Method and apparatus for storing and replaying creation history of multimedia software or other software content

• US 7,721,264 B2
• Filed: 04/26/2001
• Issued: 05/18/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 09/30/1994
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Apple Inc.
• Original Assignee: Apple Inc.
• Inventors: Peterson, Alan R., Spohrer, James C.
• Primary Examiner(s): Vo; Ted T
• Application Number:
  US09/844,921
• Publication Number:
  US 20060010420A1
• Time in Patent Office: 3,309 Days
• Field of Search: 717104-113, 717/125, 717/127
• US Class Current: 717/125
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/453 Help systems
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 27/034 on discs G11B27/036, G11B27/038 take precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G11B 27/105 of operating discs
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/854 Content authoring
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 715/967 Visual or iconic programming

Abstract

An authoring or other software tool is provided which allows users of the tool to review the creation and evolution of all or part of a content such as a multimedia title created using a tool incorporating the invention. According to the invention, an authoring tool comprises a recording mechanism for recording actions performed during the development or modification of software content in a manner that preserves, directly or indirectly, the relative chronological order of the actions and a playback mechanism for performing or otherwise simulating recorded actions. Preferably, the playback of an action includes annotation using text, recorded or computer-generated voice, video and/or graphic animation. Preferably, an authoring tool embodying the invention allows an author to specify criteria for which actions are to be played back, thereby providing an author with a mechanism for focusing on a particular subset of the recorded actions.

Claims

1. A method for recording and reviewing actions performed during development of software content created using a tool on a computer system having a processor and memory, said method comprising:

receiving user events during the development of the software content, wherein each of the user events is a low-level event generated by a peripheral device coupled to the computer system;

determining, automatically by the computer system in response to receiving the user events, which events and sequences of events constitute actions, wherein each determined action corresponds to a change in the software content and wherein at least one of the user events, by itself, does not correspond to a change in the software content;

determining, by the computer system, whether an explanation accompanies an action;

recording the determined actions during the development of the software content if a user preference specifies that the determined actions are to be recorded; and

recording the determined explanations such that a recorded explanation of a recorded action is associated with the recorded action.

2. A method as defined in claim 1, said method further comprising:

receiving a user request for playback of recorded actions;

accessing recorded actions and associated recorded explanations; and

playing back recorded actions and any associated recorded explanations.

3. A method as defined in claim 1, wherein said determining whether as explanation accompanies an action includes prompting a user for an explanation with respect to an action being recorded.

4. A computer-readable storage medium which stores instructions that, when executed by a system, cause the system to perform a method as in claim 1.

5. A computer-readable storage medium having stored thereon instructions for causing a computer to perform the following method comprising:

displaying a starting state of multimedia content;

determining automatically, by the computer, which recorded actions satisfy a specified criteria, wherein each recorded action corresponds to at least one user events and wherein each recorded action corresponds to a change in the multimedia content and wherein at least one of the at least one user events, by itself, does not correspond to a change in the multimedia content;

identifying automatically, by the computer, a plurality of redundant determined recorded actions;

summarizing automatically, by the computer, the plurality of redundant determined recorded actions to generate a summarized determined recorded action;

replacing automatically, by the computer, the plurality of redundant determined recorded actions with the summarized determined recorded action; and

playing back a sequence of only those determined recorded actions in chronological order on an output device during a development of content.

6. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 5, wherein the specified criteria is a user specified criteria.

7. A computer-readable storage medium having stored thereon instructions for causing a computer to perform a method comprising:

receiving a user event during a development of content;

determining whether said received user event indicates a playback request; and

if said received user event indicates a playback request, then

determining automatically, by the computer, which recorded actions to play back by determining which recorded actions meet a specified criteria, wherein each recorded action corresponds to at least one user events and wherein each recorded action corresponds to a change in the content and wherein at least one of the at least one user events, by itself, does not correspond to a change in the content,

identifying automatically, by the computer, a plurality of redundant determined recorded actions,

summarizing automatically, by the computer, the plurality of redundant determined recorded actions to generate a summarized determined recorded action,

replacing automatically by the computer, the plurality of redundant determined recorded actions with the summarized determined recorded action and

playing back those determined recorded actions and

if said received user event does not indicate a playback request, then determining whether there is an action to record and recording the action if it is determined that there is an action to record during the development of the content.

8. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 7, wherein the specified criteria is a user specified criteria.

9. A computer-readable storage medium having stored thereon instructions for causing a computer to perform the following method comprising:

receiving a user event during a development of content;

determining whether said received user event indicates a playback request; and

if said received user event indicates a playback request, then

determining automatically, by the computer, which recorded actions to play back by determining which recorded actions meet a specified fixed criteria, said fixed criteria being selectable from a plurality of fixed criteria, wherein each recorded action corresponds to at least one user events and wherein each recorded action corresponds to a change in the content and wherein at least one of the at least one user events, by itself, does not correspond to a change in the content,

identifying automatically, by the computer, a plurality of redundant determined recorded actions,

summarizing automatically, by the computer, the plurality of redundant determined recorded actions to generate a summarized determined recorded action,

replacing automatically, by the computer, the plurality of redundant determined recorded actions with the summarized determined recorded action and

playing back those determined recorded actions and

if said received user event does not indicate a playback request, then determining whether there is an action to record and recording the action if it is determined that there is an action to record during the development of the content.

10. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 9, wherein the specified fixed criteria is a user specified fixed criteria.

11. A computer-readable storage medium having stored thereon executable computer program instructions, the executable computer program instructions including an action class list and, when executed by a digital processing system, causing the system to perform a method for playback of actions from the action class list, wherein:

the action class list comprises a plurality of action class description fields, each action class description field having a first field containing data which specifies a particular action class and a second field containing data which specifies a generic explanation of the action class specified in the corresponding first field,

wherein the action class list is used during playback of actions, during a development of content,

to identify, automatically, by the digital processing system, a plurality of redundant actions, wherein each action corresponds to at least one user events and wherein each recorded action corresponds to a change in the content and wherein at least one of the at least one user events, by itself, does not correspond to a change in the content,

to summarize, automatically, by the digital processing system, the plurality of redundant actions to generate a summarized action,

to replace automatically, by the digital processing system the plurality of redundant actions with a summarized action and

to determine an explanation associated with the action class of each of the actions and to accompany the played back actions with the determined explanations.

12. A computer-readable storage medium as defined in claim 11 wherein said second field identifies a software routine capable of producing an explanation based upon properties of a recorded action.

13. A method for playing back actions recorded during development of content created using a tool on a computer system having a processor, memory and an output device, the tool having a user-selectable playback initiating mechanism for initiating the playback, said method comprising:

displaying a starting state of the content; and

playing back recorded actions, during the development of the content, in chronological order on said output device, an action from said recorded actions comprising a sequence of events, wherein said events are selected to constitute said action based on a preset criterion and wherein each action corresponds to a change in the content and wherein at least one of the events, by itself, does not correspond to a change in the content, wherein a plurality of redundant actions are automatically replaced by the computer system with a summarized action and wherein the summarized action is played back instead of the plurality of redundant actions and wherein the summarized action is generated automatically by the computer system.

14. The method of claim 13, wherein:

at least one action from said recorded actions is accompanied by an explanation and said playing back further comprises playing back any associated recorded explanations along with recorded actions.

15. The method of claim 13, wherein the preset criterion is a user specified preset criterion.

16. A computer-readable storage medium having stored thereon instructions for causing a computer to perform the following method comprising:

displaying a starting state of content;

playing back recorded actions, during the development of the content, in chronological order on said output device, an action from said recorded actions comprising a sequence of events, wherein said events are selected to constitute said action based on a preset criterion and wherein each action corresponds to a change in the content and wherein at least one of the events, by itself, does not correspond to a change in the content, wherein a plurality of redundant actions are automatically replaced by the computer system with a summarized action and wherein the summarized action is played back instead of the plurality of redundant actions and wherein the summarized action is generated automatically by the computer system.

17. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 16, wherein:

at least one action from said recorded actions is accompanied by an explanation and said playing back further comprises playing back any associated recorded explanations along with recorded actions.

18. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 16, wherein the preset criterion is a user specified preset criterion.

19. An apparatus for playing back actions performed during development of content created using a multimedia creation tool on a computer system having a processor and memory, said apparatus comprising:

a user interface means for receiving user events, during the development of the content, receiving user requests for playback of actions and displaying recorded actions; and

a playback module coupled to said user interface module for receiving user request for playback of recorded actions and for displaying playback of recorded actions, an action from said recorded actions comprising a sequence of events, wherein said events are selected to constitute said action based on a preset criterion and wherein each action corresponds to a change in the content and wherein at least one of the events, by itself, does not correspond to a change in the content, wherein a plurality of redundant actions is automatically replaced by the computer system with a summarized action and wherein the summarized action is played back instead of the plurality of redundant actions, said playback in response to such a user request playing back recorded actions and wherein the summarized action is generated automatically by the computer system.

20. The apparatus of claim 19, wherein:

at least one action from said recorded actions is accompanied by an explanation and said playing back further comprises playing back any associated recorded explanations along with recorded actions.

21. The apparatus of claim 19, wherein:

said playback is based on determining automatically which recorded actions satisfy a specified arbitrary criteria.

22. The apparatus of claim 19, wherein the preset criterion is a user specified preset criterion.

23. A method for recording and reviewing actions performed during development of content created using a tool on a computer system having a processor and memory, said method comprising:

receiving user events, during the development of the content;

determining, automatically by the computer system in response to receiving the user events, which events and sequences of events constitute actions; and

recording the determined actions rather than recording the individual events constituting those actions, during the development of the content if a user preference specifies that the determined actions are to be recorded, wherein each action corresponds to a change in the content and wherein at least one of the events constituting an action, by itself, does not correspond to a change in the content.

24. A computer-readable storage medium having stored thereon instructions for causing a computer to perform the following method comprising:

receiving user events, during a development of content;

determining, automatically by the computer in response to receiving the user events, which events and sequences of events constitute actions; and

recording the determined actions rather than recording the individual events constituting those actions, during the development of the content if a user preference specifies that the determined actions are to be recorded, wherein each action corresponds to a change in the content and wherein at least one of the events constituting an action, by itself, does not correspond to a change in the content.

25. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 24, wherein the operations further comprise:

determining whether an explanation accompanies an action; and

recording the determined explanations such that a recorded explanation of a recorded action is associated with the recorded action if a user preference specifies that the action is to be recorded.

26. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 24, wherein:

said determining comprises determining which events and sequences of events constitute actions by applying one of a plurality of granularities, said one of a plurality of granularities being selected based on criteria, whereby said applied one of a plurality of granularities varies depending on the criteria.

27. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 26, wherein the criteria is a user specified criteria.

28. An apparatus for recording and reviewing actions performed during development of content created using a tool on a computer system having a processor and memory, said apparatus comprising:

a user interface means for receiving user events which occur during development of content; and

a recorder module comprising hardware coupled to receive user events from said user interface means, said recorder module determining automatically in response to receiving the user events which events and sequences of events constitute actions and recording those actions, if a user preference specifies that those actions are to be recorded, said recorder module capable of recording an explanation for each individual action, said explanations being recorded in a manner which associates a recorded explanation of a recorded action with the recorded action, wherein each action corresponds to a change in the content and wherein at least one of the events constituting an action, by itself, does not correspond to a change in the content.