Apple Looking to Eliminate Home Button on iOS Devices, Integrate Touch and Display Driver Chips?

[Shirasaki]

Ah, well that is why we love Apple. They are able to come up with ways to do things that we couldn't think of.

Maybe, what we love is the uncertainty, and more often, new things upcoming. When we see new things, we will feel excited.

 

[TrueBlou]

I'd be perfectly happy for them to lose the physical button and integrate everything into the screen if it meant more screen real estate in the same form factor, or the same screen in a smaller form factor.

I don't think it would be hard to adjust to it, we all managed to adjust to a fully touch screen device when Apple came out with the iPhone with no physical keypad.

 

[James035]

I personally think that getting rid of physical home button is cool. I also think that it won't cause responsiveness problems because it would use force touch and not the digitizer. But I have no idea how to hide frontal camera and Touch ID under the screen.

 

[maxsix]

This technology seems a ways off in my opinion. I don't think we'll see this for at least a few years.

I believe you're correct. Factoring in the new rather conservative approach Apple takes slow walking changes of any significance, I think another two or three years may be the timeline if they decide to implement the change.

 

[d656]

The most valuable tech company in the world? No, dude, they don't have the technology. /s
But seriously they had to have been working on this a while to have rumors about it floating around

Valuable doesn't mean innovative

 

[Moonjumper]

I personally think that getting rid of physical home button is cool. I also think that it won't cause responsiveness problems because it would use force touch and not the digitizer. But I have no idea how to hide frontal camera and Touch ID under the screen.

Qualcomm have an ultrasonic fingerprint reader than can go behind the screen. It is much more secure as it penetrates several layers of skin. That is a realistic Touch ID solution.

I seem to remember an Apple patent about an array of sensors that fitted between pixels and they worked together as a single camera sensor. Another thought is the camera view is fed through an optical fibre like on an endoscope. The sensor is behind the screen, but sees through a tiny aperture at the very top of the device. That one may or may not be realistic. Just a thought of mine.

 

[daviddth]

I personally think that getting rid of physical home button is cool. I also think that it won't cause responsiveness problems because it would use force touch and not the digitizer. But I have no idea how to hide frontal camera and Touch ID under the screen.

Even a small bezel right at the top for the earpiece and camera beside it. Unless they have some way to direct sound sound without needing an opening, and also not vibrating the whole screen, as that could lead to privacy issues if it can be heard by an adjacent person in a quiet room. If they cant do that you still need an opening somewhere for us to use this as a phone

 

[jamesrick80]

Qualcomm have an ultrasonic fingerprint reader than can go behind the screen. It is much more secure as it penetrates several layers of skin. That is a realistic Touch ID solution.

I seem to remember an Apple patent about an array of sensors that fitted between pixels and they worked together as a single camera sensor. Another thought is the camera view is fed through an optical fibre like on an endoscope. The sensor is behind the screen, but sees through a tiny aperture at the very top of the device. That one may or may not be realistic. Just a thought of mine.

The Qualcomm reader will be implemented in the note 8 most likely in 2017.....

 

[Floris]

Sounds like a fantastic idea, wonderful news. And I hope it works in reality.

 

[Sill]

I seem to remember an Apple patent about an array of sensors that fitted between pixels and they worked together as a single camera sensor. Another thought is the camera view is fed through an optical fibre like on an endoscope. The sensor is behind the screen, but sees through a tiny aperture at the very top of the device. That one may or may not be realistic. Just a thought of mine.

I've mentioned in posts a few years back about TV manufacturers that were developing pixel cams like that, and how that would be the end of privacy in the home. First I've heard about Apple or any other phone manufacturer doing it, though. If they follow through on that, that would be the first iPhone I refuse to buy. Right now its easy to defeat this stuff - put a piece of tape over the front camera and dot it with White-Out. But if you can't even find the camera because its blended in between the display pixels, what then? Pull the front glass off your brand new phone and see if you can figure out what traces can be cut without destroying the display?

 

[Roller]

I've mentioned in posts a few years back about TV manufacturers that were developing pixel cams like that, and how that would be the end of privacy in the home. First I've heard about Apple or any other phone manufacturer doing it, though. If they follow through on that, that would be the first iPhone I refuse to buy. Right now its easy to defeat this stuff - put a piece of tape over the front camera and dot it with White-Out. But if you can't even find the camera because its blended in between the display pixels, what then? Pull the front glass off your brand new phone and see if you can figure out what traces can be cut without destroying the display?

I'd say that the greater privacy risk comes from unauthorized audio eavesdropping. If someone activates the camera remotely, it doesn't do them much good when the phone is in a pocket or some other enclosed space. But the microphone can pick up sounds under those conditions.

 

[Sill]

I'd say that the greater privacy risk comes from unauthorized audio eavesdropping. If someone activates the camera remotely, it doesn't do them much good when the phone is in a pocket or some other enclosed space. But the microphone can pick up sounds under those conditions.

Yes it can. At home, this is another reason to open up the iMac and rip the camera/mic setup out of the shell. I've seen threads here and at Apple Support from people who have found that the microphone in the iMac is incredibly difficult to keep turned off, and do we really ever know its off for sure? So, out it goes.

As for as the iPhone, sound is only one of the things that worry me about the mic. The meta software shown in the Dark Knight movie is quite possible, though how good the resulting image would be is dependent on the frequency response of the mic and speakers. A recent article on one of the other sites directly addressed this, though it was talking about how Siri will benefit from upgrades in mic technology. Still, with all the upcoming IoT stuff, I wonder if there will instead be an audio input matrix developed from things like the Sonos Play:5v2, the Amazon Echo, voice activated appliances - even the Nest thermostat. And since certain speakers can be used as microphones, perhaps every bit of net-connected audio gear will end up being tools for spying.

At this point I can only attribute how mute the general public is to the dangers of this stuff to two things: ignorance, or lack of self-preservatory instinct. The first is a direct result of education mandates, the second is more a result of bread and circuses.