[Blindmath] Tactile Touchscreen Technology

[Natalie Hanisch]

Hello everyone,

I've been highly interested for a while in the possibilities of tactile
touchscreens and math education. Recently I did some research and found two
companies who are taking steps in this direction. The first company, Tactus
Technology is based out of Fremont, California, USA. They have been
exploring tactile touch via microfluidics, which as I understand works by
filling fluid in a various part of the screen to create a genuine raised
surface. I highly appreciate the emphasis on adding tactile feedback to
touch devices, but I do have some concern about the limitations of their
product. From what I have observed it appears that they are at a point of
only offering single configurations (so you would only have raised keyboard
buttons, you could't have dynamism of a refreshable Braille display); Note
this is only my observation, I could not find information to confirm
whether or not it is true. I found this company notable though because they
seem to have a good collection of public visibility: videos, newstories,
etc.
http://www.tactustechnology.com/

The other company, which I think is more interesting, but which is a little
less in the public eye is Senseg. This company is about the same size as
Tactus, but it is based in Helsinki, Finland. Their technology uses
electrostatics, which is quite different from microfluidics. Instead of
creating a physical tactile surface, it uses electromagnetic charges to
create feelings of friction. So instead of there actually being a surface
change, it's only the feeling of a surface change. From observing one video
of a prototype I noted that this sort of screen looked highly flexible and
could be used to make any tactile output that was desired. Though Tactus
has been in the news or offering new updates fairly frequently, the last
thing online I've found from Senseg was from June 2012.
http://senseg.com/

I think this has great potential to operate as the electronic version of a
tactile drawing tablet, and it could also open a lot of doors
for accessibility on any surface that uses a screen. I'm imagining computer
monitors that display visual text but simultaneously provide touch
response, simply making computers more flexible for need or preference of
tactile communication (with the device). I'm wondering it anyone else has
heard of these companies or other companies/technologies moving in this
direction, your thoughts about how useful they will be, and what
limitations you might predict there will be with such resources.

Natalie