ADAPTIVE PAGE LAYOUT UTILIZING BLOCK-LEVEL ELEMENTS

• US 20090171920A1
• Filed: 12/28/2007
• Published: 07/02/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 12/28/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: JACOBS, CHARLES E., WADE, GERALDINE G.
• Granted Patent: US 7,831,579 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/951 Indexing; Web crawling techniques
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9577 Optimising the visualization of content, e.g. distillation of HTML documents

Abstract

Computer-storage media, computerized methods and systems for formatting a page layout according to form factors of a display area are provided. Initially, search results are received and dynamically converted into respective block-level elements, where each of the block-level elements is associated with a portion of content from one of the received search results. Form factors are retrieved from a graphical user interface. Typically the form factors are associated with properties of a display area initiated to present the search results. At least one adaptive template is selected according to the retrieved form factors. The portion of content of each of the block-level elements is formatted based on at least one adaptive template. Also, the adaptive template is utilized to establish content panes within the page layout, as directed by the form factors. These content panes are populated with one or more of the block-level elements.

Claims

1. One or more computer-storage media having computer-executable instructions embodied thereon that, when executed, perform a method for formatting a page layout according to form factors of a display area on a graphical user interface (GUI), the method comprising:

receiving search results according to a query provided to a web-browser application;

retrieving the form factors associated with, in part, the display area initiated on the GUI to present the search results;

dynamically converting the search results into respective block-level elements, wherein each of the block-level elements is associated with a portion of content from one of the received search results;

selecting at least one adaptive template according to the retrieved form factors, the adaptive template specifying presentation attributes;

executing an application procedure to apply the at least one adaptive template to prepare the page layout, wherein the application procedure includes;

(1) automatically formatting the portion of content of each of the block-level elements based on presentation attributes specified by the at least one adaptive template; and

(2) establishing one or more content panes within the page layout;

populating the one or more content panes with one or more of the block-level elements; and

rendering the populated block-level elements within the display area initiated on the GUI, thereby presenting the formatted portion of content according to the presentation attributes of the at least one selected style sheet.

2. The one or more computer-storage media of claim 1, wherein dynamically converting the search results into respective block-level elements further comprises:

decoupling the portion of content from original formatting rules associated therewith; and

extracting the portion of content from each of the received search results.

3. The one or more computer-storage media of claim 1, further comprising:

providing a data structure that includes an ordering of the block-level elements; and

at least temporarily storing the block-level elements consistent with the ordering.

4. The one or more computer-storage media of claim 1, wherein the block-level elements are hypertext markup language division (HTML DIV) elements.

5. The one or more computer-storage media of claim 3, wherein the one or more content panes established within the page layout have boundaries that define a vertical dimension.

6. The one or more computer-storage media of claim 5, wherein populating the one or more content panes with one or more of the block-level elements comprises arranging one or more of the block-level elements into a content pane of the one or more content panes according to the ordering of the block-level elements within the data structure.

7. The one or more computer-storage media of claim 5, wherein populating the one or more content panes with one or more of the block-level elements further comprises:

calculating a height of a vacant space in the content pane by deducting a total height of the arranged one or more block-level elements from the vertical dimension of the content pane;

determining whether a placeholder that is representative of a height of a subsequent block-level element of the one or more block-level elements fits within the vacant space by comparing the calculated height thereof against the height of the placeholder;

if the placeholder fits, arranging the subsequent block-level element into the vacant space of the content pane; and

if the placeholder fails to fit within the height of the calculated vacant space, triggering an overflow condition.

8. The one or more computer-storage media of claim 7, wherein populating the one or more content panes with one or more of the block-level elements further comprises:

incident to identifying the overflow condition, determining whether another content pane of the one or more content panes is established to accept the block-level elements;

if the another content pane is established, arranging the subsequent block-level component therein; and

if the another content pane is not established, ceasing populating the one or more content panes.

9. The one or more computer-storage media of claim 8, further comprising:

identifying block-level elements of the one or more of the block-level elements that are first arranged into the one or more content panes according to the ordering; and

associating an index in a page-start list to the identified block-level elements, wherein the index indicates which block-level elements to arrange first when populating the one or more content panes.

10. The one or more computer-storage media of claim 9, further comprising:

detecting an indication of a user-initiated upward or downward scroll command; and

resuming populating the one or more content panes beginning with one of the block-level elements indicated by a respective index in the page-start list.

11. The one or more computer-storage media of claim 10, further comprising:

detecting an indication of a resize the display area command, the resized display area having modified form factors;

selecting a succeeding adaptive template based on the modified form factors, the succeeding adaptive layout including one or more content panes that conform to the resized display area; and

resuming populating the one or more content panes.

12. The one or more computer-storage media of claim 11, further comprising:

incident to detecting an indication of a resize the display area command, removing the indexes from the from the page-start list;

detecting the indication of the user-initiated upward scroll command; and

estimating the block-level element to arrange first based, in part, on a number of block-level elements presently populated within the display area.

13. The one or more computer-storage media of claim 1, wherein the presentation attributes specified by the at least one adaptive template automatically format the portion of content of each of the block-level elements by governing a visual styling of the portion of content, the visual styling including at least one of font color and typographic style of text.

14. The one or more computer-storage media of claim 1, further comprising:

maintaining a predetermined number of non-inserted block-level elements, wherein the predetermined number is based, in part, on a predicted number of block-level elements that can be populated within the display area; and

if the predetermined number of non-inserted block-level elements is reached, gathering additional search results.

15. The one or more computer-storage media of claim 14, wherein, incident to gathering additional search results, dynamically converting the additional search results into respective block-level elements, wherein dynamically converting the additional search results is conducted asynchronously with respect to populating the one or more content panes.

16. A computerized method for focusing a user'"'"'s attention to one of a plurality of search results presented within a display area divided into one or more content panes according to attributes of the display area on a graphical user interface (GUI) utilizing block-level elements, wherein each of the block-level elements is associated with a portion of content from each of the plurality of search results, respectively, the method comprising:

recognizing that one of the plurality of search results is selected;

identifying which block-level element is selected and which content pane of the one or more content panes contains the selected block-level element;

highlighting the identified block-level element such that the identified block-level element is visually distinct from the block-level elements when rendered on the GUI; and

highlighting the identified content pane such that the identified content pane is visually distinct from the one or more content panes when rendered on the GUI.

17. The method of claim 16, further comprising:

determining a format for highlighting the identified block-level element and the identified content pane by referencing an adaptive template, wherein the adaptive template is selected based on the attributes of the display area; and

presenting the identified block-level element and the identified content pane on a GUI according to the determined format for highlighting.

20. The computer system of claim 17, wherein the aggregation is temporarily stored at a website that is accessible by a uniform resource locator (URL) address that targets the website.

18. A computer system for formatting a page layout according to form factors of a display area on a graphical user interface (GUI), the system comprising:

a search-engine interface component for receiving search results and form factors, wherein the display area is initiated on the GUI to present the search results, wherein the form factors include criteria for configuring a page layout of the display area;

an element-generation component for dynamically converting the search results into respective block-level elements, wherein each of the block-level elements is associated with a portion of content from one of the received search results;

a selection component for selecting at least one adaptive template according to the criteria within the retrieved form factors;

a configuration component for automatically formatting the portion of content of each of the block-level elements based on the at least one adaptive template, and establishing one or more content panes within the page layout;

a population component for populating the one or more content panes with one or more of the block-level elements; and

a presentation component for rendering the populated block-level elements within the display area initiated on the GUI presented on a display device.

19. The computer system of claim 18, further comprising an aggregation component configured for:

recognizing user-initiated selections of the block-level elements, wherein selecting includes marking a selection area associated with the selected block-level elements;

aggregating the selected block-level elements; and

at least temporarily storing the selected block-level elements within an aggregation.