Toward open-source portable haptic displays with visual-force-tactile feedback colocation

Platforms capable of generating rich haptic feedback are usually quite expensive and under strict proprietary protection. In addition, most of them are not portable and do not deliver a fully integrated force, tactile and visual user experience. In an attempt to break through these limitations, we have created the Haplet: an open-source, portable and affordable haptic device with colocated visual, force and tactile feedback. The triple colocated user experience is delivered by a small-form parallel robotic mechanism that features a simple vibrotactile actuator at the end-effector. The robotic arm is optically transparent and is motorized at the base where it clips on a tablet or computer screen. All the electronic components are encapsulated into a custom designed board based on the Arduino Due microcontroller. This board interfaces computer software to the Haplet's hardware with a capacity of up to four motors and encoders and two vibrotactile actuators. This paper describes our ongoing research on developing the Haplet; and, reports our initial experimental studies on quantifying the effect of visual-force-tactile feedback colocation on the user's experience and performance.