“Feeling force”

Haptics are force sensitive devices able to remotely actuate real equipment or to interact with virtual reality models by returning feedback information from the reaction force to the performed action, which allows the haptic device and so the user, to feel the system response. Although they have been used by in PlayStations for a long time, they are not yet easily identified or recognized as relevant devices for real activities. The authors intend to broadly introduce the tangible idea of a haptic device and show them as new tools for achieving a deeper insight in many concepts. In order to reach this purpose a very elementary low cost haptic of 1 DOF will be used. Different applications are under development for allowing demonstrating the possible interaction with this 1DOF haptic device of low price in order to highlight the device capabilities and the usefulness of such technology in deepening knowledge and disseminating the concept of this type of tangible interfaces.