Electronic Book Reader With Closely Juxtaposed Display Screens

• US 20110289444A1
• Filed: 05/21/2010
• Published: 11/24/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 05/21/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Peter G. Winsky
• Original Assignee: Peter G. Winsky
• Inventors: Winsky, Peter G.
• Granted Patent: US 9,851,747 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 715/776
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 1/1616 with folding flat displays, e.g. laptop computers or notebooks having a clamshell configuration, with body parts pivoting to an open position around an axis parallel to the plane they define in closed position
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 5/64 Constructional details of receivers, e.g. cabinets or dust covers furniture aspects of television cabinets A47B81/06

Abstract

A portable electronic book reading machine has two display screens juxtaposed in close proximity to allow for automatic cross referencing between primary textual material displayed on the leftmost display screen and related secondary textual material displayed on the rightmost display screen. The machine has memory in which both primary text and secondary text are stored. As the user of the machine changes the page of primary text displayed on the leftmost screen display, ebook controller circuitry automatically refreshes the rightmost screen display to allow the user to cross reference between the primary textual material and the secondary textual material, or at his or her discretion to change the page of secondary textual material displayed, thereby fine tuning the juxtaposition of pages for study.

Claims

1. A portable electronic device for reading and studying electronic textual materials comprising:

a first housing containing an electrical power supply;

a second housing juxtaposed in a side by side manner with said first housing and electrically coupled to said first housing;

said first housing containing a first display screen;

said second housing containing a second display screen;

a primary electronic text having pagination information embedded therein for display page by page on said one of said display screens;

a secondary electronic text having pagination information embedded therein for display page by page on the other of said display screens;

user actuated primary page turning controls coupled to said first housing containing the display screen on which is displayed the primary text;

user actuated secondary page turning controls coupled to the other of said housings;

automatic page turning means responsive to the user'"'"'s actuation of primary page turning controls by which the page of secondary electronic text displayed is refreshed to reflect the page of primary electronic text chosen to be displayed by the user.

2. The portable electronic device of claim 1 in which said first housing is mechanically coupled to said second housing.

3. The portable electronic device of claim 2 wherein said mechanical coupling between said first housing and said second housing is a hinge mechanism whereby said primary and secondary display screens can be folded together in a face to face manner.

4. The portable electronic device of claim 1 in which said display screen on which is displayed the primary text is a touch screen display.

5. The portable electronic device of claim 1 in which said user actuated secondary page turning controls allow the user to change the page of secondary text displayed on said display screen after it is so refreshed.

6. The portable electronic device of claim 1 in which said automatic page turning means further includes a user actuated state control by which the user can override the operation of the automatic page turning means.

7. The portable electronic device of claim 5 in which said automatic page turning means further includes a user actuated state control by which the user can override the operation of the automatic page turning means.

8. A portable electronic device for reading and studying electronic textual materials comprising:

a housing containing an electrical power supply;

said housing containing a display screen;

said display screen being capable of being split into a primary display screen and a secondary display screen;

a primary electronic text having pagination information embedded therein for display page by page on said primary display screen;

a secondary electronic text having pagination information embedded therein for display page by page on said secondary display screen;

user actuated primary page turning controls coupled to said primary display screen;

user actuated secondary page turning controls coupled to said secondary display screen;

automatic page turning means responsive to the user'"'"'s actuation of primary page turning controls by which the page of secondary electronic text displayed on said secondary display screen is refreshed to reflect the page of primary electronic text chosen to be displayed by the user.

9. The portable electronic device of claim 8 in which said display screen is a touch screen display.

10. The portable electronic device of claim 8 in which said user actuated secondary page turning controls allow the user to change the page of secondary text displayed after it is so refreshed.

11. The portable electronic device of claim 8 in which the automatic page turning means further includes a user actuated state control by which the user can override the operation of the automatic page turning means.

12. A method for operating a portable electronic device for reading and studying electronic textual materials having two display screens juxtaposed in a side by side manner comprising:

providing a database operatively connected to the electronic device having at least two memory portions;

storing a primary electronic text in the first of said memory portions, said text having pagination information embedded therein to allow for page by page display;

storing a secondary electronic text in the second of said memory portions, said text having pagination information embedded therein to allow for page by page display;

accessing said primary electronic text and displaying the first page of said primary electronic text on one of said display screens, being referred to herein as the primary display screen;

accessing said secondary electronic text and displaying the first page of said secondary electronic text on the other of said display screens, being referred to herein as the secondary display screen;

allowing the user to choose the page of the primary electronic text to be displayed on the primary display screen;

automatically changing the page of the secondary electronic text displayed on the secondary display screen to reflect the page of primary electronic text then chosen by the user to be displayed on the primary display screen;

allowing the user to change the page of the secondary electronic text displayed after such automatic changing;

whereby the pages of primary electronic text and secondary electronic text are juxtaposed in the discretion of the user.

13. The method of claim 12 comprising an additional step of allowing the user to override the automatic changing of page of secondary electronic text displayed.

14. The method of claim 12 comprising an additional step of allowing the primary electronic text displayed to be automatically changed to reflect user actuated changes in the secondary electronic text displayed.