METHOD AND APPRESS FOR CONTROLLING MULTITASKING OPERATIONS OF MOBILE TERMINAL HAVING TOUCHSCREEN

• US 20100066698A1
• Filed: 09/15/2009
• Published: 03/18/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 09/18/2008
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd.
• Original Assignee: Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd.
• Inventors: SEO, Kem Suk
• Application Number:
  US12/559,554
• Publication Number:
  US 20100066698A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 345/173
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2203/04803 Split screen, i.e. subdividing the display area or the window area into separate subareas
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2209/482 Application
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/04883 for inputting data by handwriting, e.g. gesture or text
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/4843 by program, e.g. task dispatcher, supervisor, operating system
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 1/72427 for supporting games or graphical animations
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 1/72436 for text messaging, e.g. short messaging services [SMS] or e-mails
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 1/72469 for operating the device by selecting functions from two or more displayed items, e.g. menus or icons
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 2250/16 including more than one display unit
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 2250/22 including a touch pad, a touch sensor or a touch detector

Abstract

A method and apparatus is provided for controlling the multitasking operations of a mobile terminal having at least one touchscreen based on the input signals corresponding to touch events detected on the touchscreen. A method for controlling multitasking operations of a mobile terminal having at least one touchscreen according to the present invention executes an application in response to a user request while at least one other applications is running, displays an execution window of an application selected from the currently running applications in an auxiliary screen in response to a touch event detected on the touchscreen, and displays the execution screens of the applications running concurrently, except for the application whose execution window is displayed in the auxiliary screen, in a main screen, accumulatively.

Claims

1. A method for controlling multitasking operations of a mobile terminal having at least one touchscreen, comprising:

executing an application in response to a user request while at least one other application is running;

displaying an execution window of the application selected from the currently running applications in an auxiliary screen in response to a touch event detected on the touchscreen; and

displaying the execution screens of the applications running concurrently, except for the application, of which execution window is displayed in the auxiliary screen, in a main screen accumulatively.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the touch event can be any of a drag event, a double click event, a flick event, and a flit event.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the main and auxiliary screens are implemented with two separate touchscreens.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein the auxiliary screen is activated to display the execution window of an application selected in response to a specific touch event.

5. The method of claim 3, wherein the execution window displayed in a foreground of the main screen is moved to the auxiliary window in response to a touch event.

6. The method of claim 5, wherein the execution windows displayed in the main and auxiliary screens are switched with each other in response to a touch event detected on the auxiliary screen.

7. The method of claim 3, wherein the main screen is split into multiple sub-screens for displaying execution windows of corresponding applications in response to a touch event detected on the main screen.

8. The method of claim 3, further comprising:

detecting an execution termination event for terminating one of the applications of which execution windows are displayed in the main and auxiliary screens;

terminating the application targeted by the execution termination event;

displaying the execution window of the most recently activated application in the main screen among the applications running in the back ground; and

closing the application execution window displayed in the auxiliary screen.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the main and auxiliary screens are implemented by splitting the touchscreen.

10. The method of claim 9, further comprising:

splitting the touchscreen into the main and auxiliary screens in response to a touch event detected on the touchscreen;

resizing the execution window of the most recently activated application in the non-split touchscreen to be appropriate for the auxiliary screen; and

displaying the resized execution window of the most recently activated application in the auxiliary screen.

11. The method of claim 10, further comprising:

resizing the execution window of the next most recently activated application in the non-split touchscreen appropriate for the main screen; and

displaying the resized execution window of the next most recently activated application in the main screen.

12. The method of claim 9, further comprising:

detecting an execution termination event for terminating one of the applications of which execution windows are displayed in the main and auxiliary screens;

closing the execution window of the application targeted by the execution termination event;

recovering the main and auxiliary screens into the non-split touchscreen; and

displaying the execution window of the most recently activated application among the currently running applications in the non-split touchscreen.

13. The method of claim 1, wherein the execution window of the most recently executed application is displayed in the foreground of the main screen and the execution windows of the other executed applications are rendered in the background of the main screen.

14. An apparatus for controlling multitasking operations of a mobile terminal having at least one touchscreen, comprising:

a display unit which provides at least one touchscreen for displaying execution windows of multiple applications running concurrently; and

a control unit which controls the display unit to define a main screen for displaying the most recently activated application in an execution window and an auxiliary screen for displaying an execution window of a recently activated application in response to a touch event detected on the touchscreen.

15. The apparatus of claim 14, wherein the touch event can be any of a drag event, a double click event, a flick event, and a flit event.

16. The apparatus of claim 14, further comprising a dual screen processor for splitting the touchscreen into the main screen and the auxiliary screen in response to a touch event detected on the touchscreen and designating the main and auxiliary screens for the execution windows of the applications.

17. The apparatus of claim 16, wherein the dual screen processor activates the auxiliary screen and displays the execution window of the application selected in response to a touch event.

18. The apparatus of claim 14, wherein the main screen and the auxiliary screen are implemented with two separate touchscreens.

19. The apparatus of claim 18, wherein the control unit moves the execution window of the applications displayed in the main screen to be displayed in the auxiliary screen in response to a touch event.

20. The apparatus of claim 18, wherein the control unit switches the execution windows displayed in the main and auxiliary screens with each other between the main and auxiliary screens in response to a touch event detected on the auxiliary screen.

21. The apparatus of claim 18, wherein the control unit splits the main screen into a plurality of sub-screens for displaying the execution windows of the applications designated to the main screen respectively in response to a touch event detected on the main screen.

22. The apparatus of claim 18, wherein the control unit terminates, when a touch event for terminating one of the applications of which execution windows are displayed on either the main or the auxiliary screens is detected, the application targeted by the touch event, displays the execution window of the most recently activated application except for the terminated application in the main screen, and deactivates the execution window displayed in the auxiliary screen.

23. The apparatus of claim 14, wherein the control unit runs, when a new application is executed, the previously executed application in a background mode of the corresponding screen.

24. The apparatus of claim 14, wherein the main and auxiliary screens are implemented by splitting the touchscreen.

25. The apparatus of claim 24, wherein the control unit splits the touchscreen into the main screen and the auxiliary screen in response to a touch event detected on the touch screen, resizes the execution window of the most recently activated application designated to the touchscreen to be appropriate for the auxiliary screen, and displays the resized execution window of the most recently activated application in the auxiliary screen.

26. The apparatus of claim 25, wherein the control unit resizes the execution window of the next most recently activated application designated to the touchscreen appropriate for the main screen and displays the resized execution window of the next most recently activated application in the main screen.

27. The apparatus of claim 24, wherein the control unit terminates, when an execution termination event for terminating one of the applications of which execution windows displayed in the main or auxiliary screens is detected, the application targeted by the execution termination event, recovers the main and auxiliary screens into the touchscreen, and displays the execution window of the most recently activated application among the currently running applications in the touchscreen.