Methods and apparatuses for display and traversing of links in page character array

• US 6,547,830 B1
• Filed: 08/13/1999
• Issued: 04/15/2003
• Est. Priority Date: 08/13/1999
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Apple Inc.
• Original Assignee: Pixo, Inc. (Oracle Corporation)
• Inventors: Mercer, Paul
• Primary Examiner(s): Herndon, Heather R.
• Assistant Examiner(s): HUYNH, CONG LAC T
• Application Number:
  US09/374,228
• Time in Patent Office: 1,341 Days
• Field of Search: 707/513, 707/501, 707/518, 707/519, 707/526, 707/529, 707/531, 707/540, 345/342, 345/788, 455/555, 455/556, 455/557, 455/90, 455/575, 715/501.1, 715/518, 715/519, 715/531
• US Class Current: 715/234
• 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: G09G 2340/145 related to small screens

Abstract

A device, such as a cellular telephone, having a software program for maximizing the amount of text displayed is provided. The software program converts a markup language page, such as a hypertext markup language page from the internet, or ASCII file, to easily viewable text which may be provided to small displays. The software program includes a method to reduce the displayed distance between characters, both horizontally and vertically. The software program also includes a method which proportionately reduces the font size of the displayed characters. The software program also includes methods for substituting fonts in a page or file with easily readable fonts and converting lowercase characters to uppercase characters. The software program maximizes the amount of displayed text while maintaining the intended relative style and positioning of the text.

Claims

1. A method for providing text to a display of a mobile device, wherein the displayed text includes a plurality of characters positioned in a plurality of rows, comprising the steps of:

obtaining a representation of the displayed text;

reducing a first vertical displayed distance between a first character in a first row of the plurality of rows and a second character in a second row of the plurality of rows;

reducing a second vertical displayed distance between the second character in the second row of the plurality of rows and a third character in a third row of the plurality of rows, wherein the first vertical displayed distance is less than the second vertical displayed distance.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the representation of the displayed text is an ASCII file.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the representation of the displayed text is a markup language page.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the reducing the first vertical displayed distance step includes the step of:

reducing the first vertical displayed distance associated with a code in the representation of the text.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein the code is an ASCII carriage return and line break code.

6. The method of claim 4, wherein the code is a markup language tag.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the reducing the second vertical displayed distance step includes the step of:

substituting a plurality of first type codes in the representation of the text with a single first type code.

8. The method of claim 1, further comprising the step of:

reducing the horizontal displayed distance between the first character in the first row and a third character in the first row.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein the reducing the horizontal distance step includes the step of:

reducing the horizontal displayed distance associated with a code in the representation of the displayed text.

10. The method of claim 9, wherein the code is a tab ASCII code.

11. The method of claim 9, wherein the code is a space ASCII code.

12. The method of claim 9, wherein the first character is in a first column and the third character is in a second column.

13. The method of claim 1, further comprising the step of:

reducing the horizontal distance displayed between a rightmost character in a first column and a leftmost character in a second column.

14. The method of claim 1, further comprising the step of:

reducing the horizontal distance displayed between a leftmost character in a first column and a rightmost character in a second column.

15. The method of claim 1, wherein the first character has a first font size and the second character has a second font size, further comprising the step of:

reducing the first character font size relative to the second character font size.

16. The method of claim 1, wherein the first character has a first type of font, further comprising the step of:

substituting the first font type for a second similar font type from a predetermined group of font types.

17. The method of claim 16, wherein the second similar font type includes the same bold, italicize and size characteristics of the first font type.

18. The method of claim 1, wherein the plurality of characters includes a lower case character, comprising the step of:

substituting the lowercase character for an uppercase character.

19. The method of claim 1, wherein the step of reducing the first vertical displayed distance reduces the overall size of the representation of displayed text;

and,

the method of claim 1 further comprising the step of;

providing the reduced size representation of the text to the display of the mobile device subsequent to the step of reducing.

20. The method of claim 1, wherein the mobile device is a wireless telephone.

21. A method for providing text to a display, wherein the displayed text includes a plurality of characters positioned in a plurality of rows, comprising the steps of:

obtaining a representation of the displayed text;

reducing the vertical displayed distance associated with a code in the representation of the text between a first character in a first row of the plurality of rows and a second character in a second row of the plurality of rows, wherein the first and the second row of characters is in a first paragraph and a third row of characters is in a second adjacent paragraph, wherein reducing the vertical display distance includes the steps of;

reducing a first vertical display distance between the first row and the second row; and

,

reducing a second vertical display distance between the second and the third row, wherein the first vertical display distance is less than the second vertical display distance.

22. An article of manufacture including a persistent storage device containing a software program, comprising:

a software method for obtaining information used to display text on a display of a mobile device, wherein the text includes a plurality of characters having respective font sizes;

a software program for reducing a first displayed distance between a first character in the plurality of characters positioned in a first row and a second character in the plurality of characters positioned in a second row; and

,

a second software program for reducing a second displayed distance between the second character in the plurality of characters positioned in the second row and a third character in the plurality of characters positioned in a third row, wherein the first vertical displayed distance is less than the second vertical displayed distance.

23. The article of manufacture of claim 22, wherein the information is at least a portion of a markup language page.

24. The article of manufacture of claim 22, wherein the information is at least a portion of an ASCII file.

25. The article of manufacture of claim 22, further comprising:

a software method for proportionally reducing the font size of a character in the plurality of characters.

26. The article of manufacture of claim 22, wherein the software program for reducing the displayed distance between the first and the second characters comprises:

a software method for reducing the number of adjacent line break (“

<

BR>

”

) language tags in the information.

27. The article of manufacture of claim 22, wherein the software program for reducing the displayed distance between the first and the second characters comprises:

a software method for reducing the number of adjacent carriage return and line feed ASCII codes in the information.

28. The article of manufacture of claim 22, wherein the software program for reducing the distance between the first character and the second character comprises:

a software method for reducing the number of tab ASCII codes in the information.

29. The article of manufacture of claim 28, wherein the plurality of characters includes a character having a first font type, further comprising:

a software method for substituting the first font type with a second similar font type.

30. The article of manufacture of claim 22, wherein the plurality of characters includes a lowercase character, further comprising:

a software method for substituting the lowercase character with an uppercase character.

31. The article of manufacture of claim 22, wherein the mobile device is a wireless telephone.