Abstract: A capacitance sensing system can filter noise that presents in a subset of electrodes in the proximity of a sense object (i.e., finger). A capacitance sensing system can include a sense network comprising a plurality of electrodes for generating sense values; a noise listening circuit configured to detect noise on a plurality of the electrodes; and a filtering circuit that enables a filtering for localized noise events when detected noise values are above one level, and disables the filtering for localized noise events when detected noise values are below the one level.

Abstract: A method and apparatus to remove direct coupled noise caused by a contact between a touch object and a capacitive sense array.

Abstract: A sense array having at least 3 sets of sense elements disposed substantially parallel with each other, with one of the sense elements of the first set extends between two of the sense elements of the second set and another one of the sense elements of the first set extends between two of the sense elements of the third set.

Abstract: A capacitive sensor may include a transmit electrode and a receive electrode capacitively coupled with the transmit electrode. A capacitance sensing circuit senses a capacitance between the transmit and receive electrodes by applying a signal to the transmit electrode and rectifying a current waveform induced at the receive electrode. A compensation circuit reduces the effect of a mutual and parasitic capacitances of the transmit and receive electrode pair by adding a compensation current to the rectified current.

Abstract: Apparatuses and methods of glove touch detection are described. One method performs a first scan to detect an object proximate to a sense array. The first scan comprises a first sensitivity parameter. The method compares touch data from the first scan against a plurality of thresholds. The method performs a second scan to detect a touch event when the first scan's touch data exceeds a glove saturation threshold of the plurality of thresholds. The second scan comprising a second sensitivity parameter that is different than the first sensitivity parameter. The method reports a glove touch event when the first scan's touch data does not exceed the glove saturation threshold and exceeds a glove-reporting threshold of the plurality of thresholds.

Abstract: A method can include determining an initial position of an object with respect to a sensing region formed by a plurality of sensors and having a core region bounded by at least one edge; if the initial position is proximate to the edge and a size of the object was previously calculated, determining a final edge position of the object using the previously calculated object size; and if the initial position is proximate to the edge and the size of the object was not previously calculated, determining a size of the object.

Abstract: A system comprises a processing device and a capacitive sense array that includes a plurality of electrodes. The system performs a first scan of a plurality of electrodes in a capacitive sense array to determine a position of a stylus. The system also performs one or more additional scans of subsets of the plurality of electrodes to determine additional positions of the stylus. The system may continually perform the additional scans on of the subsets of the plurality of electrodes until the stylus is no longer detected.

Abstract: A method and apparatus determine a difference value, the determined difference value reflecting a difference between a plurality of presence values. In an embodiment, the method and apparatus perform an operation associated with the plurality of presence values, based on the determined difference value.

Abstract: A method calculates the position of a conductive object hovering above a plurality of mutual capacitance sensors, where each mutual capacitance sensor is represented as a unit cell in an array of unit cells. The method measures the capacitance of each sensor. The method identifies a peak unit cell based on the measured capacitances and calculates an edge cutoff value. A plurality of unit cells with measured capacitances within a range defined by the edge cutoff value are selected and the position of the hovering object is calculated. In some embodiments, the array comprises a first plurality of capacitance sensing electrodes disposed along a first axis and a second plurality of capacitance sensing electrodes disposed along a second axis. In some embodiments, the array and a controller form a user interface device, and the controller is configured to calculate the position of the conductive object using the method described above.

Abstract: Touch sensor methods, devices and systems are disclosed. One embodiment of the present invention pertains to a method comprising monitoring a finger movement along a touch sensing surface based on position data of a finger touching the touch sensing surface, where the position data is obtained by locating a position of a force applied by the finger in a coordinate of the touch sensing surface. In addition, the method comprises generating direction data associated with the finger movement if the finger movement travels for more than a threshold distance. Furthermore, the method comprises determining a finger gesture which corresponds to the finger movement using a lookup table having multiple preconfigured finger gestures based on the direction data.

Abstract: A water-resistant capacitance sensing apparatus comprising a plurality of capacitive sense elements and a capacitance sensing circuit configured to measure both the mutual capacitance and self-capacitance on the plurality of capacitive sense elements. A method for water-resistant capacitance sensing, the method comprising performing a self-capacitance scan and a mutual capacitance scan, and detecting, by a processing device, a presence of an object with the plurality of sense elements. The method further determines whether the detected presence of the object is legitimate.

Abstract: A system and method are disclosed to control the power consumption of column drivers in a display system. A video input signal is received which has an active video period and a vertical blanking period between frames. A timing controller transmits a first video frame to a column driver. The timing controller transmits a column driver disable command during a vertical blanking period. Prior to the subsequent active video period, the timing controller transmits a column driver enable command. The timing controller proceeds to transmit a second video frame to the column driver. In one embodiment, the timing controller determines whether to disable and enable the column driver based on a refresh rate, the refresh rate calculated by the timing controller from the video input signal.

Abstract: A system comprising a sensing device and a capacitive sense array configured to detect a presence of a passive touch object and a stylus where the capacitive sense array receives a transmit signal from the stylus via capacitive coupling. The system further comprising a processing device configured to determine the stylus location on the capacitive sense array based on the transmit signal and to synchronize the stylus to the capacitive sense array. A system further comprises a demodulation block to extract additional data that is modulated into the transmit signal by the stylus. The demodulation block is configured to extract the additional data by amplitude shift keying. The additional data comprises at least one of an applied force value of the stylus tip, a button status data, a battery status data, or a stylus acceleration data.

Abstract: An apparatus may include an internal charge pump within an integrated circuit package, an external pin positioned at an exterior of the integrated circuit package, and a select circuit configured to operate independently from the internal charge pump and located within the integrated circuit package, wherein the select circuit is configurable to selectively couple at least one of the internal charge pump and the external pin to a transmit (TX) sensor electrode.

Abstract: A method for improving noise immunity of capacitive sensing circuit associated with a touch sense array is disclosed. The capacitive sensing circuit receives a response signal from a touch sense array. The capacitive sensing circuit measures a noise component of the response signal. When a level of noise of the noise component within a passband of the capacitive sensing circuit is greater than a threshold, the capacitive sensing circuit changes at least one parameter of capacitive sensing circuit to move the passband substantially outside the frequency spectrum of the noise component.

Abstract: Apparatuses and methods of touch location interpolation using iterative emulated touches are described. One method measures touch data on a sense array. The method determines that the touch data represents two or more touches proximate to the sense array and sequentially estimates touch geometries of the two or more touches based on two or more estimated touches that correspond to the two or more touches proximate to the sense array. The touch geometries comprise estimated touch sizes and estimated touch positions of the two or more touches. The method outputs the touch geometries of the two or more touches when an error between the two or more estimated touches and the two or more touches is less than a specified threshold.

Abstract: A method of sensing at least one object in proximity to an array of sensors can include making a determination that an object greater than a predetermined size has been detected; defining an ignore zone that includes sensor locations of the object and sensor locations surrounding those of the object; and removing the ignore zone after a predetermined duration; wherein the proximity of objects outside of the ignore zone are processed differently than the proximity of objects inside of the ignore zones.

Abstract: A capacitive sense array configured to improve noise immunity in detecting a presence of a conductive object is described. In one embodiment, a capacitive sense array includes at least a first set of sense elements disposed in straight parallel lines along a first axis of the capacitive sense array. A second set of sense elements is disposed in crooked paths about a second axis of the capacitive sense array. The first and second sets form a capacitive sense array that includes crooked sense paths in at least one of the axes of the sense array.

Abstract: Apparatus and methods of active stylus to host device data transmitting are described. One method receives, at a stylus, an indication that a host device is performing a first coordinate measurement operation to determine a coordinate of the stylus proximate to a capacitive sense array of the host device. The set of coordinate measurement operations includes a first measurement operation of a first set of electrodes of the capacitive sense array and a second measurement operation of a second set of electrodes of the capacitive sense array. While the host device is performing the set of coordinate measurement operations, the stylus transmits a data packet of stylus data to the host device. In particular, the stylus transmits a first bit of the data packet during the first measurement operation and transmits a second bit of the data packet during the second measurement operation.

Abstract: An apparatus includes a touch screen panel including a sensing matrix arranged in a row-column format. The apparatus also includes a control device to scan the sensing matrix to detect a presence of multiple objects at least proximate to the touch screen panel. The control device can identify rows and columns of the sensing matrix that correspond to the presence of the multiple objects. The control device can orthogonally multiplex the identified rows and columns into one or more row-column pairs. The control device can scan at least one of the row-column pairs to detect locations of the multiple objects relative to the touch screen panel.