PROVIDING SUMMARY VIEW OF DOCUMENTS

• US 20120144292A1
• Filed: 12/06/2010
• Published: 06/07/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 12/06/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Lee, David B.
• Granted Patent: US 8,966,361 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 715/243
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/106 Display of layout of documents; Previewing

Abstract

As part of a document summary view system, a miniaturized version of a document is provided that presents a summary overview of the document over a user interface, enabling a user to easily read and distinguish the contents of the document. The summary view may preserve a basic format and/or layout of a document and may retain the core elements within the document including headings, bulleted lists, tables, images, and/or the first sentence of each paragraph, and obscure any remaining text and elements.

Claims

1. A method to be executed at least in part in a computing device for providing a document summary view, the method comprising:

identifying a layout and a format of a document;

selecting core visual elements of the document for producing an outline of the document;

creating the summary view by;

retaining at least a portion of the layout and the format of the selected core visual elements;

obscuring remaining visual elements; and

displaying the summary view of the document over a user interface.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the core visual elements include at least one from a set of:

a heading, a first line of each paragraph, an image, a heading row of a table, a table identifier, and a first level item of a bulleted list.

3. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

retaining at least one from a set of;

a font typeface, a font color, a font weight, and a text alignment of the core visual elements.

4. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

normalizing a font size of retained text such that a correlation of larger and smaller font size text is maintained, while a placement of largest amount of readable content on the screen is optimized.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein a font size proportion among different font size text of the core visual elements is modified as part of the normalization.

6. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

altering retained textual elements by one of;

lengthening and shortening a line of text to optimally fit a width of the summary view.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein obscuring the remaining visual elements comprises reducing the remaining visual elements to a size that renders them illegible in the summary view.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein the remaining visual elements are reduced to a height comprising one of one, two, three and four pixels.

9. The method of claim 7, further comprising:

inserting a buffer line at least one of above and below each obscured text line.

10. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

displaying the summary view in response to one of;

a change in a display orientation, a change in available display area, and a user gesture indicating one of a zoom and a shrink action.

11. The method of claim 1, wherein obscuring the remaining visual elements further comprises modifying a font color of the remaining visual elements to a lighter color in the summary view.

12. A computing device for providing a document summary view, comprising:

a memory storing instructions;

a processor coupled to the memory, the processor executing at least one document processing application in conjunction with instructions stored in the memory, wherein a summary view module of the document processing application is configured to;

identify a layout and a format of a document;

select core visual elements of the document for producing an outline of the document;

retain at least one from a set of;

a font typeface, a font color, a font weight, and a text alignment of the core visual elements;

obscure remaining visual elements by reducing the remaining visual elements to a size that renders them illegible in the summary view; and

send the summary view to a display device.

13. The computing device of claim 12, wherein the summary view module is further configured to automatically send one of the summary view and a full view of the document to the display device based on available display space on a displayed user interface.

14. The computing device of claim 13, wherein the computing device is a portable computing device and the available display space on the displayed user interface is determined automatically based on an orientation of the computing device.

15. The computing device of claim 12, wherein the summary view module is further configured to restore a portion of core and remaining visual elements in a user selected region of the summary view in a zoom mode.

16. The computing device of claim 15, wherein the summary view module is further configured to obscure lower level items in a bulleted list and other-than-first row cells in a table by reducing the lower level items and contents of the other-than-first row cells to a size that renders them illegible in the summary view.

17. A computer-readable storage medium with instructions stored thereon for providing a document summary view, the instructions comprising:

identifying a layout and a format of a document;

selecting core visual elements of the document for producing an outline of the document;

creating a summary view by;

retaining at least one from a set of;

a font typeface, a font color, a font weight, and a text alignment of the core visual elements;

obscuring at least a portion of remaining visual elements by reducing the portion of the remaining visual elements to a size that renders them illegible in the summary view;

retaining another portion of the remaining visual elements based on available display space on a displayed user interface; and

displaying the summary view.

18. The computer-readable medium of claim 17, wherein the core visual elements include at least one from a set of:

a heading, a first line of each paragraph, an image, a heading row of a table, a table identifier, and a first level item of a bulleted list; and

the retained remaining elements include at least one from a set of;

a second line of each paragraph, a second level item of a bulleted list, and a second row of a table.

19. The computer-readable medium of claim 17, wherein the instructions further comprise:

bidirectionally transforming a full view of the document to a summary view and the summary view to the full view in response to one of a change in the available display space of the user interface, a change in orientation of a portable computing device displaying the user interface, and a gesture indicating one of a partial and a complete zoom.

20. The computer-readable medium of claim 17, wherein the document includes one of:

a word processing document, a spreadsheet, a presentation document, an email, a calendar, a web page, a graphical document, and a report.