Information processing method and information processing apparatus

• US 20050018658A1
• Filed: 07/08/2004
• Published: 01/27/2005
• Est. Priority Date: 07/10/2003
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Canon Kabushiki Kaisha (Canon Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Canon Kabushiki Kaisha (Canon Inc.)
• Inventors: Ikeda, Hiromi, Hirota, Makoto
• Granted Patent: US 7,421,655 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 370/352
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/038 Control and interface arrangements therefor, e.g. drivers or device-embedded control circuitry
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/04817 using icons graphical or visual programming using iconic symbols G06F8/34

Abstract

M_IDs corresponding to “not available” and “recommended 1” in respective setup items are read, and images corresponding to “recommended 1” and “not available” are read (S803). An image indicating “not available” and that indicating “recommended 1” corresponding to respective setup items are displayed at neighboring positions of GUI components of the respective setup items displayed on the display screen (S804).

Claims

1. An information processing method, which is executed by an information processing apparatus that can make inputs by means of respective input modalities, comprising:

a read step of reading out use information from a storage which stores use information associated with use of respective input modalities corresponding to a predetermined process of the information processing apparatus; and

an output step of outputting information associated with states of use of respective modalities corresponding to the predetermined process on the basis of the use information read out in the read step.

2. The method according to claim 1, wherein the use information is information indicating whether or not each of the respective input modalities is available for the predetermined process.

3. The method according to claim 1, wherein the use information is information indicating whether or not use of each of the respective input modalities is recommended for the predetermined process.

4. The method according to claim 1, wherein the output step includes a step of displaying the information associated with the states of use of respective modalities corresponding to the predetermined process on a predetermined display screen.

5. The method according to claim 4, wherein the output step includes a step of displaying images indicating the states of use of respective modalities on the predetermined display screen.

6. The method according to claim 1, wherein the output step includes a step of outputting the information associated with the states of use of respective modalities corresponding to the predetermined process by speech.

7. The method according to claim 3, wherein the information indicating whether or not use of each of the respective input modalities is recommended is determined on the basis of at least one of an operation count and operation time of each input modality corresponding to the predetermined process.

8. The method according to claim 1, further comprising:

a detection step of detecting a state of the information processing apparatus, and

in that the read step includes a step of reading out the use information from the storage means that stores the use information associated with use of the respective input modalities corresponding to the predetermined process of the information processing apparatus on the basis of the state of the information processing apparatus detected in the detection step.

9. The method according to claim 1, further comprising:

an identification step of identifying a user on the basis of personal information which differs depending on an input user, and

in that the storage means stores the use information for each user, and

the read step includes a step of reading out use information corresponding to the user identified in the identification step from the storage means.

11. A program making a computer execute an information processing method of claim 1.

12. A computer readable storage medium storing a program of claim 11.

10. An information processing apparatus that can make inputs by means of respective input modalities, comprising:

read means for reading out use information from a storage which stores use information associated with use of respective input modalities corresponding to a predetermined process of the information processing apparatus; and

output means for outputting information associated with states of use of respective modalities corresponding to the predetermined process on the basis of the use information read out by said read means.