TouchFire: Matte makes the iPad keyboard tangible

Kickstarter project is about to go into mass production

Software designer Steve Isaac has developed a way of using the on-screen keyboard from Apple http://apple.com Equipping the iPad with a haptic experience. He uses a thin, flexible silicone mat called "TouchFire" http://touchfire.com that fits exactly over the screen. The project was extremely successful on the Kickstarter crowdfunding platform and is about to be ready for the market.

Button feeling for touchscreen

The principle is simple: the mat is placed on the edge of the touch display and rolled over it. It lies precisely above the onscreen keyboard and brings its arrangement into a three-dimensional, tactile form without triggering unwanted clicks on the screen itself.

The user can feel the shape of the keys and write more intuitively on the tablet. The simple assembly and the possibility of rolling up the TouchFire and taking it with you should make the gadget an alternative to external Bluetooth keyboards. It is also easily compatible with third-party iPad cases. The mat is transparent, so you can use it with different keyboard layouts.

Start of production in March

These arguments were also convincing for the users of the crowdfunding service KickStarter http://kickstarter.com . Isaac had stopped his project there with a donation goal of 10.000 dollars (around 7.700 euros). At the end of the funding run, he was able to look forward to more than twenty times this amount with 201.400 dollars (approx. 155.000 euros).

TouchFire is aimed at prolific writers. Pre-orders are possible on the project homepage at a price of 45 dollars. Mass production is slated to begin between late February and early March.

Touchscreens of the future will probably be able to do without attachments such as TouchFire, as they can successfully fool the user into different surfaces. The first devices could be equipped with the corresponding technology as early as 2012.

(ck)

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