On January 3, Professor Howon Lee’s research team from the KAIST Institute for Information Technology Convergence (KI-ITC) announced the development of a smart e-book system.” This is a notable advancement for the usage of electronic text applications on various devices such as smartphones and tablet PCs.

The key significance of this new technology is that with the addition of various functions, the experience of reading electronic text has now become comparable to the experience of reading a paperback book. This evolution of e-book culture can be credited to two factors: increased user control possibilities through different hand gestures and the incorporation of some unused space available on the tablet.

Although until now the user input for tablet PCs has been limited to the touch panel, the highlight of Professor Lee’s research is that it now allows the usage of the device’s formerly unused border portions, also known as bezels. Also, different forms of hand gestures recall different operations. For example, the factors considered when an input is received to turn pages are the number of fingers touching the screen, the speed of the drag, the duration of the touch and the gestures in the shape of numbers.

Due to the incorporation of new algorithms, e-books are now rendered in 3D, which means that one can skim through the contents of the text like a paperback book. Also, one can turn several pages at once with multiple fingers but without additional hand gestures. Furthermore, it is possible to move back and forth multiple pages using the finger bookmarking function. Despite the addition of all these functions, the basic interface and compatibilities will be kept the same, providing little means of discomfort for those who are already adapted to the current e-books.

This technology has been filed for a patent both nationally and internationally, and Jun Kyun Choi, the director of KI-ITC, commented that, “It is expected for this new research development to contribute to the rapid growth of mobile software technology.”