Publication file conversion and display

• US 6,415,307 B2
• Filed: 03/26/1998
• Issued: 07/02/2002
• Est. Priority Date: 10/24/1994
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: P2I Limited
• Original Assignee: P2I Limited
• Inventors: Jones, Michael William Dudleston, Geen, Nicholas, Hughes, Mischka
• Primary Examiner(s): Feild, Joseph H.
• Application Number:
  US09/048,621
• Publication Number:
  US 20010047373A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,559 Days
• Field of Search: 707/515, 707/500, 707/514, 707/517, 707/525, 707/526, 707/531, 707/1, 707/3, 707/7, 707/513, 382/173, 382/176-177, 382/180, 382/305
• US Class Current: 715/202
• 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 40/103 Formatting, i.e. changing of presentation of documents automatic justification G06F40/189; automatic line break hyphenation G06F40/191
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/106 Display of layout of documents; Previewing

Abstract

A computerized information display system extracts text data, lists of keywords, story rankings in order of story importance, and image maps identifying the location of stories from an input of publication files from a publisher. The system can generate a simultaneous display of a page image in which a story appears side-by-side with the text for the story when a particular story is selected, in order to allow a viewer can read the text while referring to the page image for visual cues about the text passage. The viewer can select a story from a displayed list of stories ranked in order of importance relative to other stories appearing on a page. The story rankings are derived based upon comparing one or more story importance indicators: location of the story on the page; size of type font of a headline associated with the story; size of type font associated with the story text; and size of text content for the story. The viewer can navigate to the text for a story on a displayed page by clicking in the story area on the page which is linked by image maps to the corresponding text passage. The viewer can also navigate to a text passage and page image by clicking on a keyword from a list of keywords extracted from the text input from the publisher. These computerized contextual display and image navigation tools allow the viewer a highly interactive experience with the publication. They allow a publication to be converted to electronically viewable form frequently, e.g., several times per day, and in a more user friendly form than the original printed copy.

Claims

1. A computerized method of generating an information display from an input of publication files containing text, graphics, and other data viewable as page images of a publication having text areas and graphics image areas appearing therein, comprising the steps of:

extracting text data from the publication files corresponding to text appearing in respective text areas in predefined locations of the page images of the publication;

processing page image data from the publication files including the text areas in predefined locations corresponding to the page images of the publication;

mapping the predefined locations of the text areas appearing in the page images as respective text area image map data, and indexing each mapped text area to the respective extracted text data corresponding to the text appearing therein;

generating a display on a computer system of page images using the page image data, and linking the text areas of the displayed page images to the corresponding text data using the image map data such that the image-mapped page images have text areas which can be selected by the user pointing at any one of the desired text areas, and

generating a simultaneous display of the linked text data corresponding to a text area selected by the user by pointing at the desired text area on the page image side-by-side with the page image, whereby a viewer can read the text in the text passage while referring to the page image for visual cues about the text passage.

2. A computerized method of generating an information display according to claim 1, wherein said mapping step further includes the step of assigning to each mapped text area a page number of the page on which the text area appears and a text area number which corresponds to the relative importance of the text area to other text areas on the page.

3. A computerized method of generating an information display according to claim 2, wherein the text area number is derived based upon any one of the following group of importance indicators:

location of the text area on the page;

size of type font of a headline associated with the text area;

size of type font associated with the text in the text area; and

size of text content in the text area.

4. A computerized method of generating an information display according to claim 2, further comprising the steps of:

parsing the text data to find predetermined keywords therein, indexing each keyword to a page number and a text area number for the text area in which the keyword is found, and maintaining the indexed keywords on a keyword list from which the corresponding text areas can be located by the keywords.

5. A computerized method of generating an information display according to claim 4, wherein said parsing step is carried out by performing a text string search of the text based upon text string entries contained in a library list of keywords.

6. A computerized method of generating an information display according to claim 4, wherein the display generating step includes displaying a list of keywords indexed in the publication, and displaying a text passage generated from text data which is indexed to a keyword selected from the list of keywords simultaneously with the page image on which the text area corresponding to the text passage appears.

7. A computerized method of generating an information display according to claim 2, wherein the display generating step includes displaying a list of titles ordered by page number and text area numbers for corresponding text areas simultaneously with display of the page image.

8. A computerized method of generating an information display according to claim 1, further comprising the step of mapping graphics image areas for respective graphic images appearing in the page images as image map data, and indexing each mapped graphics image area to a page number of the page on which the graphics image appears and a graphics image area number.

9. A computerized method of generating an information display according to claim 8, wherein the display generating step includes displaying further information linked to a graphics image area simultaneously with the page image in which the graphics image appears.

10. A computerized method of generating an information display according to claim 9, wherein the displayed information is obtained from one of the following group of information sources:

a stored graphics image;

an output of an externally run process; and

stored text.

11. A method of converting digital publication files containing text, graphics, and other data corresponding to page images of a publication having text areas and graphics image areas appearing therein to digital data for generating and controlling a display on a computer system, comprising the steps of:

extracting text data from the publication files corresponding to text appearing in respective text areas in predefined locations of the page images of the publication;

producing page image data including the text areas in predefined locations corresponding to page images of the publication;

mapping the predefined locations of the text areas appearing in the page images of the publication and indexing each text area to the respective extracted text data corresponding to the text in the text area, and maintaining the mapped text areas indexed to the respective extracted text data as display navigation data; and

producing a display on a computer system of page images and linking the text areas in the displayed page images to the corresponding text data using said display navigation data such that the image-mapped page images have text areas which can be selected by the user pointing at any one of the desired text areas, and

generating a simultaneous display of the linked text data corresponding to a text area selected by the user by pointing at the desired text area on the page image side-by-side with the page image, whereby a viewer can read the text in the text passage while referring to the page image for visual cues about the text passage.

12. A method according to claim 11, wherein said mapping step further includes the step oil assigning to each mapped text area a page number and a text area number which corresponds to the relative importance of the text area to other text areas on the page.

13. A method according to claim 12, wherein the text area number is derived based upon any one of the following group of importance indicators:

location of the text area on the page;

size of type font of a headline associated with the text area;

size of type font associated with the text in the text area; and

size of text content in the text area.

14. A method according to claim 11, further comprising the steps of:

parsing the text data to find predetermined keywords therein;

indexing each keyword to a page number and a text area number for the text area in which the keyword is found;

maintaining the indexed keywords on a keyword list from which the corresponding text area can be located; and

using said keyword list as display navigation data.

15. A method according to claim 14, wherein said parsing step is carried out by performing a text string search of the text data based upon text string entries contained in a library list of keywords.

16. A method according to claim 11, further comprising the step of mapping graphics image areas for respective graphic images appearing in the page images and indexing each mapped graphics image area to a cage number and a graphics image area number, and maintaining the mapped and indexed graphics image areas as display navigation data.