Displaying and storing an image having transparent and non-transparent pixels
First Claim
Patent Images
1. A method of displaying an image having a plurality of transparent pixels and a plurality of non-transparent pixels on a background, comprising the steps of:
- retrieving a machine executable instruction in an instruction queue in a memory, the instruction queue including a plurality of copy instructions and a plurality of skip instructions, each copy instruction of the plurality of copy instructions being mapped from a set of non-transparent pixels of the plurality of non-transparent pixels and each skip instruction of the plurality of skip instructions being mapped from a set of transparent pixels of the plurality of transparent pixels, each skip instruction including a skip instruction count number;
when the machine executable instruction is a copy instruction, performing the following steps;
obtaining pixel data from a source pointer, the pixel data corresponding to non-transparent pixels of the plurality of non-transparent pixels;
replacing pixels in the background pointed to by a destination pointer with the pixel data from the source pointer;
incrementing both the source pointer and the destination pointer; and
returning to said step of retrieving; and
when the retrieved instruction is a skip instruction, performing the following steps;
incrementing the destination pointer to the background based on the skip instruction count number; and
returning to said step of retrieving.
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Abstract
An image is stored as data representing the values of non-transparent pixels, and stored instructions corresponding to some pixels, resulting in a data structure. The image may be displayed by executing two types of instructions. A first type of instruction includes a command to skip pixels in a destination image. A second type of instruction comprises a command to copy pixels from the source data to the destination image.
45 Citations
21 Claims
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1. A method of displaying an image having a plurality of transparent pixels and a plurality of non-transparent pixels on a background, comprising the steps of:
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retrieving a machine executable instruction in an instruction queue in a memory, the instruction queue including a plurality of copy instructions and a plurality of skip instructions, each copy instruction of the plurality of copy instructions being mapped from a set of non-transparent pixels of the plurality of non-transparent pixels and each skip instruction of the plurality of skip instructions being mapped from a set of transparent pixels of the plurality of transparent pixels, each skip instruction including a skip instruction count number;
when the machine executable instruction is a copy instruction, performing the following steps;
obtaining pixel data from a source pointer, the pixel data corresponding to non-transparent pixels of the plurality of non-transparent pixels;
replacing pixels in the background pointed to by a destination pointer with the pixel data from the source pointer;
incrementing both the source pointer and the destination pointer; and
returning to said step of retrieving; and
when the retrieved instruction is a skip instruction, performing the following steps;
incrementing the destination pointer to the background based on the skip instruction count number; and
returning to said step of retrieving. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17)
scanning the image a pixel at a time to detect a type of each pixel and a number of adjacent pixels of the same type;
adding a copy instruction to the instruction queue for each set of adjacent, non-transparent pixels detected; and
adding a skip instruction to the instruction queue for each set of adjacent, transparent pixels detected.
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4. The method of claim 1, wherein the copy instruction is accompanied by a copy instruction count number corresponding to a size of the pixel data, and the source pointer and the destination pointer in response to the copy instruction are incremented based on the copy instruction count number.
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5. The method of claim 1, wherein pixel color of each of the plurality of non-transparent pixels are added to a string of pixel values.
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6. The method of claim 1, wherein a copy instruction provides an instruction for moving one byte from a memory location defined by the source pointer to another memory location defined by the destination pointer.
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7. The method of claim 1, wherein a copy instruction provides an instruction for moving a word at a time from a memory location defined by the source pointer to another memory location defined by the destination pointer.
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8. The method of claim 2, wherein non-transparent pixels replace pixels in the background and wherein transparent pixels leave the background unchanged.
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13. The computer system of claim 1, wherein the transparent pixels are mapped into the skip instructions and the non-transparent pixels are mapped into the copy instructions.
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14. The computer system of claim 1, wherein the memory storing the code executable by the processor, when executed, adds pixel color to a pixel value string.
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15. The computer system of claim 1, wherein a copy instruction provides an instruction for moving one byte from a memory location defined by the source pointer to another memory location defined by the destination pointer.
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16. The computer system of claim 1, wherein a copy instruction provides an instruction for moving a word at a time from a memory location defined by the source pointer to another memory location defined by the destination pointer.
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17. The computer system of claim 1, wherein once each instruction in the instruction queue is executed, the image overlays the corresponding portion of the background, and wherein non-transparent pixels replace pixels in the background and transparent pixels leave the background unchanged.
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9. A computer-readable medium encoded for storing an image including transparent pixels and non-transparent pixels, comprising:
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a data structure stored in the computer-readable medium, the data structure including;
a string containing color codes for a plurality of non-transparent pixels; and
an instruction queue of machine-executable instructions comprising;
a plurality of copy instructions, each copy instruction of the plurality of copy instructions added to the instruction queue upon change from one of the non-transparent pixels to one transparent pixel of a plurality of transparent pixels of the image, and a plurality of skip instructions, each skip instruction of the plurality of skip instructions added to the instruction queue upon change from one of the transparent pixels to one non-transparent pixel of the plurality of non-transparent pixels of the image, wherein each copy instruction corresponds to a set of successive non-transparent pixels of the image and each skip instruction corresponds to a set of successive transparent pixels of the image, and wherein execution of the machine-executable instructions along with the string enables display of the image. - View Dependent Claims (10, 11, 12)
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18. A computer system for displaying on a background an image having transparent pixels and non-transparent pixels, comprising:
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a processor for executing code; and
a display for displaying the image;
a memory storing a code executable by the processor and when executed, performing the steps of;
retrieving a machine executable instruction from an instruction queue in the memory, the instruction including a copy instruction corresponding to a plurality of non-transparent pixels and a skip instruction accompanied by a skip instruction count number associated with a plurality of transparent pixels;
when the machine executable instruction is a copy instruction, performing the following steps;
obtaining pixel data from a source pointer;
replacing pixels in the background pointed to by a destination pointer with the pixel data from a source pointer;
incrementing both the source pointer and the destination pointer; and
returning to said step of retrieving; and
when the retrieval instruction is a skip instruction, performing the following steps;
incrementing the destination pointer based on the skip instruction count number; and
returning to said step of retrieving. - View Dependent Claims (19, 20, 21)
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Specification