Appliance with animation framework

• US 8,136,039 B2
• Filed: 09/10/2009
• Issued: 03/13/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 06/03/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Whirlpool Corporation
• Original Assignee: Whirlpool Corporation
• Inventors: Ebrom, Matthew P., Glotzbach, Mark E., McCoy, Richard A., Radford, Brian N.
• Primary Examiner(s): Patel, Ramesh
• Application Number:
  US12/556,669
• Publication Number:
  US 20100004764A1
• Time in Patent Office: 915 Days
• Field of Search: 700/15, 700/17, 700/83, 715/706, 715763-764, 717/121, 717/125
• US Class Current: 715/706
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/263 Generation of test inputs, e.g. test vectors, patterns or sequences ; with adaptation of the tested hardware for testability with external testers
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/10 Requirements analysis; Specification techniques
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/36 Software reuse
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/38 for implementing user interfaces
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/2814 Exchanging control software or macros for controlling appliance services in a home automation network arrangements for maintenance or administration involving configuration of the network and network elements H04L41/08
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 2012/285 Generic home appliances, e.g. refrigerators
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/125 involving control of end-device applications over a network
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 715/965 for process control and configuration

Abstract

An appliance includes one or more control boards having control software to control a cycle of operation, access to memory, a graphical user interface in communication with the control boards for allowing a user to observe and interact with the appliance regarding the cycle of operation, and a software framework in communication with the graphical user interface and the memory access. The software framework has animation definitions and access to builder content containing instance information with which it can create at least one instance of a user interface control and can associate one or more animation definitions with memory information associated with at least two locations in the memory. With this structure, the software framework dynamically renders animation in the graphical user interface at runtime using the animation definitions, and the rendering of the graphical user interface is dynamically affected by association of the animation definitions and the memory information.

Claims

1. An appliance configured to perform a cycle of operation on a physical article comprising:

at least one control board having control software to control the cycle of operation, and having access to memory,

a graphical user interface in communication with the at least one control board for allowing a user to observe and interact with the appliance regarding the cycle of operation,

a software framework in communication with the graphical user interface and the memory access, and having animation definitions and access to builder content containing instance information with which the software framework can create at least one instance of a user interface control and can associate at least one animation definition with memory information associated with at least two locations in the memory,

wherein the software framework dynamically renders animation in the graphical user interface at runtime using the at least one animation definition, and wherein the rendering of the graphical user interface is dynamically affected by association of the at least one animation definition and the memory information.

2. The appliance of claim 1 wherein the animation definition comprises an arbitrary function having at least one input and at least one output, wherein one of the at least two memory locations is associated with the at least one input and the other of the at least two memory locations is associated with the at least one output wherein the value of the other of the at least two memory locations is set to the output of the animation in response to the value at the at least one input in response to the one of the at least two memory locations and the arbitrary function.

3. The appliance of claim 2 wherein the other of the at least two memory locations is associated with a property of at least one instance of a user interface control wherein a value of the property affects the graphical user interface.

4. The appliance of claim 3 wherein at least a portion of the rendering is a visualization of the graphical user interface.

5. The appliance of claim 3 wherein at least a portion of the rendering is audible.

6. The appliance of claim 3 wherein at least a portion of the rendering is tactile.

7. The appliance of claim 3 wherein the property is one of size, font, color, position, and style.

8. The appliance of claim 7 wherein the position is an x, y coordinate on the graphical user interface.

9. The appliance of claim 3 wherein the property is a display value.

10. The appliance of claim 9 wherein the display value includes information associated with the cycle of operation.

11. The appliance of claim 10 wherein the information includes information about at least one of temperature, speed, time, duration of time, end time, start time, delay time, cycle, cycle selection, cycle progression, cycle step, time remaining in cycle, time remaining in step, cycle step transition conditions state, cycle step transition condition logic, cycle modifiers, cycle modifier selections, cycle outcomes, energy usage, resource usage, water usage, consumables, articles, food, doneness, detergent, and softeners.

12. The appliance of claim 2 wherein the at least one input associated with at least one of the two memory locations is associated with information associated with the cycle of operation.

13. The appliance of claim 12 wherein the information includes information about at least one of temperature, speed, time, duration of time, end time, start time, delay time, cycle, cycle selection, cycle progression, cycle step, time remaining in cycle, time remaining in step, cycle step transition conditions state, cycle step transition condition logic, cycle modifiers, cycle modifier selections, cycle outcomes, energy usage, resource usage, water usage, consumables, articles, food, doneness, detergent, and softeners.

14. The appliance of claim 3 wherein the at least one input associated with at least one of the two memory locations is associated with a property of at least one instance of a user interface control.

15. The appliance of claim 14 wherein the at least one output associated with the other of the at least two memory locations is associated with a property of at least one instance of a user interface control.

16. The appliance of claim 15 wherein the input and output are associated with different properties of the same instance of a user interface control.

17. The appliance of claim 1 wherein the control board automatically affects the animation upon actuation of an appliance control event by the control software.

18. The appliance of claim 17 wherein the affect includes one of starting, stopping, pausing or resuming.

19. The appliance of claim 17 wherein the appliance control event includes one of cycle state, phase, temperature, and time.

20. The appliance of claim 1 wherein a graphical user interface event affects the animation.

21. The appliance of claim 1 wherein the graphical user interface event includes one of widget show/hide, widget enable/disable, and screen navigation.

22. The appliance of claim 1 wherein an appliance data source change event affects the animation.

23. The appliance of claim 22 wherein the appliance data source change event includes one of a change of user setting, a change of user option, and a change in cycle selection.

24. The appliance of claim 1 wherein a network message contained in the animation definition affects the animation.

25. The appliance of claim 1 having access to builder content from at least two sources, the information in the builder content including animation instances wherein the animation instances on the at last two sources are linked with each other serially or in parallel to produce a complex composite animation behavior.

26. The appliance of claim 1 wherein the information in the builder content includes multiple animation instances that are linked with each other serially or in parallel to produce a complex composite animation behavior.

27. The appliance of claim 1 wherein an animation instance created at runtime is serially linked with itself to produce a looping behavior.

28. The appliance of claim 1 wherein the animation is stored in a reusable library and referenced by multiple controls in the graphical user interface, each control using unique animation instances with unique control events.

29. The appliance of claim 1 wherein the animation is linked between distinct screens on the graphical user interface to produce screen transition effects during navigation.

30. The appliance of claim 29 wherein the effects include at least one of fade in/fade out, sliding screens, and scrolling screens.

31. The appliance of claim 1 wherein at least one of the control board and control software has parameters governing the behavior of the control software at runtime, the animation modifies at least one parameter of the control software to affect the cycle of operation at runtime, and the rendering of the graphical user interface changes in response to activation of the animation.

32. The appliance of claim 31 wherein the control board automatically affects the animation upon actuation of an appliance control event by the control software.

33. The appliance of claim 32 wherein the affect includes one of starting, stopping, pausing or resuming.

34. The appliance of claim 32 wherein the appliance control event includes one of cycle state, phase, temperature, and time.

35. The appliance of claim 32 wherein a graphical user interface event affects the animation.

36. The appliance of claim 32 wherein the graphical user interface event includes one of widget show/hide, widget enable/disable, and screen navigation.

37. The appliance of claim 32 wherein an appliance data source change event affects the animation.

38. The appliance of claim 37 wherein the appliance data source change event includes one of a change of user setting, a change of user option, and a change in cycle selection.

39. The appliance of claim 32 wherein a network message contained in the animation definition affects the animation.

40. The appliance of claim 32 having access to builder content from at least two sources, the information in the builder content including animation instances wherein the animation instances on the at last two sources are linked with each other serially or in parallel to produce a complex composite animation behavior.

41. The appliance of claim 32 wherein the information in the builder content includes multiple animation instances that are linked with each other serially or in parallel to produce a complex composite animation behavior.

42. The appliance of claim 32 wherein an animation instance created at runtime is serially linked with itself to produce a looping behavior.

43. The appliance of claim 32 wherein the animation is stored in a reusable library and referenced by multiple controls in the graphical user interface, each control using unique animation instances with unique control events.

44. The appliance of claim 32 wherein the animation is linked between distinct screens on the graphical user interface to produce screen transition effects during navigation.

45. The appliance of claim 44 wherein the effects include at least one of fade in/fade out, sliding screens, and scrolling screens.

46. The appliance of claim 32 wherein the animation modifies a property of a screen widget or a control such as the following parameter types.

47. The appliance of claim 46 wherein the modification includes one of visibility, transparency, x screen position, y screen position, font color, font size, image sprite, or index of active layout and container.

48. The appliance of claim 32 wherein the animation produces progress indicating events that can be used by the user interface to produce time-sensitive screen behavior.

49. The appliance of claim 32 wherein the animation is represented in terms of modifying a property of a user interface control over time, where time can be defined linearly, step wise, or as an arbitrary polynomial.