Application Reporting in an Application-Selectable User Interface

• US 20160041730A1
• Filed: 10/21/2015
• Published: 02/11/2016
• Est. Priority Date: 12/23/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Inventors: Zaman, Nazia, Garside, Adrian J., Bush, Christopher T., Barcheck, Lindsey R., Leonard, Chantal M., Satterfield, Jesse Clay
• Granted Patent: US 9,766,790 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0481 based on specific properties of the displayed interaction object or a metaphor-based environment, e.g. interaction with desktop elements like windows or icons, or assisted by a cursor's changing behaviour or appearance
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/04817 using icons graphical or visual programming using iconic symbols G06F8/34
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0482 Interaction with lists of selectable items, e.g. menus
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/04842 Selection of displayed objects or displayed text elements G06F3/0482 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/107 Computer-aided management of electronic mailing [e-mailing]
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 50/01 Social networking
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/55 Push-based network services

Abstract

This document describes techniques for application reporting in an application-selectable user interface. These techniques permit a user to view reports for applications in a user interface through which these applications may be selected. By so doing, a user may quickly and easily determine which applications to select based on their respective reports and then select them or their content through the user interface.

Claims

1. A computing device comprising:

one or more computer processors; and

one or more computer-readable storage media having instructions stored thereon that, responsive to execution by the one or more computer processors, perform operations comprising;

receiving a report having a content change associated with an application along with an indication of a presentation format; and

presenting, within a selectable label associated with but not generated by the application and in the presentation format, content associated with the content change associated with the application.

2. A computing device as described in claim 1, further comprising, prior to receiving the report, enabling selection of multiple presentation formats.

3. A computing device as described in claim 2, further comprising determining the presentation format from the multiple presentation formats based on the indication.

4. A computing device as described in claim 1, wherein the report includes an image or image locator for presentation within the selectable label and according to the presentation format.

5. A computing device as described in claim 1, wherein the report includes text for presentation within the selectable label.

6. A computing device as described in claim 5, wherein presenting the content presents the text at an area within the selectable label indicated by the presentation format.

7. A computing device as described in claim 1, wherein the report includes a universal resource locator (URL) for the content and further comprising, prior to presenting the content, retrieving the content using the URL.

8. A computing device as described in claim 1, further comprising:

enabling selection, through the selectable label, to present other content associated with another content change to the application; and

responsive to selection, presenting the other content associated with the other content change to the application.

9. A computing device as described in claim 8, wherein presenting the other content presents the other content within the selectable label and according to the presentation format.

10. A computing device as described in claim 8, wherein presenting the other content presents the other content in another interface.

11. A computer-implemented method comprising:

receiving an extensible markup language (XML) report having;

an indication of a presentation format, and

a universal resource locator (URL) at which an image can be retrieved, or

text;

determining an area of a selectable label to present the image or the text based on the presentation format indicated in the XML report; and

presenting, within the selectable label associated with an application but not generated by the application, the image or the text at the area.

12. A computer-implemented method as described in claim 11, wherein the XML report includes the URL and further comprising retrieving the image using the URL.

13. A computer-implemented method as described in claim 12, wherein the XML report includes the text and the presenting presents the image and the text progressively and at different times.

14. A computer-implemented method as described in claim 12, wherein receiving the XML report is received from an entity associated with the application, the entity remote from a computing device on which the presenting is performed and retrieving the image retrieves the image from a source remote from the computing device.

15. A computer-implemented method as described in claim 11, wherein the presenting transforms the XML report into hypertext machine language (HTML) using an extensible stylesheet language transformation (XSLT) associated with the presentation format.

16. A computer-implemented method as described in claim 11, wherein:

the XML report includes the URL and the text and further includes a second URL at which a second image can be retrieved and second text; and

retrieving the second image and the second text based on the XML report.

17. A computer-implemented method comprising:

receiving multiple reports having multiple respective content changes associated with respective applications, a first report of the multiple reports having a first presentation format and a second report of the multiple reports having a second presentation format, the first and second presentation formats being different; and

presenting an application-selectable user interface having multiple selectable labels;

presenting, within a first of the selectable labels and in the first presentation format, first content associated with a first of the content changes; and

presenting, within a second of the selectable labels and in the second presentation format, second content associated with a second of the content changes.

18. A computer-implemented method as described in claim 17, wherein the first presentation format presents text and an image indicated in the first report and the second presentation format presents only text or only an image indicated in the second report.

19. A computer-implemented method as described in claim 17, wherein the first presentation format presents multiple content changes from multiple reports associated with the first application, the multiple content changes presented at on a rotating basis in the first of the selectable labels.

20. A computer-implemented method as described in claim 17, wherein the first presentation format presents multiple content changes from multiple reports associated with the first application, the multiple content changes presented at once within the first of the selectable labels.