Hierarchy of tools for navigation

• US 10,113,879 B2
• Filed: 04/16/2014
• Issued: 10/30/2018
• Est. Priority Date: 03/03/2014
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Apple Inc.
• Original Assignee: Apple Inc.
• Inventors: Moore, Bradford A., Weinberg, Joshua C., Fino, Jorge, Larus, Mark B., Barbour, Sarah G.
• Primary Examiner(s): Hammonds, Marcus
• Application Number:
  US14/254,282
• Publication Number:
  US 20150300832A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,658 Days
• Field of Search: 4554561-457, 340988-996, 701400-541
• CPC Class Codes: G01C 21/36 Input/output arrangements for on-board computers
• CPC Class Codes: G01C 21/3611 using character input or menus, e.g. menus of POIs character input methods in general G06F3/0233
• CPC Class Codes: G01C 21/3614 through interaction with a road map, e.g. selecting a POI icon on a road map
• CPC Class Codes: G01C 21/3617 using user history, behaviour, conditions or preferences, e.g. predicted or inferred from previous use or current movement
• CPC Class Codes: G01C 21/367 Details, e.g. road map scale, orientation, zooming, illumination, level of detail, scrolling of road map or positioning of current position marker
• CPC Class Codes: G01C 21/3676 Overview of the route on the road map
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/243 Natural language query formulation
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/248 Presentation of query results
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/29 Geographical information databases
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9537 Spatial or temporal dependent retrieval, e.g. spatiotemporal queries
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0482 Interaction with lists of selectable items, e.g. menus
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/02 Services making use of location information
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/024 Guidance services
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/12 Messaging; Mailboxes; Announcements

Abstract

Some embodiments provide a mapping application that provides a variety of UI elements for allowing a user to specify a location (e.g., for viewing or serving as route destinations). In some embodiments, these location-input UI elements appear in succession on a sequence of pages, according to a hierarchy that has the UI elements that require less user interaction appear on earlier pages in the sequence than the UI elements that require more user interaction. In some embodiments, the location-input UI elements that successively appear in the mapping application include (1) selectable predicted-destination notifications, (2) a list of selectable predicted destinations, (3) a selectable voice-based search affordance, and (4) a keyboard. In some of these embodiments, these UI elements appear successively on the following sequence of pages: (1) a default page for presenting the predicted-destination notifications, (2) a destination page for presenting the list of predicted destinations, (3) a search page for receiving voice-based search requests, and (4) a keyboard page for receiving character input.

Claims

1. A non-transitory machine readable medium storing a mapping application for execution by at least one processing unit, the mapping application comprising sets of instructions for:

presenting, on a display screen, a first user interface (UI) page for providing automatic predicted-location notifications and providing a first UI affordance for a list of predicted locations, wherein the first UI page does not provide a UI affordance for receiving a search query;

responsive to a selection of the first UI affordance for the list of predicted locations, presenting, on a display screen, a second UI page for providing the list of predicted locations and providing a second UI affordance for a verbal search query, wherein the second UI page does not provide a UI affordance for displaying alphanumeric characters for entering a search query through character input; and

responsive to a selection of the second UI affordance, presenting, on a display screen, a third UI page for receiving the verbal search query and providing a third UI affordance for displaying alphanumeric characters for entering a search query through character input .

2. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 1, wherein the mapping application further comprises a set of instructions for displaying alphanumeric characters for entering the search query through character input upon the selection of the third UI affordance.

3. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 2,

wherein the mapping application is for presentation on a screen in a vehicle.

4. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 1,

wherein the mapping application further comprises a set of instructions for providing an option to request a first navigation presentation or a second navigation presentation to a destination upon selection of an automatic predicted-location notification;

and

wherein the first navigation presentation provides maneuver instruction prompts at junctures along a route to the destination, while the second navigation presentation does not provide maneuver instruction prompts at the junctures along the route but provides distance information regarding the device'"'"'s distance to the destination as the device travels along the route.

5. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 4, wherein the selected automatic predicted-location notification presents the destination as a predicted destination.

17. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 1, the mapping application comprising sets of instructions for presenting, on a display screen, a fourth UI page for providing a list of different destination search results and routes to the different destination search results and for providing a fourth UI affordance for selection of a destination search result and displaying information of a plurality of routes to the selected destination search result.

18. The non-transitory machine readable medium of claim 17, the mapping application comprising sets of instructions for, responsive to a selection of the fourth UI affordance, presenting, on a display screen, a fifth UI page for displaying information of the plurality of routes to the selected destination search result and providing a fifth affordance for selection of one of the plurality of routes to the selected destination search result.

6. A method of hierarchically arranging location-input user interface (UI) elements in a UI of a mapping application, the method comprising:

displaying, on a display screen, a first map user interface (UI) page for displaying a map, providing automatic predicted-location notifications, and providing a first UI affordance for a list of predicted locations;

in response to a selection of the first UI affordance for the list of predicted locations, displaying, on a display screen, a second destination-list UI page for providing the list of predicted locations, and providing a second UI affordance for a verbal search query, wherein the second destination-list UI page does not provide a UI affordance for displaying alphanumeric characters for entering a search query through character input;

in response to a selection of the second UI affordance for the verbal search query, displaying, on a display screen, a third search UI page for receiving the verbal search query, wherein the second UI affordance and the third search UI page are provided to allow a location to be manually entered when the location does not appear as one of the predicted locations on the second UI page.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein the first UI page does not provide a UI affordance for receiving a search query.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein the second UI page does not provide a UI affordance for displaying alphanumeric characters for entering a search query through character input.

9. The method of claim 8,

wherein the mapping application is for presentation on a screen in a vehicle,

wherein the successive presentation of the first, second, and third UI pages and sequential providing of the first and second UI affordances represent hierarchal arrangements of the UI pages and UI affordances in which UI affordances that require less user interaction to specify a destination are presented before the affordances that require more user interaction to specify the destination.

10. The method of claim 6 further comprising displaying an option to request a first navigation presentation or a second navigation presentation to a destination upon selection of an automatic predicted-location notification, wherein the first navigation presentation provides maneuver instruction prompts at junctures along a route to the destination, while the second navigation presentation does not provide maneuver instruction prompts at the junctures along the route but provides distance information regarding the device'"'"'s distance to the destination as the device travels along the route.

11. An electronic device comprising

at least one processing unit;

a non-transitory machine readable medium storing a mapping application for execution by the processing unit, the mapping application comprising a user interface (UI) that comprises;

a first UI page for providing at least one predicted location;

a second UI page for receiving a verbal search query;

a third UI page for displaying alphanumeric characters for entering a character-input search query;

the first UI page providing a first UI affordance for viewing the second UI page for receiving a verbal search query but not a UI affordance for viewing the third UI page for displaying alphanumeric characters for entering a character-input search query; and

the second UI page providing a second UI affordance for viewing the third UI page,

wherein the second UI affordance and the third search UI page are provided to allow a location to be manually entered through the selection of alphanumeric characters.

12. The electronic device of claim 11, wherein the UI further comprises a fourth UI page that is presented before the first UI page and that provides (i) automatic predicted-location notifications and (ii) a third UI affordance for viewing the first UI page to view a list of predicted locations.

13. The electronic device of claim 11,

wherein the mapping application is for presentation on a screen in a vehicle,

wherein the successive presentation of the first, second, and third UI pages and sequential providing of the first and second UI affordances represent hierarchal arrangements of the UI pages and UI affordances in which UI affordances that require less user interaction to specify a destination are presented before the UI affordances that require more user interaction to specify the destination.

14. The electronic device of claim 11, wherein the first UI page does not provide a UI affordance for receiving a search query through character input.

15. An electronic device comprising

at least one processing unit;

a non-transitory machine readable medium storing a mapping application for execution by the processing unit, the mapping application comprising a user interface (UI) that comprises;

a first UI page providing automatic predicted-destination notifications;

a second UI page providing a list of predicted destinations;

a third UI page for receiving a verbal search query; and

a fourth UI page for receiving a search query through alphanumeric character input;

wherein;

the first UI page provides a first UI affordance for viewing the second UI page;

the second UI page provides a second UI affordance for viewing the third UI page and not a UI affordance for viewing the fourth UI page; and

the third UI page provides a third UI affordance for viewing the fourth UI page.

16. The electronic device of claim 15,

wherein the mapping application is for presentation on a screen in a vehicle,

wherein the successive presentation of the first and second UI pages represents hierarchal arrangements of the UI pages in which UI pages that require less user interaction to specify a destination are presented before the UI pages that require more user interaction to specify the destination.