Computer graphics processing and selective visual display system – Display driving control circuitry – Controlling the condition of display elements
Reexamination Certificate
1998-07-06
2001-10-09
Bayerl, Raymond J. (Department: 2773)
Computer graphics processing and selective visual display system
Display driving control circuitry
Controlling the condition of display elements
C345S215000, C707S793000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06300947
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to systems and methods for organizing viewing materials and, more particularly, to systems and methods for organizing viewing materials associated with web sites on visual display screens and windows on and within which the viewing materials, e.g., home or web pages, are being viewed.
Currently home or web pages, which are typically accessible over a wide area network (e.g., Internet), are designed without taking into account the variety of displays or windows on and within which they may be observed. Usually, only the most typical size of personal computer (PC) monitors are taken into account by web page designers. If such a web site is accessed from devices with small screens (e.g., palmtops, web phones), only small parts of the web pages can be viewed by users and, in order to access other parts of the web pages, users must move the respective home pages (left-right, down-up) across their displays. The only other options available to users of small screens is to convert the web site completely to a textual context. This is not an acceptable solution for most web site users. Conversely, if a user happens to have a relatively large display screen, the user can see a whole web page which may include several links. However, the user may need to activate several links, hierarchically, before he arrives at the link containing the needed information. The user of the larger display screen would be more satisfied if he could view the content of many links simultaneously, since the size of his display screen can accommodate such viewing. Similar problems occur if a user is viewing web pages in some window, or shell, whose size is only a fraction of a whole screen.
It is to be appreciated that the term “window” used herein is intended to refer to a graphical shell which is typically the outer layer of an applications program which provides the graphical user interface. Since the shell typically includes its own graphical symbols and format, the use of the shell results in only a fraction of the display screen being available to display web page data. Also, “window” may refer to the well-known graphical partitions employed by various software programs running under Microsoft Windows operating systems, which also result in only part of the display screen being available to display web page data.
A Netscape browser provides options for users to strip some specific bars and buttons from a menu, e.g., Jim Minatel,
Easy World Wide Web with Netscape
, Que Corporation, 1996. However, this frees only small amounts of a display screen or window and does not resolve the problem facing a user of not being able to display many objects associated with a web page.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The present invention provides organization of viewing material associated with web sites for visual displays and windows on and within which these web pages are being viewed. A different viewing-access strategy is provided for such visual devices varying, for example, from standard PC monitors, laptop screens and palmtops to webphone and digital camera displays, to any device, with a display, capable of web browsing, and from large windows to small windows. However, it is to be appreciated that the teachings of the present invention are not limited to implementation with the above-mentioned types of displays and one of ordinary skill in the art will contemplate usage with other forms of displays. A new web site design incorporates features that permit automatic display of the content of web pages in the most friendly manner for a user viewing this content from a screen or window of a certain size. For example, if a size of a display screen or window allows, links are displayed with some text or pictures to which they are linked. Conversely, if a size of a screen or window does not allow display of all textual and icon information on a whole screen or window, the web page is mapped into hierarchically linked new smaller pages that fully fit the current display or window. The unique display strategy of the invention is provided by a web page adaptation scheme that is implemented on a web site server, and also preferably partly incorporated on a client's computer such as in a web browser (e.g., as a java appelet). This adaptation strategy employs variables that provide size of screen and/or window information associated with the visual display from which a call to a web site was initiated.
Advantageously, any type of display device and associated screen can be provided by a user: e.g., webphone or palmtop. Also, any size window may be displayed on such screen. The display adaptor of the present invention efficiently provides for special marks to be incorporated into scripts (e.g., URL) which describe format and link hierarchy. For example, let a first page (in some standard format) have icons I1, I2 I3, and I4 and links L1, L2, L3 and L4. Assume that icons I1 and I2 have a common topic that can be represented by the icon I12 and icons I3 and I4 have another common topic that can be represented by icon I34. Similarly, assume links L1, L2 and L3 are related to some topic that can be represented by a link L123. Then, according to the invention, if the web site is viewed on a display that is much smaller than a standard display, the viewer sees, e.g., icons I12 and I34 and links L123 and L4, i.e., four items instead of eight items. In order to access I1 or I2, the user must select icon I12 (e.g., by clicking on the icon using a conventional computer mouse) and the icons I1 and I2 are displayed. Similarly, the user can view other hierarchically ordered links. Conversely, if the user views the web site on a screen that is larger than a standard display screen, not only are icons I1, I2, I3, I4 and links L1, L2, L3, L4 displayed, but some other icons and links that are hierarchically related to those items are displayed.
The present invention also preferably provides a semantic interpreter module that automatically decides how to fold or expand the content of web pages depending on a size of a screen or window without using preliminary marks left by web designers. This semantic module can be formed as a Finite State Automata (FSA) system whose states and arcs correspond to different web page appearances (e.g., links, titles, sizes of words, semantic interpretation words in links and titles, relative position of main items on pages). It is to be understood that FSA is a concept associated with a finite system whose states correspond to some situations and whose arcs correspond to some transition rules. An FSA system is among the simplest computing machines. FSA is well known in the art with extensive literature associated therewith, e.g., Gerald Gazdar & Chris Mellish, “Natural Language Processing in POP-11,” Addison-Wesley Publishing Co., New York 1989. As described therein, simple semantic notions may be represented in a formal language and instructions are provided on what should be done when certain semantic data is obtained. The most natural application for FSA are situations where, first, semantic notions should be associated with some input data and, second, rules should be produced on what actions should follow given semantic notions. As a consequence of this fact, an interpreter module, e.g. a semantic interpreter module can be represented as FSA. As an example, interpretation of a symbol “HR” may be considered as a decorative element. This interpretation could be done using FSA methodology in which states correspond to some words of URL script and to a size of a display that is available, etc. Rules (that are represented by arcs) would require actions, e.g. “underline” in some special way some words if HR was presented and there is enough space. But always underline words in some way if they represent links, since links are typically recognized as underlined words. More complex sequences of states and rules could be associated with interpreting of icons. Icons would be states, arcs would correspond to sequences of rules on extracting a content (other
Bayerl Raymond J.
F. Chau & Associates LLP
International Business Machines - Corporation
Luu Sy D.
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