SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR A COMPUTATIONAL NOTEBOOK INTERFACE

• US 20200133638A1
• Filed: 10/26/2018
• Published: 04/30/2020
• Est. Priority Date: 10/26/2018
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Fujifilm Business Innovation Corp. (Fujifilm Holdings Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Fuji Xerox Company Limited (Fujifilm Holdings Corporation)
• Inventors: Wenskovitch, JR., John Edward, Zhao, Jian, Cooper, Matthew L., Carter, Scott
• Granted Patent: US 10,768,904 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9024 Graphs; Linked lists G06F16/9027 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/904 Browsing; Visualisation therefor for navigating the web G06F16/954; browsing optimisation for the web G06F16/957
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0484 for the control of specific functions or operations, e.g. selecting or manipulating an object, an image or a displayed text element, setting a parameter value or selecting a range
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/04847 Interaction techniques to control parameter settings, e.g. interaction with sliders or dials
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/313 Logic programming, e.g. PROLOG programming language
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/33 Intelligent editors
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/34 Graphical or visual programming
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/38 for implementing user interfaces

Abstract

Example implementations described herein are directed to an improved interface for a computational notebook that represents cells of the computational notebook in a graph form involving nodes and links. Through such an improved interface, the execution order of the cells can be immediately understood, as well as the dependencies between different cells of executable code and the variables contained therein.

Claims

1. A method, comprising:

for a first interface of a computational notebook comprising a plurality of cells, each of the plurality of cells comprising one or more of executable code and markdown, providing a second interface representing the computational notebook in a graph form comprising a plurality of nodes and a plurality of links linking the nodes, the nodes comprising representations of the plurality of cells;

for execution of a subset of the plurality of cells in the computation notebook, indicating a path through the nodes and links on the second interface indicative of an order of the execution of the plurality of cells.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

upon a highlighting of one of the plurality of nodes comprising the executable code, extracting the code from one of the plurality of cells corresponding to the one of the plurality of nodes;

presenting the extracted code corresponding to the one of the plurality of nodes for display; and

for modifications made to the displayed extracted code, modifying the one of the plurality of cells in the first interface according to the modifications.

3. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

providing, on one or more of corresponding nodes of the second interface and in a background of the interface, an indication of variables utilized in each cell of the plurality of cells.

4. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

upon a highlighting of one of the plurality of nodes, determining a representation of a chart associated with one of the plurality of cells corresponding to the one of the plurality of nodes; and

presenting the determined chart corresponding to the one of the plurality of nodes for display.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the graph is a force-directed graph, wherein the plurality of nodes are arranged according to similarity of variables used in corresponding cells such that a length of each of the plurality of links is representative of the similarity, wherein the representations of the plurality of cells comprises a first representation for ones of the plurality of cells comprising executable code, and a second representation different from the first representation for ones of the plurality of cells comprising markdown.

6. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

providing on the second interface, a time slider configured to provide one or more historical execution snapshots of the computational notebook;

for an interaction on the time slider to a specific time period, displaying the graph form of the computational notebook according to a corresponding one of the one or more historical execution snapshots.

7. A non-transitory computer readable medium, storing instructions for executing a process, the instructions comprising:

for a first interface of a computational notebook comprising a plurality of cells, each of the plurality of cells comprising one or more of executable code and markdown, providing a second interface representing the computational notebook in a graph form comprising a plurality of nodes and a plurality of links linking the nodes, the nodes comprising representations of the plurality of cells;

for execution of a subset of the plurality of cells in the computation notebook, indicating a path through the nodes and links on the second interface indicative of an order of the execution of the plurality of cells.

8. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 7, the instructions further comprising:

upon a highlighting of one of the plurality of nodes comprising the executable code, extracting the code from one of the plurality of cells corresponding to the one of the plurality of nodes;

presenting the extracted code corresponding to the one of the plurality of nodes for display; and

for modifications made to the displayed extracted code, modifying the one of the plurality of cells in the first interface according to the modifications.

9. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 7, the instructions further comprising:

providing, on one or more of corresponding nodes of the second interface and in a background of the interface, an indication of variables utilized in each cell of the plurality of cells.

10. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 7, the instructions further comprising:

upon a highlighting of one of the plurality of nodes, determining a representation of a chart associated with one of the plurality of cells corresponding to the one of the plurality of nodes; and

presenting the determined chart corresponding to the one of the plurality of nodes for display.

11. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 7, wherein the graph is a force-directed graph, wherein the plurality of nodes are arranged according to similarity of variables used in corresponding cells such that a length of each of the plurality of links is representative of the similarity, wherein the representations of the plurality of cells comprises a first representation for ones of the plurality of cells comprising executable code, and a second representation different from the first representation for ones of the plurality of cells comprising markdown.

12. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 7, the instructions further comprising:

providing on the second interface, a time slider configured to provide one or more historical execution snapshots of the computational notebook;

for an interaction on the time slider to a specific time period, displaying the graph form of the computational notebook according to a corresponding one of the one or more historical execution snapshots.

13. An apparatus, comprising:

a processor, configured to;

for a first interface of a computational notebook comprising a plurality of cells, each of the plurality of cells comprising one or more of executable code and markdown, provide a second interface representing the computational notebook in a graph form comprising a plurality of nodes and a plurality of links linking the nodes, the nodes comprising representations of the plurality of cells;

for execution of a subset of the plurality of cells in the computation notebook, indicating a path through the nodes and links on the second interface indicative of an order of the execution of the plurality of cells.

14. The apparatus of claim 13, the processor further configured to:

upon a highlighting of one of the plurality of nodes comprising the executable code, extract the code from one of the plurality of cells corresponding to the one of the plurality of nodes;

present the extracted code corresponding to the one of the plurality of nodes for display; and

for modifications made to the displayed extracted code, modify the one of the plurality of cells in the first interface according to the modifications.

15. The apparatus of claim 13, the processor further configured to:

provide, on one or more of corresponding nodes of the second interface and in a background of the interface, an indication of variables utilized in each cell of the plurality of cells.

16. The apparatus of claim 13, the processor further configured to:

upon a highlighting of one of the plurality of nodes, determine a representation of a chart associated with one of the plurality of cells corresponding to the one of the plurality of nodes; and

present the determined chart corresponding to the one of the plurality of nodes for display.

17. The apparatus of claim 13, wherein the graph is a force-directed graph, wherein the plurality of nodes are arranged according to similarity of variables used in corresponding cells such that a length of each of the plurality of links is representative of the similarity, wherein the representations of the plurality of cells comprises a first representation for ones of the plurality of cells comprising executable code, and a second representation different from the first representation for ones of the plurality of cells comprising markdown.

18. The apparatus of claim 13, the processor further configured to:

provide on the second interface, a time slider configured to provide one or more historical execution snapshots of the computational notebook;

for an interaction on the time slider to a specific time period, display the graph form of the computational notebook according to a corresponding one of the one or more historical execution snapshots.