Tuesday, December 9, 2003
Think Outside Inc. Announces New Bluetooth Keyboard Software Standard: a Royalty-Free Driver for Smartphones and PDAs
Posted by Jason Dunn in "NEWS" @ 01:02 PM
"Think Outside Inc., maker of the revolutionary Stowaway(R) Portable Keyboards for handheld devices, today announced that it has created a royalty-free keyboard driver that utilizes the Bluetooth Human Interface Device (HID) profile and that the company will make available to any OEM interested in including it in a smartphone or PDA design. As a result, device manufacturers will be able to include Think Outside's keyboard HID driver in their Bluetooth-enabled products to ensure that they will support an external keyboard in the future.
One of the design limitations of Bluetooth has been that OEMs had to license a Bluetooth software stack from a software supplier to make their devices operational, and a HID profile had to be either licensed or created. The HID profile lists a series of devices, and it is this list that tells the Bluetooth radio how to communicate with a specific device. If a Bluetooth product doesn't have a particular device listed in its profile, it can't communicate with it."
If this is all that's been stopping companies from releasing Bluetooth-based keyboards, and we'll soon see some, then we all owe Think Outside a huge round of applause. However, that's a big "if" - and considering that Think Outside just released an infrared-based keyboard (which seems very retro to me), I'm not going to hold my breath. Let's hope I'm wrong though and we see some great Bluetooth-based keyboards in 2004...
<reads press release again, slower this time>
"In related news, Think Outside today also announced its Stowaway Bluetooth Wireless Keyboard, a new Bluetooth-enabled Stowaway keyboard for use with compatible smartphones and PDAs. This full-sized, collapsible mobile keyboard is based on a reference design that is capable of being modified to meet an OEM's specifications, to speed their time to market with Bluetooth keyboard products for smartphones and PDAs."
Oh. Nevermind. :D Let's hope that several big companies adopt their reference design!
One of the design limitations of Bluetooth has been that OEMs had to license a Bluetooth software stack from a software supplier to make their devices operational, and a HID profile had to be either licensed or created. The HID profile lists a series of devices, and it is this list that tells the Bluetooth radio how to communicate with a specific device. If a Bluetooth product doesn't have a particular device listed in its profile, it can't communicate with it."
If this is all that's been stopping companies from releasing Bluetooth-based keyboards, and we'll soon see some, then we all owe Think Outside a huge round of applause. However, that's a big "if" - and considering that Think Outside just released an infrared-based keyboard (which seems very retro to me), I'm not going to hold my breath. Let's hope I'm wrong though and we see some great Bluetooth-based keyboards in 2004...
<reads press release again, slower this time>
"In related news, Think Outside today also announced its Stowaway Bluetooth Wireless Keyboard, a new Bluetooth-enabled Stowaway keyboard for use with compatible smartphones and PDAs. This full-sized, collapsible mobile keyboard is based on a reference design that is capable of being modified to meet an OEM's specifications, to speed their time to market with Bluetooth keyboard products for smartphones and PDAs."
Oh. Nevermind. :D Let's hope that several big companies adopt their reference design!
