PROVIDING USER-INTERACTIVE GRAPHICAL TIMELINES

• US 20160313876A1
• Filed: 04/22/2016
• Published: 10/27/2016
• Est. Priority Date: 04/22/2015
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: Google LLC (Alphabet Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Google Inc. (Alphabet Inc.)
• Inventors: Dong, Xin, Althoff, Christopher Tim, Alai, Safa, Dang, Van, Zhang, Wei, Murphy, Kevin Patrick
• Application Number:
  US15/136,657
• Publication Number:
  US 20160313876A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/248 Presentation of query results
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/435 Filtering based on additional data, e.g. user or group profiles
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2203/04806 Zoom, i.e. interaction techniques or interactors for controlling the zooming operation
• 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: G06F 3/04845 for image manipulation, e.g. dragging, rotation, expansion or change of colour
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 11/206 Drawing of charts or graphs

Abstract

Methods, systems, and apparatus, including computer programs encoded on computer storage media, for combining authentication and application shortcut. An example method includes responsive to a user request identifying an entity: identifying a first time period associated with the entity based at least on a type of the entity; determining, within the first time period, a plurality of first candidate entities associated with the first entity; selecting first entities in the plurality of first candidate entities according to one or more selection criteria; and providing, for presentation to the user, first user-selectable graphical elements on a first graphical user-interactive timeline. Each first user-selectable graphical element identifies a corresponding first entity in the first entities.

Claims

1. A system comprising:

one or more computers; and

one or more storage units storing instructions that when executed by the one or more computers cause the system to perform operations comprising;

responsive to a user request identifying an entity;

identifying a first time period associated with the entity based at least on a type of the entity;

determining, within the first time period, a plurality of first candidate entities associated with the first entity;

selecting first entities in the plurality of first candidate entities according to one or more selection criteria; and

providing, for presentation to the user, first user-selectable graphical elements on a first graphical user-interactive timeline, wherein each first user-selectable graphical element identifies a corresponding first entity in the first entities.

2. The system of claim 1, the operations further comprising:

responsive to a zoom request associated with the first graphical user-interactive timeline;

identifying a second time period in accordance with the zoom request and the first time period;

identifying, within second time period, a plurality of second candidate entities associated with the entity;

selecting second entities in the plurality of second candidate entities; and

providing, for presentation to a user, a plurality of second user-selectable graphical elements on a second graphical user-interactive timeline, wherein each second user-selectable graphical element identifies a second entity in the second entities.

3. The system of claim 2, wherein identifying a second time period in accordance with the zoom request and the first time period comprises:

responsive to determining that the zoom request is a zoom-in request;

selecting a subset of the first time period as the second time period.

4. The system of claim 2, wherein identifying a second time period in accordance with the zoom request and the first time period comprises:

responsive to determining that the zoom request is a zoom-out request;

selecting a superset of the first time period as the second time period.

5. The system of claim 1, wherein each first user-selectable graphical element includes a thumbnail image identifying the corresponding first entity.

6. The system of claim 1, wherein the one or more selection criteria include one or more of:

a relevance criterion, a temporal diversity criterion, or a content diversity criterion.

7. The system of claim 1, the operations further comprising:

responsive to a user selection of a first user-selectable graphical element;

identifying a first entity identified by the first user-selectable graphical element time;

identifying a second time period associated with the first entity;

identifying, within the second time period, a plurality of second entities associated with the first entity; and

providing, for presentation to a user, a plurality of second user-selectable graphical elements on a second graphical user-interactive timeline, wherein each second user-selectable graphical element identifies a second entity in the plurality of second entities.

8. The system of claim 1, wherein a first entity in the first entities identifies an event or a person.

9. The system of claim 1, wherein the determining the plurality of first candidate entities associated with the first entity includes is based on a relationship between the first entity and a plurality of entities and a timestamp associated with each entity of the plurality of entities.

10. The system of claim 1, wherein selecting the first entities includes selecting the first entities based at least in part on a height and width of the first graphical user-interactive timeline.

11. The system of claim 1, wherein the one or more selection criteria include a content diversity criteria, wherein content diversity provides a diverse group of first entities including selecting entities of different types from among the first candidate entities.

12. The system of claim 1, wherein the one or more selection criteria include a content diversity criteria, wherein content diversity provides a diverse group of first entities such that the selection is based on a width and height of a graphical element representing an entity presenting on the timeline and a total number of graphical elements that may be stacked on each other when presented on the timeline.

13. The system of claim 1, wherein the one or more selection criteria include a temporal diversity criterion, wherein the temporal diversity criterion specifies that graphic elements representing a number of the selected first entities fit into the timeline having a specified width and height without overlap.

15. The method of claim 9, further comprising:

responsive to a zoom request associated with the first graphical user-interactive timeline;

identifying a second time period in accordance with the zoom request and the first time period;

identifying, within second time period, a plurality of second candidate entities associated with the entity;

selecting second entities in the plurality of second candidate entities; and

providing, for presentation to a user, a plurality of second user-selectable graphical elements on a second graphical user-interactive timeline, wherein each second user-selectable graphical element identifies a second entity in the second entities.

16. The method of claim 10, wherein identifying a second time period in accordance with the zoom request and the first time period comprises:

responsive to determining that the zoom request is a zoom-in request;

selecting a subset of the first time period as the second time period.

17. The method of claim 10, wherein identifying a second time period in accordance with the zoom request and the first time period comprises:

responsive to determining that the zoom request is a zoom-out request;

selecting a superset of the first time period as the second time period.

18. The method of claim 9, wherein each first user-selectable graphical element includes a thumbnail image identifying the corresponding first entity.

19. The method of claim 9, wherein the one or more selection criteria include one or more of:

a relevance criterion, a temporal diversity criterion, or a content diversity criterion.

20. The method of claim 9, further comprising:

responsive to a user selection of a first user-selectable graphical element;

identifying a first entity identified by the first user-selectable graphical element time;

identifying a second time period associated with the first entity;

identifying, within the second time period, a plurality of second entities associated with the first entity; and

presenting, to a user, a plurality of second user-selectable graphical elements on a second graphical user-interactive timeline, wherein each second user-selectable graphical element identifies a second entity in the plurality of second entities.

14. A method comprising:

responsive to a user request identifying an entity;

identifying a first time period associated with the entity based at least on a type of the entity;

determining, within the first time period, a plurality of first candidate entities associated with the first entity;

selecting first entities in the plurality of first candidate entities according to one or more selection criteria; and

providing, for presentation to the user, first user-selectable graphical elements on a first graphical user-interactive timeline, wherein each first user-selectable graphical element identifies a corresponding first entity in the first entities.

21. A non-transitory computer storage medium encoded with a computer program, the computer program comprising instructions that when executed by a computing system cause the computing system to perform operations comprising:

responsive to a user request identifying an entity;

identifying a first time period associated with the entity based at least on a type of the entity;

determining, within the first time period, a plurality of first candidate entities associated with the first entity;

selecting first entities in the plurality of first candidate entities according to one or more selection criteria; and

providing, for presentation to the user, first user-selectable graphical elements on a first graphical user-interactive timeline, wherein each first user-selectable graphical element identifies a corresponding first entity in the first entities.