Electronic document location indication and navigation method, system and program

• US 8,572,512 B2
• Filed: 11/24/2008
• Issued: 10/29/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 03/28/2003
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Cimpress Schweiz GmbH (Cimpress Plc)
• Original Assignee: Vistaprint Technologies Limited (Cimpress Plc)
• Inventors: Walker, Kenneth A.
• Primary Examiner(s): Ries, Laurie
• Assistant Examiner(s): SMITH, BENJAMIN J
• Application Number:
  US12/276,993
• Publication Number:
  US 20090077465A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,800 Days
• Field of Search: 715/243, 715/247, 715/856, 358/1.18, 345/660
• US Class Current: 715/856
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/106 Display of layout of documents; Previewing

Abstract

While a user is viewing in a first display area a portion of an electronic document intended to be printed to produce a printed product, presenting to the user in a second display area a representation of the physical outline of the printed product and an indicator that indicates to the user the size and location of the electronic document portion relative to the printed product. When the user positions a cursor in the second display area, a second indicator image, visually distinctive from the first indicator image, is displayed. The user can position the second indicator at a desired location relative to the representation and request that the portion of the electronic document at that second indicator location be displayed in the first display area.

Claims

1. A system for displaying an electronic document to a user of a computer system, the electronic document comprising an electronic representation of a document to be printed, the system comprising:

one or more processors configured to execute a design tool, the design tool configured to display on a display

a first display area having a portion of the electronic document displayed therein, and

a second display area, displayed simultaneously with the first display area, the second display area having simultaneously displayed therein a representation of the printed product to be produced from the electronic document the representation including an outline indicating boundaries of the printed product,

a location indicator and a position indicator simultaneously displayed over the second display area, the location indicator and the position indicator having a width and height that is scaled to match the portion of the electronic document displayed in the first display area,

the location indicator located over an area of the printed product representation displayed in the second display area and indicating the location in the printed product of the portion of the electronic document currently displayed in the first display area, and

the position indicator displayed when a cursor is present within the boundaries of the printed product representation, wherein the position indicator operates in a first state upon occurrence of a first event to dynamically follow movement of the cursor within the boundaries of the printed product representation while the position of the location indicator and the portion of the electronic document displayed in the first display area remain unchanged, and wherein the position indicator operates in a second state upon occurrence of a second event to reposition the location indicator to the location of the position indicator and to update the content of the first display area to display the portion of the electronic document indicated by the repositioned location indicator.

2. The system of claim 1 wherein the first event is a mouseOver event, and wherein the second event is a mouseUp event.

3. The system of claim 1 wherein the position indicator is the same size and the location indicator.

4. The system of claim 1 wherein the position indicator is displayed only if the user has positioned a cursor in the second display area.

5. The system of claim 1 wherein the location indicator and the position indicator are displayed in a manner such that the user can distinguish location indicator from the position indicator.

6. The system of claim 1 wherein the printed product is intended to be folded after printing and wherein representation displayed in the second display area includes indications of where the printed product will be folded.

7. A method comprising

displaying on a display, by one or more processors, an edit area in which a user of the system can view and edit a portion of an electronic document from which a physical product is to be produced;

displaying on the display, by one or more processors, simultaneously with the edit area, a representation of the physical product to be produced from the electronic document the representation including an outline indicating boundaries of the physical product;

simultaneously displaying on the display and over the displayed representation of the physical product, a location indicator and a position indicator, the location indicator and the position indicator having a width and height that is scaled to match the portion of the electronic document displayed in the edit area and which is displayed in position over an area of the physical product representation to indicate the location in the printed product of the portion of the electronic document currently displayed in the edit area;

detecting, by one or more processors, a position of a cursor and a current state of the cursor;

if the cursor is present within the boundaries of the physical product representation and a first event is detected, the cursor operates in a first state, displaying on the display the position indicator wherein the position of the position indicator operates to dynamically follow movement of the cursor within the boundaries of the printed product representation while the position of the location indicator and the portion of the electronic document displayed in the first display area remain unchanged, and

if the cursor is present within the boundaries of the physical product representation and a second event is detected, the cursor operates in a second state, repositioning the location indicator on the display to the location of the position indicator and updating the content of the first display area to display the portion of the electronic document indicated by the repositioned location indicator.

8. The method of claim 7 further comprising responding to zooming and scrolling commands from the user to control the portion of the electronic document displayed in the edit area.

9. The method of claim 7 wherein the primed product is intended to be folded after priming and wherein the representation includes indications of where the primed product will be folded.

10. A non-transitory computer readable storage tangibly embodying program instructions which, when executed by a computer, implement a method, the method comprising:

displaying an edit area in which a user of the system can view and edit a portion of an electronic document from which a physical product is to be produced;

displaying simultaneously with the edit area, a representation of the physical product to be produced from the electronic document the representation including an outline indicating boundaries of the physical product;

simultaneously displaying over the displayed representation of the physical product, a location indicator and a position indicator, the location indicator and the position indicator having a width and height that is scaled to match the portion of the electronic document displayed in the edit area and which is displayed in position over an area of the physical product representation to indicate the location in the printed product of the portion of the electronic document currently displayed in the edit area;

detecting a position of a cursor and a current state of the cursor;

if the cursor is present within the boundaries of the physical product representation and a first event is detected, the cursor operates in a first state, displaying the position indicator wherein the position of the position indicator operates to dynamically follow movement of the cursor within the boundaries of the printed product representation while the position of the location indicator and the portion of the electronic document displayed in the first display area remain unchanged, and

if the cursor is present within the boundaries of the physical product representation and a second event is detected the cursor operates in a second state, repositioning the location indicator to the location of the position indicator and updating the content of the first display area to display the portion of the electronic document indicated by the repositioned location indicator.

11. The non-transitory computer readable storage of claim 10, the method further comprising program instructions configured to allow zooming and scrolling such that the user can modify the portion of the electronic document displayed in the edit area.

12. The non-transitory computer readable storage of claim 10, the method further comprising program instructions configured to recalculate the position of the indicator and updating the display of the indicator a plurality of times per second.

13. The non-transitory computer readable storage of claim 10 wherein the program instructions execute in a browser program in the computer system.

14. The non-transitory computer readable storage of claim 10, the method further comprising program instructions configured to repetitively obtain information from the browser program regarding the portion of the electronic document displayed in the edit area and program instructions configured to recalculate the position of the indicator using the obtained information.