TIMMi is a prototype for an input device that is meant to be worn on an index finger (not sure if left or right) and can sense bending and button presses in three locations along the sleeve. It has a textile sleeve that covers conductive silicon rubber and stitched with conductive threads. It was built to be able to communicate with smartphones and smartglasses. Where certain gestures like light tapping or bend and tap would effect different functions.

Pros:

• Wireless interaction with phone or smartglass
• Multimodal in that one barely has to lift a finger (haha) to make a gesture
• Easy to gesture especially while busy doing other things
• Example: running momentum is not broken if a user would want to skip a song

Cons:

• smartphone input has far risen from simple gestures
• 3 button and bend input is not easily translated into x,y touch mapping of a smartphone touchscreen
• technology using population has inherited how to use a touchscreen smartphone, to truncate those gestures for a finger sleeve would create a learning curve.

 

TIMMi: Finger-worn Textile Input Device with Multimodal Sensing in Mobile Interaction

Wearable Textile Input Device with Multimodal Sensing for Eyes-Free Mobile Interaction during Daily Activities

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1574119216300311?via%3Dihub