A new patent filing suggests that LG is not done with the rear-mounted buttons it introduced with the LG G2. On LG’s current flagship smartphone, the buttons work as volume controls and can also launch QuickMemo and the camera when they are long-pressed. On a future device, the button functions could depend on the app that is currently running, allowing it to fulfill many more functions than it currently does. For example, with the browser open, a swipe would scroll a web page while a tap might act as a Home function. When a call comes in, the same button might be used instead to decide to answer the call or send it to voicemail.
The filing shows that the button would be elongated to support the swiping gestures as well as presumably both short and long presses.
In another image, the patent filing shows how a button gesture could work in conjunction with one on the display. For example, in one situation illustrated in the figure below, “when the display module and the rear input unit are dragged in opposite directions, an image output on the display module may rotate along the dragging direction. With the image rotating, a two-dimensional (2D) image may be converted into a three-dimensional (3D) image.”
The patent was filed with the USPTO (United States Patent and Trademark Office) back in January 2013 and with the Korean Patent Office in July 2012.
While there is nothing in the patent to suggest that such a button will make it onto the upcoming LG G3, the fact that LG first filed it over a year ago does give us the hope that they have been working on it since then. Not only would the button be a natural evolution of the backside button first introduced with the LG G2 but it would give LG another feature that it could use to differentiate the LG G3 from its competition.
Source : Patent Bolt