Shawn Lankton Online

I got an iPod shuffle several months ago, and coupled with my cord-free headphones, I am a very satisfied customer. The only problem was that with the iPod mounted securely to your left ear, its hard to see which button is which. This means that sometimes when you want to turn down the volume, you accidentally skip the track and a host of similar transposition of intent problems.

Well, I have found the solution. I needed to give the buttons some kind of tactile indicator. In this case of the shuffle, there is just one doughnut-shaped button. This button smoothly transitions from one function to the next, so you have to add something in order to know that you’re finger is over the appropriate function before you press. I turned to an old friend… superglue.

I put a dollop of superglue over each function. When the glue dried, it left a nice little bump that is feel-able, but doesn’t interfere with operation at all. If you do this to an iPod or other device, be sure to use gel superglue. If you don’t I imagine you’d be in for trouble. Also, keep in mind that it takes the glue several hours to dry when its in blob form I made the mistake of touching the “volume up” dollop too soon. The result is actually nicer though. Now there’s no bump over “volume up,” so I can tell the orientation.