Thumbnail image virtual address space

• US 7,499,979 B2
• Filed: 12/20/2005
• Issued: 03/03/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 10/23/1998
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: eBay Inc.
• Original Assignee: eBay Inc.
• Inventors: Hess, Martin L., Wilson, Michael K.
• Primary Examiner(s): VU, VIET DUY
• Application Number:
  US11/312,876
• Publication Number:
  US 20060101131A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,169 Days
• Field of Search: 709/213, 709/214, 709/216, 709/219, 709/217, 707/10, 707/104.1
• US Class Current: 709/213
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 12/0223 User address space allocation, e.g. contiguous or non contiguous base addressing
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/51 Indexing; Data structures therefor; Storage structures
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/958 Organisation or management of web site content, e.g. publishing, maintaining pages or automatic linking
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 40/04 Trading; Exchange, e.g. stocks, commodities, derivatives or currency exchange
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99945 Object-oriented database structure processing
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99948 Application of database or data structure, e.g. distributed, multimedia, or image

Abstract

A method includes loading a plurality of thumbnail images into a virtual address space having a first address, and retrieving a specific thumbnail image of the plurality of thumbnail images from the virtual address space by indexing into the virtual address space at a location defined by an offset, the offset corresponding to the specific thumbnail image.

Claims

1. A method including:

creating a first thumbnail image from an original image, the original image being unrecoverable from the first thumbnail image;

loading a plurality of thumbnail images including the first thumbnail image, into a virtual address space having a first address;

retrieving thumbnail images associated with items for sale, the thumbnail images created based on images retrieved from a plurality of sites; and

retrieving a specific thumbnail image of the plurality of thumbnail images from the virtual address space by indexing into the virtual address space at a location defined by an offset, the offset corresponding to the specific thumbnail image.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the loading of the plurality of thumbnail images comprises loading a database including the plurality of thumbnail images into the virtual address space.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein the loading of the plurality of thumbnail images comprises opening the database as a memory mapped file.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein each entry within the database includes a length field and image data for a respective thumbnail image.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the virtual address space is a continuous virtual address space.

6. A system including:

first means for creating a first thumbnail image from an original image, the original image being unrecoverable from the first thumbnail image;

second means for loading a plurality of thumbnail images including the first thumbnail image, into a virtual address space having a first address;

third means for retrieving thumbnail images associated with items for sale, the thumbnail images created based on images retrieved from a plurality of sites; and

fourth means for retrieving a specific thumbnail image of the plurality of thumbnail images from the virtual address space by indexing into the virtual address space at a location defined by an offset, the offset corresponding to the specific thumbnail image.

7. The system of claim 6, wherein the first means is for loading a database including the plurality of thumbnail images into the virtual address space.

8. The system of claim 7, wherein the first means is for opening the database as a memory mapped file.

9. The system of claim 8, wherein each entry within the database includes a length field and image data for a respective thumbnail image.

10. The system of claim 6, wherein the virtual address space is a continuous virtual address space.

11. A tangible machine-readable medium comprising instructions, which when implemented by one or more processors perform the following operations:

creating a first thumbnail image from an original image, the original image being unrecoverable from the first thumbnail image;

loading a plurality of thumbnail images including the first thumbnail image, into a virtual address space having a first address;

retrieving thumbnail images associated with items for sale, the thumbnail images created based on images retrieved from a plurality of sites; and

retrieving a specific thumbnail image of the plurality of thumbnail images from the virtual address space by indexing into the virtual address space at a location defined by an offset, the offset corresponding to the specific thumbnail image.