Handheld electronic device with reduced keyboard and associated method of providing quick text entry in a message

• US 8,290,895 B2
• Filed: 04/24/2012
• Issued: 10/16/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 03/16/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Malikie Innovations Limited (Key Patent Innovations Limited)
• Original Assignee: Blackberry Limited
• Inventors: Babu, George V.
• Primary Examiner(s): Chawan, Vijay B
• Application Number:
  US13/454,820
• Publication Number:
  US 20120209593A1
• Time in Patent Office: 175 Days
• Field of Search: 704/251, 704/257, 704/9, 704/2, 704/270, 704/275, 704/8, 704/7, 704/235, 715/811, 715/22, 710/67, 341/22, 341/28, 245/156, 245/169
• US Class Current: 707/603
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0237 using prediction or retrieval techniques
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/189 Automatic justification
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/242 Dictionaries
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/274 Converting codes to words; Guess-ahead of partial word inputs

Abstract

An improved handheld electronic device having a reduced keyboard provides facilitated language entry by making available to a user certain words that a user may reasonably be expected to enter. In some situations, certain words can be stored, for example, in a temporary dictionary for use in particular situations. For instance, the names of the recipients of an electronic message might be stored in a temporary dictionary for rapid retrieval when entering a salutation in the message. As another example, a number of the words in an existing electronic message may be stored in a temporary dictionary and made available to a user when replying to or forwarding the message since the existing message might include words that the user might reasonably be expected to type in the reply message or the forwarded message.

Claims

1. A method for enabling input into an electronic device, the method comprising:

generating a new message in response to a command, wherein the new message relates to a pre-existing message thread;

detecting an ambiguous input; and

identifying, as a priority output for display, at least one language object stored in a dictionary of language objects associated with the message thread, based on detecting the ambiguous input.

2. The method of claim 1, comprising generating the dictionary of language objects associated with the message thread upon determining that a dictionary associated with the message thread does not exist.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein generating the dictionary comprises storing, as language objects of the dictionary, words found in messages associated with the message thread.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein the language objects are associated with frequency objects containing frequency values for the language objects.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein the language objects are assigned frequency values higher than objects contained in a generic word list.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the dictionary of language objects is located in a first portion of a memory separate from a generic word list located in a second portion of the memory.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the command is a replying or forwarding command with respect to at least one message in the message thread.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the ambiguous input is detected from a set of selections of input keys.

9. An electronic device comprising:

a memory storing instructions; and

a processor executing the instructions to perform the steps of;

generating a new message in response to a command,

wherein the new message relates to a pre-existing message thread;

detecting an ambiguous input; and

identifying, as a priority output for display, at least one language object stored in a dictionary of language objects associated with the message thread, based on detecting the ambiguous input.

10. The electronic device of claim 9, the processor executing the instructions to perform the further step of generating the dictionary of language objects associated with the message thread upon determining that a dictionary associated with the message thread does not exist.

11. The electronic device of claim 10, wherein generating the dictionary comprises storing, as language objects of the dictionary, words found in messages associated with the message thread.

12. The electronic device of claim 11, wherein the language objects are associated with frequency objects containing frequency values for the language objects.

13. The electronic device of claim 12, wherein the language objects are assigned frequency values higher than objects contained in a generic word list.

14. The electronic device of claim 9, wherein the dictionary of language objects is located in a first portion of the memory separate from a generic word list located in a second portion of the memory.

15. The electronic device of claim 9, wherein the command is a replying or forwarding command with respect to the at least one message.

16. The electronic device of claim 9, wherein the ambiguous input is detected from a set of selections of input keys.

17. A tangibly embodied non-transitory computer-readable storage medium storing instructions that, when executed by a processor, perform a method comprising:

generating a new message in response to a command, wherein the new message relates to a pre-existing message thread;

detecting an ambiguous input; and

identifying, as a priority output for display, at least one language object stored in a dictionary of language objects associated with the message thread, based on detecting the ambiguous input.

18. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 17, the method further comprising generating the dictionary of language objects associated with the message thread upon determining that a dictionary associated with the message thread does not exist.

19. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 18, wherein generating the dictionary comprises storing, as language objects of the dictionary, words found in messages associated with the message thread.

20. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 19, wherein the language objects are associated with frequency objects containing frequency values for the language objects.

21. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 20, wherein the language objects are assigned frequency values higher than objects contained in a generic word list.

22. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 17, wherein the dictionary of language objects is located in a first portion of a memory separate from a generic word list located in a second portion of the memory.

23. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 17, wherein the command is a replying or forwarding command with respect to the at least one message.

24. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 17, wherein the ambiguous input is detected from a set of selections of input keys.