System and method that facilitates computer desktop use via scaling of displayed objects with shifts to the periphery

• US 7,386,801 B1
• Filed: 05/21/2004
• Issued: 06/10/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 02/25/2003
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Czerwinski, Mary P., Horvitz, Eric J., Robertson, George G., Meyers, Brian R., Smith, Gregory R.
• Primary Examiner(s): HAILU, TADESSE
• Application Number:
  US10/851,928
• Time in Patent Office: 1,481 Days
• Field of Search: 715763-765, 715/769, 715/778, 715/779, 715/781, 715/788, 715/805, 715/815
• US Class Current: 715/764
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2203/04803 Split screen, i.e. subdividing the display area or the window area into separate subareas
• 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

Abstract

The present invention relates to a system that facilitates multi-tasking in a computing environment. A focus area component defines a focus area within a display space—the focus area occupying a subset area of the display space area. A scaling component scales display objects as a function of proximity to the focus area, and a behavior modification component modifies respective behavior of the display objects as a function their location of the display space. Thus, and more particularly the subject invention provides for interaction technique(s) and user interface(s) in connection with managing display objects on a display surface. One aspect of the invention defines a central focus area where the display objects are displayed and behave as usual, and a periphery outside the focus area where the display objects are reduced in size based on their location, getting smaller as they near an edge of the display surface so that many more objects can remain visible. In addition or alternatively, the objects can fade as they move toward an edge, fading increasing as a function of distance from the focus area and/or use of the object and/or priority of the object. Objects in the periphery can also be modified to have different interaction behavior (e.g., lower refresh rate, fading, reconfigured to display sub-objects based on relevance and/or visibility, static, etc.) as they may be too small for standard rendering. The methods can provide a flexible, scalable surface when coupled with automated policies for moving objects into the periphery, in response to the introduction of new objects or the resizing of pre-existing objects by a user or autonomous process.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method that facilitates organizing data within a display, comprising:

identifying items to be or already are displayed on a window of the display;

automatically organizing the items via employment of predefined templates that define layout for the items within the window;

automatically providing a prototypical structure for the window; and

providing a template component that provides gestures such that separate components of the prototypical structure are selectively expanded to focus, the entire prototypical structure is selectively expanded, both selectively maintaining a cleaned up structure, isomorphic in layout to a minimized structure, and selectively returned to a last state.

2. The method of claim 1 further comprising identifying type of the items and associating a most relevant template to apply to the items.

3. The method of claim 1 further comprising inferring a most appropriate template to apply to a set of items.

4. The method of claim 1 further comprising learning a layout of items displayed on the display and applying the learned layout to a new set of items.

5. The method of claim 1 further comprising organizing and displaying the items as a function of user context.

6. The method of claim 1 further comprising organizing and displaying the items as a function of item content.

7. The method of claim 1 further comprising organizing and displaying the items as a function of determined and/or inferred priority of the respective items.

8. The method of claim 1, further comprising automatically setting behaviors and/or interaction modes for the items.

9. The method of claim 1, further comprising employing a user model in connection with automatically organizing and displaying a subset of the items.

10. The method of claim 9, wherein the user model comprises at least one of rules, historical data, preferences, Bayesian networks, neural networks, and non-linear training systems.

11. The method of claim 9, further comprising automatically configuring the items via employment of the user model.

12. The method of claim 1, further comprising automatically organizing the items as a function of at least one of:

data types of the items, determined and/or inferred priority of the item, utility given user context and/or data content, and display space.

13. A computer readable storage medium having stored thereon computer-executable instructions for performing the method of claim 1.

14. A system that facilitates presenting data, comprising:

means for defining how data is to be rendered on a display;

means for automatically rendering the data on the display as a function of determined and/or inferred user desire for the data rendering;

means for providing a glanceable conveyance of information associated with the data; and

means for providing gestures such that separate components of a prototypical structure are selectively expanded to focus, the entire prototypical structure is selectively expanded, both selectively maintaining a cleaned up structure, isomorphic in layout to a minimized structure, and selectively returned to a last state.

15. A computer-implemented system that facilitates organizing items within one or more displays, comprising:

a data store that stores information relating to organizing and displaying items within one or more windows of the display(s); and

a template component that employs the information to automatically organize and display a set of items within the one or more windows, wherein the items comprise e-mail messages and the template component automatically organizes the messages so that the messages are resized and arranged in accordance with a template that provides for a desired organization of the e-mails, wherein the template component provides gestures such that separate components of a prototypical structure are selectively expanded to focus, the entire prototypical structure is selectively expanded, both selectively maintaining a cleaned up structure isomorphic in layout to a minimized structure, and selectively returned to a last state.

16. The system of claim 15, wherein the set of items are tasks, and the template component automatically configures and sets a layout of the tasks within the display(s).

17. The system of claim 15, wherein the items comprise at least one of clusters of windows, windows, and tasks.

18. The system of claim 15, further comprising an artificial intelligence component that infers user desired configuration of the items.

19. The system of claim 15, further comprising a task profile that stores encodings of representations of tasks, layouts, and/or behaviors on gestures.

20. The system of claim 19, wherein the task profile provides for defining global defaults and/or defining specialized canonical tasks.

21. The system of claim 15, wherein the items comprise windows and the template component automatically provides a prototypical structure for the window.

22. The system of claim 21, wherein the template component provides gestures that allow for separate components of the prototypical structure to be selectively expanded to focus, or to have the entire prototypical structure expanded, either maintaining a cleaned up structure, isomorphic in layout to a minimized structure, or returned to a last state.

23. The system of claim 15, wherein the organization is based upon at least one of:

pre-defined rules, an explicitly and/or implicitly trained machine learning system, a utility-based analysis, probabilistic-based analysis, statistical-based analysis, and confidence-based analysis.

24. The system of claim 15, wherein the template component facilitates glanceable conveyance of information associated with the items.

25. The system of claim 15, wherein the template component employs a subset of a plurality of pre-defined templates and/or dynamically generated templates to facilitate organization and presentation of the items.

26. The system of claim 15, wherein the template component automatically learns a configuration for a data type and thereafter applies such learned configuration to a new set of data.

27. The system of claim 26, the template component organizes items associated with the new data in a manner inferred to be most consistent with the learned layout and/or consistent with inferred user desire for the manner in which the items should be presented.