackpad operation data D 3  corresponding to the touch information D 1  to the second driver module  166  by the touch behavior determining unit U 1 . The processor  160  performs the second driver module  166  to perform relevant system operation and control. In an embodiment, the second driver module  166  includes an inbox driver of an operating system, for example, a Windows precision touchpad driver. 
     According to the aforementioned operations, the first driver module  162  selectively outputs instruction code D 2  to the interactive service module  164  or outputs trackpad operation data D 3  to the second driver module  166  according to different touch information D 1 . 
     Referring to  FIG. 2 ,  FIG. 2  is a schematic diagram showing a data transmission architecture  200  according to some embodiments of the present disclosure. Elements in  FIG. 2  that are similar to those in the embodiment in  FIG. 1  are marked with same reference numbers, so as to be more comprehensible, the specific principle of the similar elements has been described in detail in preceding paragraphs, and elements will not be introduced if they have no cooperative operation relationship with the elements in  FIG. 2 . 
     As described in the preceding paragraphs, in some embodiments, the touch screen  140  and the processor  160  perform two-way data communication via a communications transmission interface  210 , but the present disclosure is not limited thereby. In the embodiment shown in  FIG. 2 , a communications transmission interface  210  (for example, an I2C bus) on a n equipment layer can communicate with a communications transmission controller  220  (for example, an I2C controller) on an upper layer on an kernel mode. In some embodiments, the communications transmission controller  220  can include a communications transmission controller driver of a third party. The communications transmission controller  220  can communicate with a human interface device (HID) driver  230  (for example, HIDI2C.Sys driver) built in a layer of upper than the layer that the communications transmission controller  220  built in. The HID driver  230  communicates with an HID class driver  240  (for example, HIDClass.Sys driver) built in a layer upper than the layer that the HID driver  230  built in. And, the HID class driver  240  communicates with the first driver module  162  built in a layer upper than the layer that the HID class driver  240 , so that the first driver module  162  acquires the touch information D 1 . 
     The first driver module  162  executed in a kernel mode can further communicate with the interactive service module  164  executed in a user mode and the second driver module  166  executed in the kernel mode, so as to provide the instruction code D 2  to the interactive service module  164 , or provide the trackpad operation data D 3  to the second driver module  166 . 
     Referring to  FIG. 3 ,  FIG. 3  is a flowchart showing a control method  300  of an electronic device  100  according to some embodiments of the present disclosure. To describe conveniently and clearly, the control method  300  is described with reference to the embodiment in  FIG. 1 , but the present disclosure is not limited thereby. A person skilled in the art can make various changes and modifications without departing from the spirit and scope of the present disclosure. As shown in  FIG. 3 , the control method  300  includes steps S 310 , S 320 , S 330 , S 340 , S 350 , S 360 , and S 370 . 
     First, in step S 310 , the processor  160  receives touch information D 1  output by the touch screen  140  in response to a touch behavior. 
     Then, in step S 320 , the processor  160  determines whether the touch behavior relates to a user interface instruction or a trackpad operation instruction according to the touch information D 1 . In specific, the electronic device  100  determines whether the touch behavior relates to a user interface instruction or a trackpad operation instruction according to the touch information D 1  and the setting of the user interface setting unit U 2  by the touch behavior determining unit U 1  of the processor  160 . 
     When the touch behavior relates to the user interface instruction is determined, step S 330  is then performed. In step S 330 , the processor  160  provides corresponding instruction code D 2  to the interactive service module  164  according to the touch information D 1 , so as to control an application program APP displayed on the display screen  120  or update a corresponding user interface on the touch screen  140 . 
     Then, in step S 340 , the interactive service module  164  determines whether it is necessary to adjust a user interface. If it is not necessary to adjust a user interface, step S 310  is performed again to receive new touch information D 1 . 
     If the interactive service module  164  determines that it is necessary to adjust the user interface, step S 350  is performed. In step S 350 , the interactive service module  164  outputs interface adjustment setting data to adjust the user interface. In an embodiment, the interface adjustment setting data includes an interface display instruction Cmd 2  and an interface setting instruction Cmd 1 . 
     In specific, the interactive service module  164  outputs the interface display instruction Cmd 2  to the display instruction processing unit U 3 . In an embodiment, the display instruction processing unit U 3  can be a Graphics Processing Unit, (GPU). The interactive service module  164  uses the display instruction processing unit U 3  to convert the interface display instruction Cmd 2  into a display instruction Cmd 3  that can be received by the touch screen  140 , so as to control the touch screen  140  to display the user interface. Furthermore, the interactive service module  164  additionally outputs an interface setting instruction Cmd 1  to the user interface setting unit U 2 , and the interface setting instruction Cmd 1  includes user interface layout information. In an embodiment, the user interface setting unit U 2  records the user interface layout information and transmits the user interface layout information to the touch behavior determining unit U 1 , so that the touch behavior determining unit U 1  knows the current user interface layout. 
     Next, the electronic device  100  returns to step S 310  to receive new touch information D 1  again. 
     The touch behavior determining unit U 1  of the first driver module  162  determines a subsequent touch behavior according to the touch information D 1  and setting of a new user interface setting unit U 2  (for example, the user interface layout information). 
     In an embodiment, in step S 330 , the requirement corresponding to the instruction code D 2  received by the interactive service module  164  is to modify a font color, and then, the interactive service module  164  outputs interface adjustment setting information based on instruction code D 2 , so as to update the user interface as a layout of a coloring plate, for example, each coordinate range in the user interface area displays a different color. Thus, a user can select a desired font color by touching different areas of the touch screen  140 . 
     In another aspect, when the touch behavior relates to the trackpad operation instruction, the electronic device  100  performs steps S 360  and S 370 . 
     In step S 360 , the electronic device  100  converts touch information D 1  by using the data processing unit U 4  in the processor  160 . In some embodiments, the processor  160  further includes a corresponding data processing unit U 4  that configured to process touch information D 1  to acquire trackpad operation data D 3 . Then, in step S 370 , the touch behavior determining unit U 1  provides trackpad operation data D 3  corresponding to the touch information D 1  to the second driver module  166 . Thus, the second driver module  166  operates and controls the system correspondingly according to the trackpad operation data D 3 . 
     Referring to  FIG. 4 ,  FIG. 4  is a schematic diagram showing an electronic device  100  according to other embodiments of the present disclosure. Elements in  FIG. 4  that are similar to those in the embodiment in  FIG. 1  are marked with same reference numbers so as to be more comprehensible, the specific principle of the similar elements has been described in preceding paragraphs, and the elements will not be introduced if they have no cooperative operation relationship with the elements in  FIG. 4 . 
     Compared with the electronic device  100  in  FIG. 1 , in the embodiment shown in  FIG. 4 , the first driver module  162  further includes a data processing unit U 4 . Furthermore, in some embodiments, the electronic device  100  in  FIG. 1  also includes a data processing unit U 4 . 
     The data processing unit U 4  is coupled to the touch behavior determining unit U 1 , so as to process touch information D 1  output by the touch behavior determining unit U 1  to provide trackpad operation data D 3  to the second driver module  166 . In specific, since the data format required by the first driver module  162  and interactive service module  164  is possibly different from the data format that can be accessed by the second driver module  166 , the data processing unit U 4  can be used to convert a data format, so that each of the driver modules  162  and  166  and the interactive service module  164  can communicate with each other. 
     In some embodiments, the data processing unit U 4  is further coupled to the interactive service module  164  to receive a gesture instruction Cmd 4  from the interactive service module  164 , and provide the trackpad operation data D 3  to the second driver module  166  according to the gesture instruction Cmd 4  after receiving the gesture instruction Cmd 4 . 
     To describe more conveniently, in the following paragraphs, the detailed operation of the data processing unit U 4  in  FIG. 4  will be described with reference to the flowchart. Referring to  FIG. 5 ,  FIG. 5  is a flowchart showing a control method  300  of an electronic device  100  according to other embodiments of the present disclosure. To describe clearly and conveniently, the control method  300  is described with reference to the embodiment in  FIG. 4 , but the present disclosure is not limited thereby. 
     Compared with the control method  300  shown in  FIG. 3 , in this embodiment, the method further includes step S 345 . If, in step  340 , the processor  160  determines it is not necessary to adjust the user interface data on the touch screen  140 , step S 345  is performed. 
     In step S 345 , the interactive service module  164  determines whether a gesture operation is received. If the gesture operation is not received, step S 310  is performed again to receive new touch information D 1 . 
     If the gesture operation is received, the interactive service module  164  transmits the gesture instruction Cmd 4  to the data processing unit U 4  in the processor  160  to perform steps S 360  and S 370 . In steps S 360  and S 370 , the data processing unit U 4  provides trackpad operation data D 3  to the second driver module  166 . 
     In specific, in step S 360 , the data processing unit U 4  in the processor  160  converts the touch information, and converts the gesture instruction Cmd 4  into a suitable format as the trackpad operation data D 3 . Then, in step S 370 , the data processing unit U 4  outputs and provides the corresponding trackpad operation data D 3  to the second driver module  166 . Thus, the second driver module  166  operates and controls a system correspondingly according to the trackpad operation data D 3 . 
     In an embodiment, when an application program APP is executed, to make a user zoom an object by the gesture of two fingers, the interactive service module  164  can output the gesture instruction Cmd 4  to the data processing unit U 4 , the data processing unit U 4  processes the gesture instruction Cmd 4  to output trackpad operation data D 3  to the second driver module  166 . The application program APP determines a gesture operation of the user via the second driver module  166 , and performs computation processing according to the setting of the application program APP. 
     It should be noted that, the examples are only for convenient description and are not intended to limit the present disclosure. If the application program APP intends to call the second driver module  166  to perform other relevant operation, the interactive service module  164  can also be used to output a corresponding instruction to the data processing unit U 4 , so that the data processing unit U 4  converts relevant data into a suitable format and provides the same to the second driver module  166  to perform computation, so as to realize cooperation between each of the driver modules. 
     In other words, in step S 360 , the data processing unit U 4  can process the touch information D 1  to acquire trackpad operation data D 3 , and can also process various instructions, such as a gesture instruction Cmd 4 , output by the interactive service module  164 , so as to acquire the trackpad operation data D 3 . 
     In view of the above, in each embodiment of the present disclosure, data transmission is performed through firmware and drivers based on a standard transmission protocol, for example, an I2C transmission protocol, thereby accelerating a data transmission speed. Furthermore, the first driver module  162  provides different touch information to corresponding interactive service modules  164  and  166  respectively to perform a subsequent operation, thereby simplifying a transmission process of touch information and enhancing a transmission speed. Intercommunication between a display screen  120  and a touch screen  140  can be realized only through one operating system. 
     It should be noted that, in a situation of no conflicts, each drawing, each embodiment, and the features and circuits in the embodiments in the present disclosure can be combined with each other. The circuits in the drawings are only exemplary, are simplified to make the description simple and comprehensible, and are not intended to limit the present disclosure. 
     Although the embodiments of the present disclosure have been disclosed above, the embodiments are not intended to limit the present disclosure. A person skilled in the art can make some changes and modifications without departing from the spirit and scope of the present disclosure. The protection scope of the present disclosure should depend on the claims.