Web browser allowing navigation between hypertext objects using remote control

• US 6,034,689 A
• Filed: 06/03/1996
• Issued: 03/07/2000
• Est. Priority Date: 06/03/1996
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Rovi Technologies Corporation (Adeia Inc.)
• Original Assignee: WebTV Networks Inc. (Microsoft Corporation)
• Inventors: Ohlfs, Keith R., Goldman, Phillip Y., Anderson, David R., White, Christopher M., Leak, Bruce A.
• Primary Examiner(s): SAX, STEVEN PAUL
• Application Number:
  US08/660,088
• Time in Patent Office: 1,373 Days
• Field of Search: 345/357, 345/356, 345/355, 345/327, 345/328, 345/326, 345/329, 345/330-339, 345/340-354, 707/151, 707/11
• US Class Current: 715/854
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/957 Browsing optimisation, e.g. caching or content distillation
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9577 Optimising the visualization of content, e.g. distillation of HTML documents
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0236 using selection techniques to select from displayed items
• 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 3/04812 Interaction techniques based on cursor appearance or behaviour, e.g. being affected by the presence of displayed objects
• 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 3/04892 Arrangements for controlling cursor position based on codes indicative of cursor displacements from one discrete location to another, e.g. using cursor control keys associated to different directions or using the tab key arrangements for controlling cursor position based on coordinate signals G06F3/038
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/04897 Special input arrangements or commands for improving display capability
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/65 Updates security arrangements therefor G06F21/57
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 2370/027 Arrangements and methods specific for the display of internet documents
• CPC Class Codes: H01H 9/0235 specially adapted for remote control, e.g. of audio or video apparatus
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/34 involving the movement of software or configuration parameters network booting or remote initial program loading [RIPL] G06F9/4416
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/329 in the application layer [OSI layer 7]
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 2242/22 Automatic class or number identification arrangements
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 19/46 Embedding additional information in the video signal during the compression process H04N19/517, H04N19/68, H04N19/70 take precedence
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/2383 Channel coding or modulation of digital bit-stream, e.g. QPSK modulation arrangements for detecting or preventing errors in the information received by adapting the channel coding H04L1/0009; analogue front ends or means for connecting modulators, demodulators or transceivers to a transmission line H04L27/0002
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/25891 being end-user preferences retrieval of video data in a video database based on user preferences G06F16/739; arrangements for recognizing users' preferences H04H60/46; user profiles in network data switching protocols H04L67/306; processing of user preferences or user profiles in wireless networks H04W8/18
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/42204 User interfaces specially adapted for controlling a client device through a remote control device; Remote control devices therefor constructive details of casings for the remote control device H01H9/0235; user interfaces for controlling a tuning device of a television receiver through a remote control H03J9/00; remote control of peripheral devices connected to a television receiver through the remote control device of the television receiver H04B1/205
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/42212 Specific keyboard arrangements
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4312 : involving specific graphical features, e.g. screen layout, special fonts or colors, blinking icons, highlights or animations
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4314 : for fitting data in a restricted space on the screen, e.g. EPG data in a rectangular grid
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4316 : for displaying supplemental content in a region of the screen, e.g. an advertisement in a separate window
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4331 : Caching operations, e.g. of an advertisement for later insertion during playback
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4355 : involving reformatting operations of additional data, e.g. HTML pages on a television screen optimising the visualization of content for information retrieval from the Internet G06F16/9577; adaptation of message content in packet-switching networks H04L51/066; media handling at the source in data packet switching networks H04L65/764
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4356 : by altering the spatial resolution, e.g. to reformat additional data on a handheld device, attached to the STB
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4382 : Demodulation or channel decoding, e.g. QPSK demodulation analog front ends or means for connecting modulators, demodulators or transceivers to a transmission line H04L27/0002
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4396 : by muting the audio signal
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/44012 : involving rendering scenes according to scene graphs, e.g. MPEG-4 scene graphs
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/440263 : by altering the spatial resolution, e.g. for displaying on a connected PDA
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4438 : Window management, e.g. event handling following interaction with the user interface
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4516 : involving client characteristics, e.g. Set-Top-Box type, software version or amount of memory available
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/454 : Content or additional data filtering, e.g. blocking advertisements
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4622 : Retrieving content or additional data from different sources, e.g. from a broadcast channel and the Internet web site content organization and management for information retrieval from the Internet G06F16/958; transmission by internet of broadcast information H04H60/82; stock exchange data over packet-switching network H04L12/1804; push services including data channel over packet-switching network H04L12/1859
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/47 : End-user applications
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4782 : Web browsing , e.g. WebTV
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4852 : for modifying audio parameters, e.g. switching between mono and stereo
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/4858 : for modifying screen layout parameters, e.g. fonts, size of the windows
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/8113 : comprising music, e.g. song in MP3 format
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/8166 : involving executable data, e.g. software arrangements for executing specific programs G06F9/44; broadcasting computer programmes in broadcast systems H04H20/91; involving the movement of software or configuration parameters H04L67/34
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/8543 : using a description language, e.g. Multimedia and Hypermedia information coding Expert Group [MHEG], eXtensible Markup Language [XML] information retrieval of semistructured data, the underlying structure being taken into account, e.g. mark-up language structure data G06F16/80
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 5/445 : for displaying additional information H04N5/50 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 5/45 : Picture in picture , e.g. displaying simultaneously another television channel in a region of the screen
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 5/602 : for digital sound signals
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 7/147 : Communication arrangements, e.g. identifying the communication as a video-communication, intermediate storage of the signals selecting H04Q

Abstract

Browser software implemented in a set-top box as part of a client system communicating over the Internet with one or more servers allows a user to navigate using a remote control through World-Wide Web pages in which a plurality of hypertext anchors are displayed on a television. A user input entered from a remote input device is received by the client system over an infrared (IR) link. The user input specifies a direction in which the user wishes to move a selection relative to a currently selected hypertext anchor. Based on the user input, a determination is made of which one of the hypertext anchors is a best selectable hypertext anchor, and that hypertext anchor is then selected and indicated as such to the user. The user interface allows for the selection of hypertext anchors which are part of either clientside or server-side image maps.

Claims

1. In a client system in communication with at least one remote server system, the client system being coupled to a display devise a method of helping a user to navigate through an interactive display environment including a plurality of hypertext objects, the method comprising:

causing an image of a keyboard to be displayed on the display device, the image including a plurality of soft buttons representing alphanumeric characters;

receiving a first user input from the remote input device, the first user input for selecting one of the alphanumeric characters by specifying a direction of movement of a selection indicator among the soft buttons;

receiving a second user input for entering one of the soft buttons;

and

inputting one of the alphanumeric characters as a selection in response to the second user input.

2. In a client system in communication with at least one remote server system. The client system being coupled to a display device, a method of helping a user to navigate through an interactive display environment including a plurality of hypertext objects. The method comprising:

receiving information corresponding to an image map from one of the server systems. The image map including at least one hypertext object. Each hypertext object having an address stored within the client system and associated with one of the server systems for accessing information stored in said one of the server systems;

causing the image map to be displayed on the display device;

identifying the hypertext objects included within the image map;

determining one of the hypertext objects within the image map to be a selected hypertext object based on a first user input entered from a remote input device; and

identifying the selected hypertext object within the image map by displaying a selection indicator.

3. In a client system in communication with at least one remote server system, the client system being coupled to a display device. a method of navigating through an interactive display environment including a plurality of hypertext objects, the method comprising:

receiving information corresponding to an image map from one of the server systems. The image map including at least one hypertext object having an address stored in one of the server systems and not in the client system. The address corresponding to one of the server systems and for accessing information stored in one of the server systems,

causing the image map to be displayed on the display device,

receiving a first user input that selects the image map,

displaying a selection icon on the display device in response to the image map being selected according to the first user input;

receiving a second user input entered from the remote input device specifying a movement of the selection icon;

receiving a third user input entered from the remote input device specifying coordinates within the image map, the coordinates corresponding to a current position of the selection icon; and

transmitting the coordinates specified by the third user input to one of the server systems in order to access information associated with the address.

4. A method according to claim 3, further comprising the steps of:

scaling the image map down in size before causing the image map to be displayed, to format the image map for the display device; and

scaling the coordinates specified by the third user input up before transmitting the coordinates.

5. In a client system in communication with at least one remote server system over a network the client system including a processor and a memory and coupled to a display device, a method of allowing a user to navigate through an interactive display environment including World-Wide Web (WWW) content the method comprising:

receiving information corresponding to an image map from one of the remote server systems, wherein the image map corresponds to at least one hypertext object having a uniform resource locator (URL) that is stored in one of the remote server systems and not in the client system;

causing the image map to be displayed on the display device;

selecting the image map in response to a first user input,

displaying a selection icon on the display device in response to the image map being selected according to the first user input;

receiving a second user input entered from the remote input device specifying a movement of the selection icon;

receiving a third user input entered from the remote input device specifying coordinates within the image map, the coordinates corresponding to a current position of the selection icon; and

transmitting the coordinates specified by the third user input to one of the server systems in order to access information associated with the URL.

6. A method according to claim 5, further comprising the steps of:

scaling the image map down in size before causing the image map to be displayed to conform the image map to the display device; and

scaling the coordinates specified by the third user input up before transmitting the coordinates.

7. A program storage device readable by a machine, the program storage device tangibly embodying a program of instructions executable by the machine to perform method steps for helping a user to navigate through an interactive display environment including a plurality of hypertext objects. The method steps comprising:

causing an image of a keyboard to be displayed on the display device, the image including a plurality of soft buttons representing alphanumeric characters;

receiving a first user input from the remote input device, the first user input specifying one of the alphanumeric characters, the first user input further specifying a direction of movement of a selection indicator among the soft buttons; and

recognizing one of the alphanumeric characters in response to the first user input.

8. A program storage device readable by a machine. The program storage device tangibly embodying a program of instructions executable by the machine to perform method steps for helping a user to navigate through an interactive display environment including a plurality of hypertext objects. The method steps comprising:

receiving information corresponding to an image map from one of the at least one server systems. The image map including at least one of hypertext object. Each hypertext objects included within the image map having a uniform resource locator (URL) stored within the client system,

causing the image map to be displayed on the display device;

identifying the hypertext objects included within the image map;

determining one of the hypertext objects within the image map to be a selected hypertext object based on a first user input entered from a remote input device; and

identifying the selected hypertext object within the image map by displaying a selection indicator.

9. A program storage device according to claim 8, the method steps further comprising the steps of:

receiving a second user input directed to the selected hypertext object;

transmitting the URL of the selected hypertext object to one of the server systems;

receiving information associated with the URL of the selected hypertext object in response to the step of transmitting; and

causing the received information to be displayed on the display device.

10. A program storage device readable by a machine. The program storage device tangibly embodying a program of instructions executable be the machine to perform method steps for helping a user to navigate through an interactive display environment including a plurality of hypertext objects. The method steps comprising;

receiving information corresponding to an image map from one of the at least one server systems. The image map corresponding to at least one hypertext object having a uniform resource locator (URL) that is stored in one of the server systems and not in the client system,

causing the image map to be displayed on the display device,

receiving a first user input that selects the image map;

displaying a selection icon on the display device in response to the image map being selected according to the first user input;

receiving a second user input entered from the remote input device specifying a movement of the selection icon;

receiving a third user input entered from the remote input device specifying coordinates within the image map, the coordinates corresponding to a current position of the selection icon; and

transmitting the coordinates specified by the third user input to one of the server systems in order to access information associated with the URL.

11. A program storage device according to claim 10, the method steps further comprising the steps of:

scaling the image map down in size before causing the image map to be displayed to conform the image map to the display device; and

scaling the coordinates specified by the third user input up before transmitting the coordinates.