HOW TOUCH SCREEN WORKS?

A touchscreen is an electronic visual display that can detect the presence and location of a touch within the display area. The term generally refers to touching the display of the device with a finger or hand. Touchscreens can also sense other passive objects, such as a stylus. Touchscreens are common in devices such as all-in-one computers, tablet computers, and smartphones. The touchscreen has two main attributes. First, it enables one to interact directly with what is displayed, rather than indirectly with a pointer controlled by a mouse or touchpad. Secondly, it lets one do so without requiring any intermediate device that would need to be held in the hand. Such displays can be attached to computers, or to networks as terminals. They also play a prominent role in the design of digital appliances such as the personal digital assistant (PDA), satellite navigation devices, mobile phones, and video games. Touch screen is becoming popular as it is user friendly medium. Everyone can use it without any hesitation. There is no need of any mastery to use touch screen. Whatever is display on the screen can be used as per requirement. Let see how touch screen works. There are three different systems used in the mechanism of touch screen. 1. Resistive System In this resistive mechanism of touch screen two sheets are used one is conductive and the other is resistive. Both cover the top glass panel. There is a space between two sheets so that current pass when it is toggle. Now touching the screen forced both layers to contact at a certain point. This contact of both layers cause in the electric field a variation which is informed to the main system that a touch is felt. OS transcribe the touch into desired action. In other words The resistive system consists of a normal glass panel that is covered with a conductive and a resistive metallic layer. These two layers are held apart by spacers, and a scratch-resistant layer is placed on top of the whole setup. An electrical current runs through the two layers while the monitor is operational. When a user touches the screen, the two layers make contact in that exact spot. The change in the electrical field is noted and the coordinates of the point of contact are calculated by the computer. Once the coordinates are known, a special driver translates the touch into something that the operating system can understand, much as a computer mouse driver translates a mouse's movements into a click or a drag. 2. Capacitive System Second method utilizes in touch screen is capacitive. To understand this mechanism, it is better to know about human biology first. Many chemical reactions take place in our body and electricity produced in result to perform different functions. That is the reason why human heart is

recharged with electric shocks for the recovery. Considering human body a cell you can better understand this phenomenon. In this system an electric charge sheet (capacitor) is directly placed on the glass. When we touch the screen with finger, a static charge produces and reacts with the capacitor (electric charge sheet). As the touch screen works due to electric current develop when touches the finger. In other words In the capacitive system, a layer that stores electrical charge is placed on the glass panel of the monitor. When a user touches the monitor with his or her finger, some of the charge is transferred to the user, so the charge on the capacitive layer decreases. This decrease is measured in circuits located at each corner of the monitor. The computer calculates, from the relative differences in charge at each corner, exactly where the touch event took place and then relays that information to the touch-screen driver software. One advantage that the capacitive system has over the resistive system is that it transmits almost 90 percent of the light from the monitor, whereas the resistive system only transmits about 75 percent. This gives the capacitive system a much clearer picture than the resistive system.

3. Surface Acoustic Wave System

This type of touch screen works with the help of wave energy. This enables a touch to transform into another form of energy and deliver the command which in response perform the desired action. A pair of transducers is placed on glass plate sides. In the glass plate there are reflectors. On touching the screen wave produced and which transforms into energy for fulfilling the command. It tells where on the screen touch is detected First both techniques utilize the electric charge mechanism to develop a touch screen system but the third uses wave system and do not need a metallic plate. This surface acoustic wave system is free of electric field thats why there is no resistance in the way of light dispersal. This 100 percent light emission gives extra clarity to the screen which is not possible in first two mechanisms. Resistive system enables 75 % of light emission. However capacitive system allows 90% of light emission so better than resistive. Capacitive system enables sharp image as compared to resistive system even then no comparison with the image quality if surface acoustic system.

In other words on the monitor of a surface acoustic wave system, two transducers (one receiving and
one sending) are placed along the x and y axes of the monitor's glass plate. Also placed on the glass are reflectors -- they reflect an electrical signal sent from one transducer to the other. The receiving transducer is able to tell if the wave has been disturbed by a touch event at any instant, and can locate it accordingly. The wave setup has no metallic layers on the screen, allowing for 100-percent light throughput and perfect image clarity. This makes the surface acoustic wave system best for displaying detailed graphics (both other systems have significant degradation in clarity).