Text processor

• US 5,802,533 A
• Filed: 08/07/1996
• Issued: 09/01/1998
• Est. Priority Date: 08/07/1996
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Walker Reading Technologies, Inc.
• Original Assignee: Randall C. Walker
• Inventors: Walker, Randall C.
• Primary Examiner(s): FETTING, ANTON W
• Application Number:
  US08/693,444
• Time in Patent Office: 755 Days
• Field of Search: 395/779-781, 395/788-791, 395/754-757, 434/178, 434/179, 434/184, 707/517-529
• US Class Current: 715/201
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/103 Formatting, i.e. changing of presentation of documents automatic justification G06F40/189; automatic line break hyphenation G06F40/191
• CPC Class Codes: G09B 17/04 for increasing the rate of reading; Reading rate control
• CPC Class Codes: G09B 5/065 Combinations of audio and video presentations, e.g. videotapes, videodiscs, television systems

Abstract

A text enhancement method and apparatus for the presentation of text for improved human reading. The method includes extracting text specific attributes from machine readable text and varying the text presentation in accordance with the attributes. The preferred embodiment of the method: extracts parts of speech and punctuation from a sentence, applies folding rules which use the parts of speech to determine folding points, uses the folding points to divide the sentence into text segments, applies horizontal displacement rules to determine horizontal displacement for the text segments, and presents the text segments each on a new line and having the determined horizontal displacement. Another embodiment displays text color based on parts of speech.

Claims

1. A method for enhancing text presentation comprising:

a) extracting text specific attributes from said text; and

b) varying said text presentation in accordance with said attributes, wherein said text specific attributes include a text difficulty measure, and said text presentation includes an automatic text advancement rate, and said presentation includes varying said text presentation rate in accordance within said text difficulty measure.

2. A method for enhancing text presentation as recited in claim 1, wherein said text difficulty measure includes an estimated pronunciation time of said text.

3. A method for enhancing text presentation as recited in claim 1, wherein said text difficulty measure includes an estimated educational level of said text.

4. A method for enhancing text presentation as recited in claim 1, wherein said text difficulty measure includes the number of syllables in said text.

5. A method for enhancing text presentation comprising:

a) extracting text specific attributes from said text; and

b) varying said text presentation in accordance with said attributes, wherein

i) said attributes include punctuation and parts of speech,

ii) extracting includes parsing said text into punctuation and parts of speech,

iii) said varied text presentation is implemented using rules having inputs and outputs, said rule inputs including said parts of speech, said rule outputs including said visual attributes,

iv) said enhanced text presentation includes visual attributes and said rule outputs include said visual attributes,

v) said rules include folding rules, said folding rules divide said text into text segments, said folding rule inputs include punctuation, said folding rule inputs include parts of speech,

vi) said visual attributes include the displaying of said text segments on new lines,

vii said rules include horizontal displacement rules,

viii said visual attributes include text segment horizontal displacement, and

viv said horizontal displacement rules include parts of speech as inputs and horizontal displacement as outputs.

6. A method for enhancing text presentation as recited in claim 5 further comprising:

a) accepting user edits of the displayed text folding points; and

b) storing the user edits in machine readable form.

7. A method for enhancing text presentation as recited in claim 6 further comprising:

a) accepting user edits of the displayed text parts of speech; and

b) storing the user edits in machine readable form.

8. A method for enhancing text presentation as recited in claim 6 further comprising:

a) accepting user annotations to the displayed text parts of speech; and

b) storing the user annotations in machine readable form.

9. A method for enhancing text presentation as recited in claim 5 wherein said folding rules include primary rules and secondary rules, wherein said primary rules include punctuation as inputs, wherein said secondary rules parts of speech as inputs.

10. A method for enhancing text presentation as recited in claim 9 wherein said folding rules further include a microgrammar for disambiguating said parts of speech.

11. A method for enhancing text presentation comprising:

a) providing a plurality of folding rules which utilize punctuation;

b) providing text segment horizontal displacement rules;

c) parsing said text into words and punctuation;

d) determining folding point locations in said text by applying said folding rules, utilizing said punctuation, thereby dividing said text into text segments;

e) applying said text segment horizontal displacement rules to said text segments, thereby determining a horizontal displacement for each text segment; and

f) displaying said text segments each on a new line, each displayed text segment having said determined horizontal displacement.

12. A method for enhancing text as recited in claim 11 wherein said folding rules utilize parts of speech as inputs, further comprising, determining the likely parts of speech of said words from said parsing step.

13. A method for enhancing text as recited in claim 12 wherein said text is a sentence.

14. A method for enhancing text as recited in claim 12 further comprising:

a) providing color display rules, wherein said color display rules include parts of speech as inputs and text color as an output; and

b) displaying said text according to said text color output.

15. A method for enhancing text presentation comprising:

a) providing folding rules utilizing parts of speech and punctuation marks, wherein said folding rules include primary rules and secondary rules, said primary rules utilizing punctuation marks and said secondary rules utilizing parts of speech, wherein said secondary folding rules include a micro-grammar for disambiguating the parts of speech;

b) providing text segment horizontal displacement rules, wherein the rules utilize parts of speech;

c) providing a minimum text segment length;

d) providing a maximum text segment length;

e) parsing said text into words and punctuation marks;

f) determining the likely parts of speech of the words from step e;

g) determining primary folding point locations in said text by applying the primary folding rules, thereby dividing said text into super-phrases;

h) determining secondary folding point locations in the super-phrases by applying the secondary folding rules, thereby dividing the super-phrases into text segments;

i) repeating step h until all text segments are no greater than the maximum text segment length, and no less than the minimum text length;

j) applying the text segment horizontal displacement rules to the text segments, thereby determining the horizontal displacement for each text segment; and

k) displaying each text segment on a new line, each text segment having the determined horizontal displacement.

16. A method for enhancing text presentation as recited in claim 15 further comprising:

a) accepting user edits of the displayed text folding points; and

b) storing the user edits in machine readable form.

17. A method for enhancing text presentation as recited in claim 15 further comprising:

a) accepting user edits of the displayed text parts of speech; and

b) storing the user edits in machine readable form.

18. A method for enhancing text presentation as recited in claim 15 further comprising:

a) accepting user annotations to the displayed text parts of speech; and

b) storing the user annotations in machine readable form.

19. A device for enhancing text presentation comprising:

a) a parsing means for parsing said text into words and punctuation marks;

b) a means for determining likely parts of speech for the words resulting from step a;

c) a means for determining folding point locations in the text including applying folding rules, which utilize said parts of speech and said punctuation marks, thereby dividing said text into text segments;

d) a means for determining text segment horizontal displacement applying text segment horizontal displacement rules to the text segments, thereby determining the horizontal displacement for each text segment; and

e) a means for displaying the text segments each on a new line, each having the determined horizontal displacement.

20. A device for enhancing text presentation as recited in claim 19 further comprising:

a) a means for selecting a color based on said parts of speech; and

b) a means for displaying said text according to said selected color.

21. A device for enhancing text presentation comprising:

a) a parser capable of parsing text into words and punctuation marks;

b) a table containing words and likely parts of speech corresponding to the words;

c) a folding point location determinator which applies folding rules which utilize parts of speech and punctuation marks, thereby dividing the text into text segments;

d) a text segment horizontal displacement determinator which applies text segment horizontal displacement rules and determines the horizontal displacement for each text segment; and

e) a text segment display for displaying the text segments each on a new line, utilizing the determined horizontal displacement.