Adding and removing white space from a document

• US 20060117254A1
• Filed: 01/17/2006
• Published: 06/01/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 05/10/2002
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Iwema, Marieke, Lui, Charlton E., Altman, Dan, Fox, Eric, Weil, Steve
• Granted Patent: US 7,735,007 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 715/252
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/103 Formatting, i.e. changing of presentation of documents automatic justification G06F40/189; automatic line break hyphenation G06F40/191

Abstract

A method, a computer system and a computer-readable medium having instructions for a processor stored thereon are provided for growing a page on a display. Input indicating a first position or designation of content on a page of an electronic document and an amount of white space to be inserted in the page is received. Responsive to the received input, at least some of the content of the page of the electronic document is moved to insert white space. The moving starts from a point based on the first position. The portion of the content being moved is moved a distance based on the amount of white space indicated in the received input. The page is grown by an amount based on the amount of the white space indicated in the received input. A respective size of other pages of the electronic document remains unchanged. Also provided are a method, a computer system and a computer-readable medium having instructions for a processor stored thereon for deleting a portion of a page and reducing a size of the page.

Claims

1. A system for adding space to a page of electronic paper displayed on a display, comprising:

means for receiving a designation of a location on a page of electronic paper containing content, the page being formatted to a first page size;

means for inserting space at the location in the page in response to receiving the designation;

means for moving a portion of the content on the page in response to the inserting; and

means for reformatting the page from the first page size to a second page size larger than the first page size based on the space inserted, the reformatted page at the second page size consisting of the content and the inserted space;

wherein the page is part of a document including a plural of pages and wherein the step of reformatting the page does not cause all of the other pages in the document to be reformatted.

2. The system of claim 1 wherein the designation includes an amount of space, the system further including means for determining that the amount of space if added to the page would cause at least some of the portion of the content of the page to not fit on the page formatted to the first page size.

3. The system of claim 2, wherein the difference between the second page size and the first page size corresponds to the minimum amount of space necessary for the at least some of the portion of the content of the page that would not fit on the page formatted to the first page size to fit on the page formatted to the second page size.

4. The system of claim 1, further comprising:

means for determining that available space exists within the portion of the content to be moved; and

means for removing a portion of the available space within the portion of the content to be moved,

wherein removing the portion of the available space allows a portion of the at least some of the portion of the content of the page to fit on the page formatted to the first page size.

5. The system of claim 1, wherein the page is part of a document including plural pages, the method further including reformatting the page size of other pages to the second page size based on the space inserted.

6. The system of claim 1, wherein reformatting from the first page size to the second page size includes increasing the width of the page.

7. The system of claim 1, wherein the designation is a complex path.

8. The system of claim 1, wherein the portion of the content to be moved is determined based at least in part on a structural component on the page.

9. The system of claim 1, wherein the moving of the portion of the content on the page includes modifying a structural component on the page.

10. The system of claim 1, wherein the designation is a line or lines separating content.

11. The system of claim 1, further including means for providing a scrolling control on a display displaying the page of electronic paper when the second page size of the page is too large to allow the page to be displayed on a single display screen.

12. A computer system comprising:

a processor;

means for displaying at least a page of electronic paper of an electronic document in which space will be inserted;

means for inputting a designation on a page of electronic paper of an electronic document;

means for receiving a designation of a location on a page of electronic paper containing content, the page being formatted to a first page size;

means for inserting space at the location in the page in response to receiving the designation;

means for moving a portion of the content on the page in response to the inserting; and

means for reformatting the page from the first page size to a second page size larger than the first page size based on the space inserted, the reformatted page at the second page size consists of the content and the inserted space

where the page is part of a document including plural pages and wherein the step of reformatting the page does not cause all of the other pages in the document to be reformatted.

13. The computer system of claim 12 wherein the designation includes an amount of space, and the process is configured to perform the further step of determining that the amount of space if added to the page would cause at least some of the portion of the content of the page to not fit on the page formatted to the first page size.

14. The computer system of claim 13, wherein the difference between the second page size and the first page size corresponds to the minimum amount of space necessary for the at least some of the portion of the content of the page that would not fit on the page formatted to the first page size to fit on the page formatted to the second page size.

15. The computer system of claim 12 further comprising:

means for determining that available space exists within the portion of the content to be moved; and

means for removing a portion of the available space within the portion of the content to be moved,

wherein removing the portion of the available space allows a portion of the at least some of the portion of the content of the page to fit on the page formatted to the first page size.

16. The computer system of claim 12, wherein the page is part of a document including plural pages, and the processor is configured to perform the further step of reformatting the page size of other pages to the second page size based on the space inserted.

17. The computer system of claim 12, wherein reformatting from the first page size to the second page size includes increasing the width of the page.

18. The computer system of claim 12, wherein the moving of the portion of the content of the page includes modifying a structural component on the page.

19. The computer system of claim 12, wherein the designation is a line or lines separating content.

20. The computer system of claim 12, further including means for providing a scrolling control on a display displaying the page of electronic paper when the second page size of the page is too large to allow the page to be displayed on a single display screen.