Displaying Scaled-Down Versions of Documents on Favorites and Recent Menu

• US 20080141120A1
• Filed: 02/19/2008
• Published: 06/12/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 06/03/1996
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Rovi Technologies Corporation (Adeia Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Goldman, Phillip Y., Anderson, David R., White, Christopher M., Ohlfs, Keith R., Leak, Bruce A.
• Granted Patent: US 8,234,592 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 715/252
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/957 Browsing optimisation, e.g. caching or content distillation
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9577 Optimising the visualization of content, e.g. distillation of HTML documents
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0236 using selection techniques to select from displayed items
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0481 based on specific properties of the displayed interaction object or a metaphor-based environment, e.g. interaction with desktop elements like windows or icons, or assisted by a cursor's changing behaviour or appearance
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/04812 Interaction techniques based on cursor appearance or behaviour, e.g. being affected by the presence of displayed objects
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/04817 using icons graphical or visual programming using iconic symbols G06F8/34
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0482 Interaction with lists of selectable items, e.g. menus
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/04892 Arrangements for controlling cursor position based on codes indicative of cursor displacements from one discrete location to another, e.g. using cursor control keys associated to different directions or using the tab key arrangements for controlling cursor position based on coordinate signals G06F3/038
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/04897 Special input arrangements or commands for improving display capability
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/65 Updates security arrangements therefor G06F21/57
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 2370/027 Arrangements and methods specific for the display of internet documents
• CPC Class Codes: H01H 9/0235 specially adapted for remote control, e.g. of audio or video apparatus
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/34 involving the movement of software or configuration parameters network booting or remote initial program loading [RIPL] G06F9/4416
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/329 in the application layer [OSI layer 7]
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 2242/22 Automatic class or number identification arrangements
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/46 Embedding additional information in the video signal during the compression process H04N19/517, H04N19/68, H04N19/70 take precedence
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/2383 Channel coding or modulation of digital bit-stream, e.g. QPSK modulation arrangements for detecting or preventing errors in the information received by adapting the channel coding H04L1/0009; analogue front ends or means for connecting modulators, demodulators or transceivers to a transmission line H04L27/0002
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/25891 being end-user preferences retrieval of video data in a video database based on user preferences G06F16/739; arrangements for recognizing users' preferences H04H60/46; user profiles in network data switching protocols H04L67/306; processing of user preferences or user profiles in wireless networks H04W8/18
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/42204 User interfaces specially adapted for controlling a client device through a remote control device; Remote control devices therefor constructive details of casings for the remote control device H01H9/0235; user interfaces for controlling a tuning device of a television receiver through a remote control H03J9/00; remote control of peripheral devices connected to a television receiver through the remote control device of the television receiver H04B1/205
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/42212 Specific keyboard arrangements
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4312 : involving specific graphical features, e.g. screen layout, special fonts or colors, blinking icons, highlights or animations
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4314 : for fitting data in a restricted space on the screen, e.g. EPG data in a rectangular grid
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4316 : for displaying supplemental content in a region of the screen, e.g. an advertisement in a separate window
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4331 : Caching operations, e.g. of an advertisement for later insertion during playback
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4355 : involving reformatting operations of additional data, e.g. HTML pages on a television screen optimising the visualization of content for information retrieval from the Internet G06F16/9577; adaptation of message content in packet-switching networks H04L51/066; media handling at the source in data packet switching networks H04L65/764
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4356 : by altering the spatial resolution, e.g. to reformat additional data on a handheld device, attached to the STB
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4382 : Demodulation or channel decoding, e.g. QPSK demodulation analog front ends or means for connecting modulators, demodulators or transceivers to a transmission line H04L27/0002
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4396 : by muting the audio signal
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/44012 : involving rendering scenes according to scene graphs, e.g. MPEG-4 scene graphs
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/440263 : by altering the spatial resolution, e.g. for displaying on a connected PDA
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4438 : Window management, e.g. event handling following interaction with the user interface
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4516 : involving client characteristics, e.g. Set-Top-Box type, software version or amount of memory available
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/454 : Content or additional data filtering, e.g. blocking advertisements
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4622 : Retrieving content or additional data from different sources, e.g. from a broadcast channel and the Internet web site content organization and management for information retrieval from the Internet G06F16/958; transmission by internet of broadcast information H04H60/82; stock exchange data over packet-switching network H04L12/1804; push services including data channel over packet-switching network H04L12/1859
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/47 : End-user applications
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4782 : Web browsing , e.g. WebTV
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4852 : for modifying audio parameters, e.g. switching between mono and stereo
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4858 : for modifying screen layout parameters, e.g. fonts, size of the windows
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/8113 : comprising music, e.g. song in MP3 format
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/8166 : involving executable data, e.g. software arrangements for executing specific programs G06F9/44; broadcasting computer programmes in broadcast systems H04H20/91; involving the movement of software or configuration parameters H04L67/34
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/8543 : using a description language, e.g. Multimedia and Hypermedia information coding Expert Group [MHEG], eXtensible Markup Language [XML] information retrieval of semistructured data, the underlying structure being taken into account, e.g. mark-up language structure data G06F16/80
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 5/445 : for displaying additional information H04N5/50 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 5/45 : Picture in picture , e.g. displaying simultaneously another television channel in a region of the screen
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 5/602 : for digital sound signals
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 7/147 : Communication arrangements, e.g. identifying the communication as a video-communication, intermediate storage of the signals selecting H04Q

Abstract

A system for accessing the World Wide Web or other information sources using the Internet incorporates scaled-down versions of images associated with recently-viewed documents or documents designated as favorites into a recent menu or a favorites menu, respectively. As a user accesses a Web page, a scaled-down version of the Web page is inserted into a recent menu. The user can view the recent menu and visually determine the identity of the recently-viewed Web pages, which allows the user to conveniently select Web pages to access. This recent menu also enables the user to access recently-viewed documents in any order, which does not need to be in the chronological order in which the pages were originally viewed or in a reverse chronological order. Scaled-down versions of Web pages designated as favorites are stored in the favorites menu, thereby assisting the user in recalling the content of the favorite documents.

Claims

1. In a client system in communication with at least one server system in a network, the client system having a processor and a display device and being capable of accessing Internet documents, a method of accessing a recently-viewed Internet document in response to a user selecting a scaled-down version of an image associated with the Internet document that is displayed to the user with scaled-down versions of images associated with other Internet documents, the method comprising the acts of:

in response to the client system accessing a plurality of Internet documents, maintaining information that identifies the plurality of Internet documents and designating the plurality of Internet documents as being recently-viewed;

displaying a document on the display device that includes scaled-down versions of images associated with the plurality of Internet documents;

receiving user input selecting the scaled-down version of the image associated with one of the plurality of Internet documents; and

in response to the user input, accessing and displaying on the display device said one of the plurality of Internet documents.

2. A method as recited in claim 1, wherein the act of receiving user input selecting the scaled-down version of the image associated with said one of the plurality of Internet documents is conducted as part of receiving user input selecting a series of scaled-down versions of the images associated with a series of the plurality of Internet documents, wherein the series of Internet documents are accessed and displayed without regard to any chronological order in which said plurality of Internet documents were originally accessed.

3. A method as recited in claim 1, wherein the act of maintaining information comprises the act of storing titles and addresses associated with the plurality of Internet documents.

4. A method as recited in claim 1, wherein the act of displaying the document comprises the act of displaying in the document the titles associated with the plurality of Internet documents.

5. A method as recited in claim 1, wherein the act of maintaining information comprises the act of storing the scaled-down versions of the images associated with the plurality of Internet documents.

6. A method as recited in claim 5, wherein the act of maintaining information further comprises the act of scaling down full-sized versions of the images associated with the plurality of Internet documents.

7. A method as recited in claim 1, wherein the scaled-down versions of the images are included in the document in a row-and-column format.

8. A method as recited in claim 1, wherein the scaled-down versions of the images are included in the document in a format without regard to any tree hierarchy representing relationships between Internet documents of the plurality of Internet documents.

23. A method as recited in claim 1, wherein a plurality of client systems are in communication with one or more server systems, each of the client systems being capable of accessing Internet documents, and wherein at least one of the plurality of client systems uses a television as a display device, the method further comprising the act of scaling down a visual representation of each of the recently-viewed Internet documents such that the document may be displayed without horizontal scrolling.

9. In a server system in communication with a client system in a network, the server system providing the client system with access to Internet documents, a method of enabling a user of the client system to select an Internet document that has been designated as a favorite, the method comprising the acts of:

receiving information from the client system indicating that a user of the client system has designated an Internet document as being a favorite Internet document;

adding a scaled-down version of an image associated with the favorite Internet document to a favorites document that is configured to include scaled-down versions of images associated with other favorite Internet documents; and

transmitting the favorites document to the client system for display at the client system, such that a user of the client system can access a selected one of the favorite Internet documents by selecting the scaled-down version of the image associated with the selected favorite Internet document.

10. A method as recited in claim 9, further comprising the act of including titles and addresses associated with the plurality of Internet documents in the favorites document, such that the client can directly access the selected favorite Internet document using the address associated with the selected favorite Internet document.

11. A method as recited in claim 9, wherein the act of adding the scaled-down version of the image to the favorites document comprises the act of retrieving the image from a cache maintained by the server.

12. A method as recited in claim 9, wherein the act of adding the scaled-down version of the image to the favorites document comprises the act of retrieving the image from an Internet server using an address associated with the favorite Internet document.

13. A method as recited in claim 9, further comprising the acts of:

receiving information from the client system indicating that the user has selected the scaled-down version of the image associated with the selected one of the favorite Internet documents; and

providing the client system with access to the selected favorite Internet document.

14. A method as recited in claim 13, wherein the act of providing the client system with access to the selected favorite Internet document comprises the act of the server retrieving the selected favorite Internet document from an Internet server using an address associated with the selected favorite Internet document.

15. A method as recited in claim 9, wherein the scaled-down versions of the images are included in the document in a row-and-column format.

24. A method as recited in claim 9, wherein a plurality of client systems are in communication with one or more server systems, each of the client systems being capable of accessing Internet documents, and wherein at least one of the plurality of client systems uses a television as a display device, the method further comprising the act of scaling down a visual representation of the identified favorite Internet document such that the favorites document may be displayed without horizontal scrolling.

16. In a client system in communication with at least one server system in a network, the client system having a processor and a display device and being capable of accessing Internet documents, a method of accessing a favorite Internet document in response to a user selecting a scaled-down version of an image associated with the favorite Internet document that is displayed to the user with scaled-down versions of images associated with other favorite Internet documents, the method comprising the acts of:

receiving user input identifying an Internet document as being a favorite Internet document;

in response to the user input, adding a scaled-down version of an image associated with the favorite Internet document to a favorites document stored at the client, the favorites document being configured to include scaled-down versions of images associated with other favorite Internet documents;

displaying the favorites document on the display device;

receiving user input selecting the scaled-down version of the image associated with a selected one of the favorite Internet documents; and

in response to the user input, accessing and displaying on the display device said selected one of the favorite Internet documents.

17. A method as recited in claim 16, further comprising the act of storing titles and addresses and title associated with the favorite Internet documents.

18. A method as recited in claim 17, wherein the act of displaying the favorites document comprises the act of displaying in the favorites document the titles associated with the favorite Internet documents.

19. A method as recited in claim 16, wherein the act of adding the scaled-down version of the image to the favorites document comprises the act of scaling down a full-sized version of the image associated with the favorite Internet document.

20. A method as recited in claim 16, wherein the scaled-down versions of the images are included in the favorites document in a row-and-column format.

21. A method as recited in claim 16, wherein the act of accessing said selected favorite Internet document comprises the act of transmitting an address associated with said selected favorite Internet document to a proxying server, which in turn access the selected favorite Internet document using the address.

22. A method as recited in claim 16, wherein the act of accessing said selected favorite Internet document comprises the act of using an address associated with said selected favorite Internet document without transmitting the address to a proxying server.

25. A method as recited in claim 16, wherein a plurality of client systems are in communication with one or more server systems, each of the client systems being capable of accessing Internet documents, and wherein at least one of the plurality of client systems uses a television as a display device, the method further comprising the act of scaling down a visual representation of the favorite Internet document such that the favorites document may be displayed without horizontal scrolling.

26. In a client system in communication with at least one server system in a network, the client system having a processor and a display device and being capable of accessing Internet documents, a method of accessing a recently-viewed Internet document comprising acts of:

in response to the client system accessing a plurality of Internet documents, maintaining information that identifies each of the plurality of Internet documents and that designates each of the plurality of Internet documents as being recently-viewed;

scaling down a visual representation of each of the recently-viewed Internet documents;

at the client system which accessed said plurality of Internet documents, displaying the scaled-down visual representations of the recently-viewed Internet documents;

receiving user input selecting a specific scaled-down visual representation of a specific recently-viewed Internet document; and

in response to the user input, accessing and displaying the specific recently-viewed Internet document.

27. A method as recited in claim 26, wherein the act of maintaining information comprises the act of storing titles and addresses associated with each of the plurality of Internet documents.

28. A method as recited in claim 26, wherein the act of scaling down a visual representation of each of the recently-viewed Internet documents comprises the act of scaling down a full-sized image of each of the recently-viewed Internet documents so that each scaled-down visual representation may be displayed without horizontal scrolling.

29. A method as recited in claim 26, wherein the specific recently-viewed Internet document includes one or more selectables leading to one or more other Internet documents, one of the one or more selectables having been selected when the specific recently-viewed Internet document was viewed, and wherein the act of maintaining information comprises an act of storing the selected one of the one or more selectables, the method further comprising an act of indicating the selected one of the one or more selectables as a current selection when the specific recently-viewed Internet document is accessed and displayed.

30. A method as recited in claim 29, wherein the act of indicating includes an act of highlighting the selected one of the one or more selectables.

31. A method as recited in claim 26, wherein a plurality of client systems are in communication with one or more server systems, each of the client systems being capable of accessing Internet documents, and wherein at least one of the plurality of client systems uses a television as a display device.

32. In a client system in communication with at least one server system in a network, the client system having a processor and a display device and being capable of accessing Internet documents, a computer program product comprising a computer readable medium carrying computer executable instructions that implement a method of accessing a recently-viewed Internet document in response to a user selecting a scaled-down version of an image associated with the Internet document that is displayed to the user with scaled-down versions of images associated with other Internet documents, the method comprising acts of:

in response to the client system accessing a plurality of Internet documents, maintaining information that identifies the plurality of Internet documents and designating the plurality of Internet documents as being recently-viewed;

displaying a document on the display device that includes scaled-down versions of images associated with the plurality of Internet documents;

receiving user input selecting the scaled-down version of the image associated with one of the plurality of Internet documents; and

in response to the user input, accessing and displaying on the display device said one of the plurality of Internet documents.

33. A computer program product as recited in claim 32, wherein the act of receiving user input selecting the scaled-down version of the image associated with said one of the plurality of Internet documents is conducted as part of receiving user input selecting a series of scaled-down versions of the images associated with a series of the plurality of Internet documents, wherein the series of Internet documents are accessed and displayed without regard to any chronological order in which said plurality of Internet documents were originally accessed.

34. A computer program product as recited in claim 32, wherein the act of maintaining information comprises the act of storing titles and addresses associated with the plurality of Internet documents.

35. A computer program product as recited in claim 32, wherein the act of displaying the document comprises the act of displaying in the document the titles associated with the plurality of Internet documents.

36. A computer program product as recited in claim 32, wherein the act of maintaining information comprises the act of storing the scaled-down versions of the images associated with the plurality of Internet documents.

37. A computer program product as recited in claim 32, wherein the scaled-down versions of the images are included in the document in a format without regard to any tree hierarchy representing relationships between Internet documents of the plurality of Internet documents.

38. In a client system in communication with at least one server system in a network, the client system having a processor and a display device and being capable of accessing Internet documents, a computer program product comprising a computer-readable medium carrying computer-executable instructions that implement a method of accessing a favorite Internet document in response to a user selecting a scaled-down version of an image associated with the favorite Internet document that is displayed to the user with scaled-down versions of images associated with other favorite Internet documents, the method comprising the acts of:

receiving user input identifying an Internet document as being a favorite Internet document;

in response to the user input, adding a scaled-down version of an image associated with the favorite Internet document to a favorites document stored at the client, the favorites document including other scaled-down versions of images associated with other favorite Internet documents;

displaying the favorites document on the display device;

receiving user input selecting the scaled-down version of the image associated with a selected one of the favorite Internet documents; and

in response to the user input, accessing and displaying on the display device said selected one of the favorite Internet documents.

39. A computer program product as recited in claim 38, wherein the method further comprises an act of storing titles and addresses and title associated with the favorite Internet documents.

40. A computer program product as recited in claim 39, wherein the act of displaying the favorites document comprises the act of displaying in the favorites document the titles associated with the favorite Internet documents.

41. A computer program product as recited in claim 38, wherein the act of adding the scaled-down version of the image to the favorites document comprises the act of scaling down a full-sized version of the image associated with the favorite Internet document.

42. A computer program product as recited in claim 38, wherein the act of accessing said selected favorite Internet document comprises the act of transmitting an address associated with said selected favorite Internet document to a proxying server, which in turn access the selected favorite Internet document using the address.

43. A computer program product as recited in claim 38, wherein the act of accessing said selected favorite Internet document comprises the act of using an address associated with said selected favorite Internet document without transmitting the address to a proxying server.