Text reflow in a structured document

• US 7,511,720 B2
• Filed: 04/22/2005
• Issued: 03/31/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 08/09/2000
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Adobe Inc.
• Original Assignee: Adobe Systems Incorporated (Adobe Inc.)
• Inventors: Ayers, Robert M., Sites, Richard L.
• Primary Examiner(s): Tung; Kee M
• Assistant Examiner(s): Chu; David H
• Application Number:
  US11/112,015
• Publication Number:
  US 20050188303A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,439 Days
• Field of Search: 345/629, 345/630, 715/514, 715/517, 715/518, 715/521, 382/180
• US Class Current: 345/629
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/106 Display of layout of documents; Previewing
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/189 Automatic justification
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/191 Automatic line break hyphenation

Abstract

A method and computer program product for reflowing a PDL page without using the original application used to create the PDL page. The method and computer program product include receiving a page represented in a page description language, the page including a plurality of page objects, and changing one or both of a size of the page and a size of one or more of the page objects, while maintaining spatial relationships between the page objects.

Claims

1. A computer program product, tangibly stored on a computer-readable medium, for forming illustrations in a page, comprising instructions operable to cause a programmable processor to:

at a processor, receive a page represented in a page description language (PDL), the page including a plurality of page objects including line art elements, each page object associated with a PDL element range including at least one PDL element represented by a unique sequence value;

based on the sequence values repeatedly augment each PDL range with a PDL element that is sequentially adjacent to the PDL range and is not part of another PDL range when the bounding box of the PDL element overlaps the bounding box of the PDL object associated with the PDL range;

such that the PDL elements in each PDL range define an illustration.

2. The computer program product of claim 1, further comprising instructions operable to cause a programmable processor to:

combine two illustrations when their PDL ranges are adjacent and their bounding boxes overlap.

3. A computer program product, tangibly stored on a computer-readable medium, for forming illustrations in a page, comprising instructions operable to cause a programmable processor to:

receive a page represented in a page description language (PDL), the page including a plurality of page objects including line art elements, each page object associated with a PDL element range including at least one PDL element represented by a unique sequence value;

recursively coalesce line art elements having overlapping bounding boxes to form one or more illustrations;

add to each illustration each PDL element within the PDL range of the illustration that is not part of the illustration when the bounding box of the PDL element overlaps the bounding box of the illustration; and

based on the sequence values repeatedly augment the PDL range of each illustration with PDL elements that are sequentially adjacent to the PDL range and are not part of another illustration when the bounding box of the PDL elements overlap the bounding box of the illustration;

such that the PDL elements in each PDL range define an illustration.

4. The computer program product of claim 3, further comprising instructions operable to cause a programmable processor to:

combine two illustrations when their PDL ranges are adjacent and their bounding boxes overlap.

5. The computer program product of claim 4, wherein the instructions operable to cause a programmable processor to recursively coalesce comprises instructions to cause a programmable processor to:

combine two line art elements having overlapping bounding boxes, thereby forming an illustration; and

create a new bounding box containing the illustration.

6. The computer program product of claim 5, further comprising instructions operable to cause a programmable processor to:

combine a line art element with the illustration when the bounding boxes of the line art element and the illustration overlap.

7. A method for forming illustrations in a page, comprising:

receiving a page represented in a page description language (PDL), the page including a plurality of page objects including line art elements, each page object associated with a PDL element range including at least one PDL element represented by a unique sequence value;

based on the sequence values repeatedly augment each PDL range with a PDL element that is sequentially adjacent to the PDL range and is not part of another PDL range when the bounding box of the PDL element overlaps the bounding box of the PDL object associated with the PDL range;

such that the PDL elements in each PDL range define an illustration;

initiating display of the illustration.

8. The method of claim 7, further comprising combining two illustrations when their PDL ranges are adjacent and their bounding boxes overlap.

9. A method for forming illustrations in a page, comprising:

receiving, at a processor, a page represented in a page description language (PDL), the page including a plurality of page objects including line art elements, each page object associated with a PDL element range including at least one PDL element represented by a unique sequence value;

recursively coalescing line art elements having overlapping bounding boxes to form one or more illustrations;

adding to each illustration each PDL element within the PDL range of the illustration that is not part of the illustration when the bounding box of the PDL element overlaps the bounding box of the illustration;

based on the sequence values repeatedly augmenting the PDL range of each illustration with PDL elements that are sequentially adjacent to the PDL range and are not part of another illustration when the bounding box of the PDL elements overlap the bounding box of the illustration;

such that the PDL elements in each PDL range define an illustration;

initiating display of the illustration.

10. The method of claim 9, further comprising combining two illustrations when their PDL ranges are adjacent and their bounding boxes overlap.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein the step of recursively coalescing comprises:

combining two line art elements having overlapping bounding boxes, thereby forming an illustration; and

creating a new bounding box containing the illustration.

12. The method of claim 11, further comprising:

combining a line art element with the illustration when the bounding boxes of the line art element and the illustration overlap.

13. A system for forming illustrations in a page, comprising:

a computer system that includes a processor for receiving a page represented in a page description language (PDL), the page including a plurality of page objects including line art elements, each page object associated with a PDL element range including at least one PDL element represented by a unique sequence value;

wherein the processor is configured to, based on the sequence values, repeatedly augment each PDL range with a PDL element that is sequentially adjacent to the PDL range and is not part of another PDL range when the bounding box of the PDL element overlaps the bounding box of the PDL object associated with the PDL range;

such that the PDL elements in each PDL range define an illustration; and

wherein the processor is configured to initiate display of the illustration.

14. The system of claim 13, wherein the processor is further configured to combine two illustrations when their PDL ranges are adjacent and their bounding boxes overlap.

15. A system for forming illustrations in a page, comprising:

a computer system that includes a processor for receiving a page represented in a page description language (PDL), the page including a plurality of page objects including line art elements, each page object associated with a PDL element range including at least one PDL element represented by a unique sequence value;

wherein the processor is configured to recursively coalesce line art elements having overlapping bounding boxes to form one or more illustrations;

wherein the processor is further configured to add to each illustration each PDL element within the PDL range of the illustration that is not part of the illustration when the bounding box of the PDL element overlaps the bounding box of the illustration;

wherein the processor is also configured to, based on the sequence values, repeatedly augment the PDL range of each illustration with PDL elements that are sequentially adjacent to the PDL range and are not part of another illustration when the bounding box of the PDL elements overlap the bounding box of the illustration;

such that the PDL elements in each PDL range define an illustration; and

wherein the processor is configured to initiate display of the illustration.

16. The system of claim 15, wherein the processor is further configured to combine two illustrations when their PDL ranges are adjacent and their bounding boxes overlap.

17. The system of claim 16, wherein to recursively coalesce, the processor is configured to combine two line art elements having overlapping bounding boxes, thereby forming an illustration, and create a new bounding box containing the illustration.

18. The system of claim 17, wherein the processor is further configured to combine a line art element with the illustration when the bounding boxes of the line art element and the illustration overlap.