RIM’s optical trackpads: they weren’t joking about the ‘optical’ part
Thinking about how your phone's touchscreen operates, you might assume that the so-called optical pads that have been making appearances on recent BlackBerrys ( among other devices ) operate in a similar fashion -- but you'd be wrong. RIM's official BlackBerry blog is chiming in today to drop some knowledge on us dullards, and it turns out that "optical" isn't just a cute nickname -- the pads do actually operate in much the same way as modern desktop mice, using a low-res infrared camera to capture movement across the surface and translate it into movement. In practical terms, what this means is that you don't need a conductive surface to operate the pad -- you can use pretty much anything that the sensor can see, so a gloved hand (for instance) is theoretically good to go
Categories: Android, BlackBerry, Mobile Phone, Other Tags: 18th-2009, black, BlackBerry, chris-ziegler, droid, engadget, mobile, neutral, optical, opticaltrackpad, report, return-false, rim, trackpad