GENERATING AND DISPLAYING HYBRID CONTEXT MENUS

• US 20110093815A1
• Filed: 10/19/2010
• Published: 04/21/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 10/19/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: GOBEIL, CHARLES M.
• Granted Patent: US 8,572,509 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 715/825
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0482 Interaction with lists of selectable items, e.g. menus
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/44505 Configuring for program initiating, e.g. using registry, configuration files
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/451 Execution arrangements for user interfaces

Abstract

Hybrid menus can be generated and displayed, where the hybrid menus comprising primary and sub-menus having different geometries. Depending upon the context in which a user provides selection input for menu display, the context-appropriate model elements are retrieved from a tree model. A layout generation component transforms the tree model into a hybrid menu for display to the user.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method for dynamically generating context-dependent hybrid menus for display at graphical user interfaces comprising:

interpreting user input to the graphical user interface to determine input location and context;

selecting model elements representing menu items for said determined context;

generating a hierarchical model comprising the selected model elements; and

transforming the hierarchical model to generate a hybrid menu comprising at least one primary menu coupled to at least one sub-menu, at least one of the primary and at least one sub-menu comprising a radial menu.

2. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

displaying at least the one primary menu at the graphical user interface.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein the at least one primary menu comprises at least one indicator for user selection for display of at least one sub-menu and wherein the method further comprises:

receiving user selection input at said at least one indicator; and

displaying the at least one sub-menu associated with the selected indicator.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein each of said model elements comprise model element properties and wherein the generating of the hierarchical model comprises determining model element positioning in the hierarchical model based on the model element properties.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein the model element properties comprise at least one of a preferred menu display geometry property, a preferred angle property, and an explicit group property.

6. The method of claim 5, wherein said preferred menu display geometry property comprises at least one of radial and linear display.

7. The method of claim 5, wherein the preferred menu display geometry property indicates no preference whereby said transforming comprises automatic menu display geometry determination.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein said generating a hierarchical model comprises creating a tree model.

9. The method of claim 2, wherein said displaying comprises displaying a radial primary menu having segments and wherein said at least one sub-menu comprises at least one of a linear and radial sub-menu for selective display upon user input to at least one segment of the radial primary menu.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein said generating a hierarchical model comprises ordering model elements based on a frequency of use value for said model elements in the determined context.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein the frequency of use value comprises one of a predefined frequency value and a tracked frequency value for a given user.

12. The method of claim 1, wherein at least one menu comprises a radial menu having segments and wherein said transforming comprises applying a coupling constraint to couple at least one sub-menu with a corresponding radial menu segment.

13. The method of claim 9, wherein said displaying a radial primary menu comprises displaying a number of segments having icons.

14. The method of claim 13, further comprising selectively displaying labels for said icons based on user input.

15. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

at least one of adding and updating model elements based on newly added or newly enabled context features.

16. The method of claim 1, wherein the primary menu comprises a radial menu and further comprising applying dynamic model adjustment when the number of model elements for said primary menu exceeds or falls below a predefined optimal number of radial segments.

17. The method of claim 4, wherein the model element properties comprise a display geometry property, a preferred angle property, and an explicit group property, and wherein said transforming the hierarchical model to generate a hybrid menu comprises:

optimizing the hierarchical model based on the preferred menu display geometry property and the explicit group property for each menu item in the hierarchical model;

creating radial and linear menus of menu items from the optimized model, based on the preferred menu display geometry property of each menu item; and

arranging menu items within each menu using the preferred angle property for each menu item.

18. A system for dynamically generating context-dependent hybrid menus for display at graphical user interfaces, said system comprising at least one processing device for executing components and further comprising:

an input interpretation component for interpreting user input to the graphical user interface to determine input location and context;

a model element selection component for selecting model elements representing menu items for said determined context;

a model generating component for generating a hierarchical model comprising the selected model elements; and

a hierarchical model component for transforming the hierarchical model to generate a hybrid menu comprising at least one primary menu and at least one sub-menu of differing geometry.

19. The system of claim 18 further comprising at least one display generation component for displaying at least the one primary menu at the graphical user interface.

20. The system of claim 18 further comprising at least one storage location for storing said model elements.

21. The system of claim 18 wherein said hierarchical model component comprises:

a model optimizer for optimizing the hierarchical model based on a preferred menu display geometry property, an explicit group property and a priority weight factor property for each menu item in the hierarchical model;

a menu controller for creating radial and linear menus of menu items from the optimized model, based on a preferred menu display geometry property of each menu item; and

a layout generator for arranging menu items within each menu using a preferred angle property and a priority weight factor property for each menu item.

22. A computer program readable by machine tangibly embodying a program of instructions executable by the machine for performing a method for dynamically generating context-dependent hybrid menus for display at graphical user interfaces, said method comprising the steps of:

interpreting user input to the graphical user interface to determine input location and context;

selecting model elements representing menu items for said determined context;

generating a hierarchical model comprising the selected model elements; and

transforming the hierarchical model to generate a hybrid menu comprising at least one primary menu coupled to at least one sub-menu, at least one of the primary and at least one sub-menu comprising a radial menu.

23. An apparatus for dynamically generating context-dependent hybrid menus for display at graphical user interfaces comprising:

a processor for executing computer implemented instructions;

a memory that is a non-transitory storage medium that stores at least one computer program product comprising computer implemented instructions;

a bus for communicatively linking said memory and said processor, wherein said processor when executing the at least one computer program products is operable to;

interpret user input to the graphical user interface to determine input location and context;

select model elements representing menu items for said determined context;

generate a hierarchical model comprising the selected model elements; and

transform the hierarchical model to generate a hybrid menu comprising at least one primary menu coupled to at least one sub-menu, at least one of the primary and at least one sub-menu comprising a radial menu.