The Nightsword project

[BVH]

With the drawing printed to scale, cut out, and my four fingers cupped about 1" underneath the front-most part of the handle to simulate handle thickness, I looked up and noticed my thumb resting dead center on the OLED screen. It feels very natural to me. I can easily reach left for the physical screen "buttons" and my thumb feels fine sliding the imaginary slider button. All-in-all, its fits me well.

 

[ez78]

Seems like that combined setup in post 895 might be the best way to go. I like the fact that the light could be ignited without having to play with the OLED screen but it's still there to show the setting and additional info when you want to look at those. Would be nice to see the beam spread angle and power and stuff. Didn't get a chance to try that print yet. Maybe later.

 

[London Lad]

The touch panel manufacturer is offering me an incredible deal if order 100 units now, but I would first like for others here print out the drawing of the control and see how well it sizes up.

Printable Display Drawing PDF

This works for me

 

[Ceya!]

I've looked at it , played with where my hand should be.

Have you thought of the icons being at the bottow and box on top in landscape mode?

S/F,
CEYA!

 

[get-lit]

Doesn't turn out so well, the bottom icons have to be made a bit too small, and the OLED display board would block the back-light from illuminating the top third of them.

EDIT - Just found that the touch panel manufacturer was offering panels with pre-printed cell phone buttons, useless. Their minimum order for a custom size is 10,000 units. So I sent out inquiries to 15 other manufacturers. It's very difficult finding touch panels this small. I can go a bit larger, but the panel's external height needs to be <1.75" so the handle isn't pushed further back behind the center of gravity. I did happen to locate a touch panel to fit just the OLED, so something like the display in Post #880 can be done. I expect to get a response from one of those manufacturers with the size needed here.

 

[get-lit]

Just when I thought we finally covered all of the considerations between an electronic display and a physical display, there's another significant issue. OLEDs suffer from screen burn!!

OLEDs can last tens of thousands of hours, but only when conforming to stringent design guidelines to reduce screen burn, otherwise screen burn may occur within a few hundred hours or less.

Things to definitely avoid are solid colors, and static images and lines. Basically ruling out everything we're doing here with the screens, because these exact things are all we'd be using the display for in this application... The thumb slider outline, nope. Stationary icons, nope. Fixed meters, nope. Solid color icons, nope. Combine those things and OLEDs can suffer from screen burn in less than 100 hours. Not to say that it will happen that fast, but it can. I've read reports on forums of this happening within 24 hours.

The proper way to implement OLED display in this project is to not use it for any fixed controls or display, but just for feedback only when interacting with the system, something more like post #887. I'm working on a new display version that works in this manner, but in a better fitting layout than #887.

 

[get-lit]

Again, to protect the OLED from screen burn, it shouldn't be used for stationary meters and icons. Here's a "physical" back-lit display in which the OLED is used strictly for managing settings. It can show meters in special circumstances, like showing the power ramp up during ignition.

No luck so far from any of the touch panel manufacturers. They won't produce touch panels down to the size needed without an order of 10,000 or more. I can go larger and use a stocked touch panel size, but I'm finding that I prefer the size to actually be even smaller to reduce the amount of thumb movement to as little as possible.

This display uses the only stocked touch panel I've found that is small.

In order to make it easier to navigate a small touch screen, I simplified the layout by reducing the number of icons to just three. I'm also finding that I prefer the thumb slider to be left of center with the icons to the right, rather than right of center with the icons to the left. This orientation has a slight advantage in the ease of thumb slide movement. I figure most people are right-handed, so this slight advantage should be swayed to that majority to get the most use of that advantage.

In the display below, the three icons from top to bottom are POWER, CUSTOM, and EDIT. (Shown with rounded-corner bezel to be flush mounted to housing)...

The CUSTOM icon is a "C" with a centered dot representing a custom button. It can be assigned to be any of the functions in the menu. I myself would probably keep it assigned to FLASH or LOW.

EDIT is used to bring up the OLED menu in place of the thumb slide function, and to toggle back and forth between the OLED menu and the thumb slide function. The icon was originally to be an arrow pointing left to the menu, which I then rounded to reflect the shape of the other two icons. Afterward I recognized it looked like an "E" for EDIT.

To the left of the three icons is a vertical demarcation of the thumb slider area. The thumb slider is wide, covering the entire remaining display to the left of the icons. The thumb slider is not as high in this version of the display, and the thumb does not have to travel as much vertically for full focus range.

Below is the display with the OLED menu on. In order to fit the OLED board within the small display area, the OLED screen is very small at .55" x .79" (.96" diagonal). EDITED: As a result, it can only display three functions at a time. While in function menu mode, the top two icons (POWER and CUSTOM) are touched to cycle up and down through the functions menu, in pages of three at a time. A function is activated by touching it. Touching the EDIT button again will close the menu and resume the thumb slide function.

The two key things I prefer about this particular display is the reduced thumb movement with a smaller display, and the uncluttered layout with just three icons, so the user is not fumbling around looking at a dizzying array of icons. You can easily remember what the buttons are without having to look.

EDIT - Printable PDF

 

[BVH]

The CUSTOM icon is a "C" with a centered dot representing a custom button. It can be assigned to be any of the functions in the menu. I myself would probably keep it assigned to FLASH or LOW. Does this mean that we, as users can assign the custom function at-will or is it something you do in hard programming?



Below is the display with the OLED menu on. In order to fit the OLED board within the small display area, the OLED screen is very small at .55" x .79" (.96" diagonal). As a result, it can only display one function at a time while also displaying the arrow button I don't see the ARROW BUTTON? to navigate through the function menu. The arrow button is below the current highlighted function. Each time the arrow is touched, the menu cycles to the next function. A function is activated by touching it. Touching the EDIT button again will close the menu and resume the thumb slide function.

To accommodate two or three functions to be displayed at a time, I could do away with the arrow button and use the top two icons (POWER and CUSTOM) to cycle up and down through the functions menu. I like this method better!

Will either or both of the screens (physical and/or the OLED screen backgrounds be programmable by the user? I'm liking the idea of simplicity better and better.

 

[get-lit]

The user can set which function is assigned to the custom button.

I've revised the post to remove the arrow button from the functions menu and use the additional space to display three functions at once.

At this point I'm unsure as to whether or not the colors can be set by the user. It requires more pins of the main controller board to connect with an RGB LED, and I don't think there are enough free pins. Even if a single color back-light LED has to be used, it can probably be physically change out for a different color. The colors of the OLED can be changed.

The printable PDF is updated as well.

 

[Ceya!]

For those who haven't learned what OLED is , look below.

http://www.oled-info.com/introduction

http://apps1.eere.energy.gov/buildings/publications/pdfs/ssl/pattison_oled_sslmiw2011.pdf

http://www.princeton.edu/~sturmlab/theses/Florian.Pschenitzka.thesis.pdf

http://reviews.cnet.com/8301-33199_7-57598963-221/seven-problems-with-current-oled-televisions/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OLED

Enjoy the read.

As I once said" the more you KNOW, the more you GROW".


S/F,
CEYA!

 

[get-lit]

Here's the equivalent display in the entirely "physical" version...

 

[London Lad]

I find it more attractive the simpler it gets.

 

[get-lit]

I agree 100%. Do you prefer the OLED text version of the function menu? or the"physical" icon version of the function menu?

 

[BVH]

I like the OLED text version. Easy to read and scroll via the two physical buttons.

 

[Ceya!]

Text version, easy to understand . Nothing to explain.
S/F,
CEYA!

 

[get-lit]

I was split right down the middle on this one, kinda hoping to be swayed to the physical icons because it's a lot less work, but I'll do the text OLED if it's the better way. Having a clear vision that this is definitely the way to go without question along the way will make it easier to push through the more difficult work. Ordering the OLED and touch panel, and looking forward to digging right in.

This version kind of reminds me of..

 

[London Lad]

I agree 100%. Do you prefer the OLED text version of the function menu? or the"physical" icon version of the function menu?

Physical version, I think!

 

[get-lit]

Ok I'll wait for some more feedback, and at least get started with the touch panel in the meantime. So far its 2 for OLED text and 1 for physical icons.

 

[ez78]

I think I would also be happy with that fully physical version. OLED is very nice too but if it comes with a lot of extra work and potential problems then for me it's not worth it maybe. At first look I thought those three red icons look odd, but after seeing that picture from Predator I think it's a plus that the icons make it look like alien technology. And they're easy to remember anyways.

 

[get-lit]

ez78, without considering development difficulty, which do you prefer?