Method and tool for generating and displaying a descriptive annotation of selected application data

• US 6,335,738 B1
• Filed: 01/05/1999
• Issued: 01/01/2002
• Est. Priority Date: 07/24/1998
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Whiting, James, Trainer, Raymond, Englefield, Paul Jonathan, Tibbits, Mark Justin Paul
• Primary Examiner(s): Bayerl, Raymond J.
• Assistant Examiner(s): Nguyen, Thomas T.
• Application Number:
  US09/226,910
• Time in Patent Office: 1,092 Days
• Field of Search: 707/503, 709/201, 709/747, 345/744, 345/739, 345/738, 345/812, 345/811, 345/813, 345/853, 345/854, 345/856, 345/857
• US Class Current: 715/744
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/453 Help systems

Abstract

A set of software components, a system and a method provide to a user of a data processing system per-value interpretative information relating to application data values. The method includes the following steps: in response to user selection of a set of an application component'"'"'s data values, generating per-value interpretation information corresponding to the selected data values; and, in response to subsequent movement of an input device pointer into a display screen area associated with a data value within the set, presenting the interpretation information to the user via an output device connected to the data processing system. A processing component selectable by the user from set of processing components preferably responds to user selection of both the operation to be performed and a set of application data by performing the processing operation on the set of data to produce a result, and then generating per-value interpretation information corresponding to that result. The presentation of interpretation information to the user preferably uses a flyover text box in a GUI, as is known in the art for application-specific Bubble Help.

Claims

1. A set of components for providing per-value data interpretation information to a user of a data processing system which has an input controller responsive to signals from an input device for moving an input device pointer on a display device, the set of components including:

an application component for displaying data values to the data processing system user;

a processing component responsive to user selection of an operation to be performed and responsive to user selection of a set of the application component'"'"'s data values to

(a) perform the selected processing operation on the selected set of data values to generate a result,

(b) generate per-value interpretation information corresponding to said generated result, and

(c) provide said per-value interpretation information to the application component for display to the user;

wherein the application component is responsive to positioning of said input device pointer, subsequent to said provision of generated interpretation information, to

(d) identify a specific data value of said selected set in response to movement of the input device pointer into a display area displaying the identified specific data value, and

(e) display to the user the generated per-value interpretation information for the specific data value on a display device connected to the data processing system.

2. A set of components according to claim 1, wherein said processing component includes logic for comparing each data value of a selected set with other values in the set or with a reference value and for generating a result for each value indicative of a relationship between the respective value and said other values in the set or the reference value, respectively, and

wherein generated said per-value interpretation information is adapted to generate information descriptive of said relationship.

3. A set of components according to claim 2, wherein said processing component includes logic for comparing the identified specific data value with the other data values within a predefined partition of the selected set which partition includes the identified specific data value.

4. A set of components according to claim 1, wherein the application component displays the generated per-value interpretation information as flyover alphanumeric text.

5. A set of components according to claim 4, wherein the alphanumeric per-value interpretation text is generated by combining the generated result of processing the selected set of an application component'"'"'s data values with stored explanatory text which is predefined as corresponding to a result category of said generated result.

6. A set of components according to claim 1, wherein the application component displays the generated per-value interpretation information as alphanumeric text within a status line message.

7. A set of components according to claim 1, wherein said processing component is one of a plurality of processing components each comprising a processing object class instantiable to provide objects within an object oriented processing environment, said objects generating the per-value interpretation information, said objects being adapted to interface with application components comprising additional objects adapted to interface with the processing objects such that data values can be provided from an application component to the processing object and interpretation information can be returned from the processing object to the respective application component.

8. A set of components according to claim 7, including a connection class instantiable to provide a connection object for managing the flow of application data, processing results and interpretation information between application components and processing objects.

9. A set of components according to claim 7, wherein each processing object comprises a controller object and an associated algorithm object, the controller object being adapted to make calls to the algorithm object to perform a calculation on selected data values to generate a result and the controller object being adapted to generate per-value interpretation information using said result.

10. A set of components according to claim 7, wherein said processing object classes each comprise one or more Java Beans.

11. A set of components according to claim 1, wherein said generation of per-value interpretation information comprises initiating a database lookup operation using a selected data value as an input parameter for controlling said database lookup operation.

12. A set of components according to claim 1, wherein said processing component includes logic for comparing each data value of a selected set with other values in the set or with a reference value and for generating a result for each value indicative of a relationship between the respective value and the other values in the set or the reference value, and

wherein generated said per-value interpretation information is adapted to use said generated result as an input parameter for a database lookup operation to obtain interpretation information corresponding to said generated result.

13. A set of components according to claim 1, wherein the generated per-value interpretation information includes audio clips.

14. A method for providing to a user of a data processing system per-value interpretative information relating to data values of an application component, the method including the steps of:

in response to user selection of an operation and user selection of a set of an application component'"'"'s data values, processing the selected set of data values to generate a result according to said selected operation;

generating per-value interpretation information corresponding to said generated result; and

providing said per-value interpretation information to the application component for display to the user;

identifying user selection of a specific data value of said selected set in response to movement of the input device pointer into a display area associated with the identified specific data value, and displaying to the user the generated per-value interpretation information for the specific data value on a display device connected to the data processing system.

15. A method according to claim 14, wherein said processing of the selected set of data values comprises comparing each data value of a selected set with other values in the set or with a reference value and generating a result for each value indicative of the relationship between the respective value and said other values in the set or the reference value, respectively, and generating a result for each value indicative of the relationship between the respective value and said other values in the set or the reference value, respectively, and generating per-value interpretation information which is descriptive of said relationship.

16. A method according to claim 15, wherein the generation of per-value interpretation information comprises generation of an annotation string for each of said set of selected data values wherein the respective generated annotation strings represent the relationship between the respective data value and other data values of said set.

17. A computer program product comprising computer program code recorded on a computer readable storage medium, the computer program code including a set of components for providing per-value data interpretation information to a user of a data processing system having an input device pointer and a connected display device, the computer program product comprising:

an application program code component for displaying data values to the data processing system user;

a processing program code component for responding to user selection of an operation to be performed to user selection of a set of the application component'"'"'s data values to

(a) perform the selected processing operation on the selected set of data values to generate a result,

(b) generate per-value interpretation information corresponding to said generated result, and

(c) provide said per-value interpretation information to the application component for display to the user;

wherein the application program code component is responsive to positioning of said input device pointer, subsequent to said provision of generated interpretation information, to

(d) identify a specific data value of said selected set in response to movement of the input device pointer into a display area associated with the identified specific data value, and

(e) display to the user the generated per-value interpretation information for the identified specific data value on a display device connected to the data processing system.

18. A computer program product as in claim 17, wherein said processing program code component includes computer program code means for comparing each data value of a selected set with other values in the set or with a reference value and for generating a result for each value indicative of a relationship between the respective value and said other values in the set or the reference value, respectively, and

wherein generated said per-value interpretation information is adapted to generate information descriptive of said relationship.

19. A computer program product as in claim 18, wherein said processing program code component includes computer program code means for comparing the identified specific data value with the other data values within a predefined partition of the selected set which partition includes the identified specific data value.

20. A computer program product as in claim 19, wherein the application program code component comprises computer program code means for displaying the generated per-value interpretation information as alphanumeric text within a status line message.

21. A computer program product as in claim 20, wherein said processing program code component is one of a plurality of processing program code components each comprising a processing object class instantiable to provide objects for generating the per-value interpretation information within an object oriented processing environment, said objects being adapted to interface with application program code components comprising additional objects adapted to interface with the processing objects such that data values can be provided from an application program code component to the processing object and interpretation information can be returned from the processing object to the respective application program code component.

22. A computer program product as in claim 21, including a connection class instantiable to provide a connection object for managing the flow of application data, processing results and interpretation information between application program code components and processing objects.

23. A computer program product as in claim 22, wherein each processing object comprises a controller object and an associated algorithm object, the controller object being adapted to make calls to the algorithm object to perform a calculation on selected data values to generate a result and the controller object being adapted to generate per-value interpretation information using said result.

24. A computer program product as in claim 23, wherein said generation of per-value interpretation information comprises initiating a database lookup operation using a selected data value as an input parameter for controlling said database lookup operation.

25. A computer program product as in claim 23, wherein generated said per-value interpretation information is further adapted to use said generated result as an input parameter for a database lookup operation to obtain interpretation information corresponding to said generated result.