Ubi-finger: a Simple Gesture Input Device for Mobile and Ubiquitous Environment

We propose a novel interface in mobile environment called “Ubi-Finger” that realizes sensuous operations for PDAs and information appliances using gestures of fingers. In this paper, first, we propose the concept of Ubi-Finger. This concept enables users to sensuously control various devices in the real world. Since gestures are usual methods of nonverbal communications and enables sensuous operations for users, many researches on them carried out especially in the field of Virtual Reality. In the meanwhile, the uses of computers have rapidly extended to the daily life, such as mobile computing and ubiquitous computing.Ubi-Finger is a gesture-input device, which is simple, compact, and optimized for the new computing environment. Second, we develop prototype systems based on the concept that can control real-world devices with simple and natural gestures. Third, we develop some applications to control devices in the real world. Using our systems, a user can detect a target device by pointing with her/his index finger, then control it flexibly by performing natural gestures of fingers. Finally, we evaluate how effective our approach works.