Method and system for maintaining freeform ink annotations on changing views

• US 6,687,876 B1
• Filed: 12/30/1998
• Issued: 02/03/2004
• Est. Priority Date: 12/30/1998
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Fuji Xerox Company Limited (Fujifilm Holdings Corporation), Xerox Corporation (Xerox Holdings Corp.)
• Original Assignee: Fuji Xerox Company Limited (Fujifilm Holdings Corporation), Xerox Corporation (Xerox Holdings Corp.)
• Inventors: Golovchinsky, Gene, Schilit, William N, Price, Morgan N
• Primary Examiner(s): Hong, Stephen S.
• Assistant Examiner(s): Paula, Cesar B.
• Application Number:
  US09/222,962
• Time in Patent Office: 1,861 Days
• Field of Search: 707/500, 707/502, 707/512, 707/513, 707/501.1, 715/500, 715/502, 715/512, 715/513, 715/501.1
• US Class Current: 715/231
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/169 Annotation, e.g. comment data or footnotes

Abstract

The method and system of the invention maintains the indication of the logical relationship of freeform digital ink annotations to objects in an electronic display even as the view changes. The invention maps the logical relationship of the freeform digital ink annotations to objects in the view based upon the layout relationships of the freeform digital ink annotations to the objects in the view. If the view changes, the invention maintains the layout relationship of the freeform digital ink annotations to the objects in the view based upon the mapping of the freeform digital ink annotations to the objects.

Claims

1. A method for maintaining an indication of a logical relationship of at least one freeform digital ink annotation to at least one object in a first view as a position of the at least one object in the first view changes, the indication including a layout relationship of the at least one freeform digital ink annotation to the at least one object, the method comprising:

automatically mapping the logical relationship of the at least one freeform digital ink annotation to the at least one object based upon the layout relationship of the at least one freeform digital ink annotation and the at least one object in the first view by splitting the at least one freeform digital ink annotation into a plurality of substrokes, each substroke corresponding to the portion of the annotation that is in proximity to an object, and creating an anchor for the at least one freeform digital annotation; and

,

rendering the at least one freeform digital ink annotation in response to the generation of the second view, the layout relationship of the at least one freeform digital ink annotation and the at least one object in the second view being rendered based upon the mapped logical relationship of the at least one freeform digital ink annotation to the at least one object in the first view.

2. The method of claim 1, the at least one object being in an electronic book and document reader.

3. The method of claim 1, the at least one object being in a word processor.

4. The method of claim 1, the second view being generated in response to a change in the structure of a document.

5. The method of claim 1, the second view being generated in response to a change in the layout of a document.

6. The method of claim 1, the step of mapping comprising creating an anchor for the at least one freeform digital ink annotation.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein mapping the logical relationship comprises:

splitting the at least one freeform digital ink annotation into a plurality of substrokes, each substroke corresponding to a portion of the annotation that is in proximity to the at least one object; and

creating an anchor for each of the plurality of substrokes based upon the layout relationship of each of the plurality of substrokes to the at least one object in the first view.

8. The method of claim 7, further comprising generating connecting lines between substrokes.

9. The method of claim 7, further comprising:

rendering the at least one freeform digital ink annotation comprises rendering the at least one freeform digital ink annotation in response to a separation of the at least one object in the second view, splitting the at least one freeform digital ink annotation further comprises splitting the at least one freeform digital ink annotation into at least two freeform digital ink annotations, each freeform digital ink annotation corresponding to the at least one the object.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein the at least one object comprises at least two objects and wherein the second view is in response to a merging of the at least two objects.

11. The method of claim 1, wherein the second view is in response to a replacement of the at least one object with at least one new object.

12. The method of claim 1, the mapping depending upon the shape of the at least one freeform digital ink annotation and the proximity of the at least one freeform digital ink annotation to the object.

13. The method of claim 12, the at least one freeform digital ink annotation being one of an underline and a cross-out annotation.

14. The method of claim 12, the at least one freeform digital ink annotation being an insertion annotation.

15. The method of claim 12, the at least one freeform digital ink annotation being a connector annotation.

16. The method of claim 1, the mapping depending upon the location of the at least one freeform digital ink annotation in the view.

17. The method of claim 16, the location being in a margin of the first view.

18. The method of claim 1, further comprising displaying the first view in response to a selection of the at least one freeform digital ink annotation in the second view.

19. The method of claim 1, the at least one freeform digital ink annotation including at least two freeform digital ink annotations and the at least one object including at least two objects that each correspond to one of the at least two freeform digital ink annotations, the method further comprising merging the at least two freeform digital ink annotations into a single freeform digital ink annotation when the corresponding at least two objects merge.

20. A system for maintaining an indication of a logical relationship of at least one freeform digital ink annotation to at least one object in a view as a position of the at least one object in the view changes, the indication including a layout relationship of the at least one freeform digital ink annotation to the digital object, the system comprising:

a display that displays the layout relationship of the at least one freeform digital ink annotation to the at least one object;

a processor that maps the at least one freeform digital ink annotation to the at least one object based upon the layout relationship of the at least one freeform digital ink annotation to the at least one object in a first view, the display responsive to a change in the first view to generate a second view in which a position of the at least one object is changed in relation to another object and to render the at least one freeform digital ink annotation in the second view, the layout relationship of the at least one freeborn digital ink annotation and the at least one object in the second view based on the mapped logical relationship of the at least one freeform digital ink annotation to the at least one object in the first view; and

a processor that automatically maps the logical relationship of the at least one freeform digital ink annotation to the at least one object based upon the layout relationship of the at least one freeform digital ink annotation and the at least one object in the first view and creates an anchor for the at least one freeform digital annotation.

21. The system of claim 20, the system being a word processor.

22. The system of claim 20, the system being an electronic book and document reader.

23. The system of claim 20, further comprising a housing that holds the display and the processor, the housing being of a size that is small enough so that the system is capable of being held by a hand.

24. The system of claim 23, further comprising a pointing device.

25. The system of claim 20, the change in the first view being a change in the structure of a document.

26. The system of claim 20, the change in the first view being a change in the layout of a document.

27. The system of claim 20, the processor mapping the at least one freeform digital ink annotation by creating an anchor for the at least one freeform digital ink annotation.

28. The system of claim 20, the processor mapping the at least one freeform digital ink by splitting the at least one freeform digital ink annotation into a plurality of substrokes, each substroke corresponding to the portion of the annotation that is in proximity to an object;

and

creating an anchor for each of the plurality of substrokes based upon the layout relationship of each of the plurality of substrokes to at least one object in the first view.

29. The system of claim 28, the processor also capable of generating connecting lines between substrokes.

30. The system of claim 28, wherein the second view is generated in response to a splitting of the at least one object into at least two objects and to a separation of the at least two objects and wherein the at least one freeform digital ink annotation is split into at least two freeform digital ink annotations each corresponding to at least one of the at least two objects.

31. The system of claim 20, wherein the second view is generated in response to a replacement of the at least one object with at least one new object.

32. The system of claim 20, wherein the at least one object comprises at least two objects and wherein the second view is in response to a merging of the at least two objects.

33. The system of claim 20, the processor mapping depending upon the shape of the at least one freeform digital ink annotation and the proximity of the at least one freeform digital ink annotation to the at least one object.

34. The system of claim 33, the at least one freeform digital ink annotation being one of an underline and a cross-out annotation.

35. The system of claim 33, the at least one freeform digital ink annotation being an insertion annotation.

36. The system of claim 33, the at least one freeform digital ink annotation being a connector annotation.

37. The system of claim 20, the processor mapping depending upon the location of the at least one freeform digital ink annotation in the view.

38. The system of claim 37, the location being in a margin of the first view.

39. The system of claim 20, the at least one freeform digital ink annotation including at least two freeform digital ink annotations and the at least one object including at least two objects that each correspond to one of the at least two freeform digital ink annotations, the processor being responsive to a merger of the at least two objects to merge the at least two freeform digital ink annotations into a single freeform digital ink annotation.

40. The system of claim 20, the display being further responsive to a selection of the at least one freeform digital ink annotation in the second view to display the first view.

41. A method for maintaining an indication of a logical relationship of at least one freeform digital ink annotation to at least one object in a first view as a position of the at least one object in the first view changes, the indication including a layout relationship of the at least one freeform digital ink annotation to the at least one object, and usable with a hyperbolic browser on a node of a tree in a hyperbolic browser when the user changes the display to bring another portion of the tree into focus, the method comprising:

automatically mapping the logical relationship of the at least one freeform digital ink annotation to the at least one object based upon the layout relationship of the at least one freeform digital ink annotation and the at least one object in the first view;

rendering the at least one freeform digital ink annotation in response to the generation of the second view, the layout relationship of the at least one freeform digital ink annotation and the at least one object in the second view being rendered based upon the mapped logical relationship of the at least one freeform digital ink annotation to the at least one object in the first view; and

rotating and scaling the freeform digital ink notation along with the tree to continue to indicate the logical relationship of the freeform digital ink annotation to the node, the indication including a layout relationship of the at least one freeform digital ink annotation to the at least one node.

42. A system for maintaining an indication of a logical relationship of at least one freeform digital ink annotation on a node of a tree in a hyperbolic browser when the user changes the display to bring another portion of the tree into focus, including rotating and scaling the freeform digital ink notation along with the tree to continue to indicate the logical relationship of the freeform digital ink annotation to the node, the indication including a layout relationship of the at least one freeform digital ink annotation to the at least one node, and usable with a hyperbolic browser on a node of a tree in a hyperbolic browser when the user changes the display to bring another portion of the tree into focus the system comprising:

a display that displays the layout relationship of the at least one freeform digital ink annotation to the at least one object; and

a processor that maps the at least one freeform digital ink annotation to the at least one object based upon the layout relationship of the at least one freeform digital ink annotation to the at least one object in a first view, the display responsive to a change in the first view to generate a second view in which a position of the at least one object is changed in relation to another object and to render the at least one freeform digital ink annotation in the second view, the layout relationship of the at least one freeform digital ink annotation and the at least one object in the second view based on the mapped logical relationship of the at least one freeform digital ink annotation to the at least one object in the first view;

a processor that creates an anchor for each of the plurality of substrokes based upon the layout relationship of each of the plurality of substrokes to at least one object in the first view;

a processor for rotating and scaling the freeform digital ink notation along with the tree to continue to indicate the logical relationship of the freeform digital ink annotation to the node, the indication including a layout relationship of the at least one freeform digital ink annotation to the at least one node.