Assisted punctuation of character strings

• US 8,943,405 B1
• Filed: 11/27/2013
• Issued: 01/27/2015
• Est. Priority Date: 11/27/2013
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Google LLC (Alphabet Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Google Inc. (Alphabet Inc.)
• Inventors: Azose, Benjamin Albert
• Primary Examiner(s): Nguyen, Chau
• Application Number:
  US14/092,475
• Time in Patent Office: 426 Days
• Field of Search: 715/229, 715259-261
• US Class Current: 715/259
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/04886 by partitioning the display area of the touch-screen or the surface of the digitising tablet into independently controllable areas, e.g. virtual keyboards or menus
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/166 Editing, e.g. inserting or deleting
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/197 Version control for software G06F8/71
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/232 Orthographic correction, e.g. spell checking or vowelisation
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/242 Dictionaries
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/274 Converting codes to words; Guess-ahead of partial word inputs

Abstract

A computing device receives one or more indications of user input to enter a character string. In response, the computing device determines, based on a corpus that includes punctuated character strings previously entered by a user of the computing device, one or more punctuated versions of the character string. Each of the one or more punctuated versions of the character string includes one or more punctuation marks not present in the character string. The computing device outputs, for display, at least one of the one or more punctuated versions of the character string.

Claims

1. A method comprising:

receiving, by a computing device, one or more indications of user input to enter a character string;

responsive to determining that the character string does not match a non-punctuated version of any punctuated character string in a corpus that includes punctuated character strings previously entered by a user of the computing device each of the punctuated character strings in the corpus including one or more punctuation marks;

outputting, by the computing device, for display, the character string and a keyboard that comprises a plurality of graphical keys corresponding to a plurality of punctuation marks;

receiving, by the computing device, an indication of a user selection of a particular graphical key among the plurality of graphical keys; and

outputting, by the computing device and for display, a modified version of the character string that includes a punctuation mark that corresponds to the particular graphical key.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein each of the punctuated character strings in the corpus is a multi-word sentence.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the character string is a first character string, and the method further comprises:

receiving, by the computing device, one or more indications of user input to enter a second character string;

determining, by the computing device, based on the corpus, one or more punctuated versions of the second character string, each of the one or more punctuated versions of the second character string including one or more punctuation marks not present in the second character string; and

outputting, by the computing device and for display, the one or more punctuated versions of the second character string.

4. The method of claim 3, further comprising:

after outputting the one or more punctuated versions of the second character string, receiving, by the computing device, an indication of user input to select a particular character string from among the one or more punctuated versions of the second character string; and

outputting, by the computing device and for display, the particular character string in place of the second character string.

5. The method of claim 3, wherein the second character string matches non-punctuated versions of the punctuated character strings previously-entered by the user.

6. The method of claim 3, wherein:

the method further comprises determining, by the computing device, based on data regarding past usage by the user of the one or more punctuated versions of the second character string, a ranking order of the one or more punctuated versions of the second character string; and

outputting the one or more punctuated versions of the second character string comprises outputting, by the computing device, for display, the one or more punctuated versions of the second character string ordered according to the ranking order of the one or more punctuated versions of the second character string.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein the data regarding past usage by the user of the one or more punctuated versions of the second character string comprise data indicating numbers of times that the computing device has received indications of user input of the one or more punctuated versions of the second character string.

8. The method of claim 3, wherein outputting the one or more punctuated versions of the second character string comprises, in response to receiving an indication that the user has finished inputting the second character string, outputting, by the computing device, for display, the one or more punctuated versions of the second character string.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein the indication that the user has finished inputting the second character string comprises an indication of a user input to send the second character string to another computing device.

10. The method of claim 3, wherein at least one of the one or more punctuated versions of the second character string includes a capitalized letter in place of a non-capitalized letter in the second character string.

11. The method of claim 1, wherein:

the method further comprises in response to determining that the corpus does not include any punctuated versions of the character string;

identifying, by the computing device, one or more candidate punctuation locations, each of the one or more candidate punctuation locations being a location at which a punctuation mark is likely to occur;

outputting, by the computing device, a candidate punctuation location indicator indicating a current candidate punctuation location among the one or more identified candidate punctuation locations;

outputting the modified version of the character string comprises outputting, by the computing device and for display the modified version of the character string such that the modified version of the character string includes, at the current candidate punctuation location, the punctuation mark that corresponds to the particular graphical key.

12. The method of claim 11, further comprising responsive to determining that there is at least one remaining candidate punctuation location in the one or more identified candidate punctuation locations, outputting, by the computing device and for display, the current candidate punctuation location indicator at a next one of the identified candidate punctuation locations.

13. A computing device comprising one or more processors configured to:

receive one or more indications of user input to input a character string;

responsive to determining that the character string does not match a non-punctuated version of any punctuated character string in a corpus that includes punctuated character strings previously entered by a user of the computing device, each of the punctuated character strings in the corpus including one or more punctuation marks;

output, for display, the character string and a keyboard that comprises a plurality of graphical keys corresponding to a plurality of punctuation marks;

receive an indication of a user selection of a particular graphical key among the plurality of graphical keys; and

output, for display, a modified version of the character string that includes a punctuation mark that corresponds to the particular graphical key.

14. The computing device of claim 13, wherein the character string is a first character string and the one or more processors are further configured to:

receive one or more indications of user input to input a second character string;

determine, based on the corpus, one or more punctuated versions of the second character string, each of the one or more punctuated versions of the second character string including one or more punctuation marks not present in the second character string; and

output, for display, the one or more punctuated versions of the second character string.

15. The computing device of claim 14, wherein the one or more processors are configured such that, in response to receiving an indication of a user input to select a particular character string from among the one or more punctuated versions of the second character string, the one or more processors output, for display, the particular character string in place of the second character string.

16. The computing device of claim 14, wherein the second character string matches non-punctuated versions of the punctuated character strings previously-entered by the user.

17. The computing device of claim 14, wherein the one or more processors are configured to:

determine, based on data regarding past usage by the user of the one or more punctuated versions of the second character string, a ranking order of the one or more punctuated versions of the second character string; and

output, for display, the one or more punctuated versions of the second character string ordered according to the ranking order of the one or more punctuated versions of the second character string.

18. The computing device of claim 17, wherein the data regarding past usage by the user of the one or more punctuated versions of the second character string comprise data indicating numbers of times that the computing device has received indications of user input of the one or more punctuated versions of the second character string.

19. A non-transitory computer-readable data storage medium having instructions stored thereon that, when executed, cause one or more processors of a computing device to:

receive one or more indications of user input to enter a character string;

responsive to determining that the character string does not match a non-punctuated version of any punctuated character string in a corpus that includes punctuated character strings previously entered by a user of the computing device, each of the punctuated character strings in the corpus including one or more punctuation marks;

output, for display, the character string and a keyboard that comprises a plurality of graphical keys corresponding to a plurality of punctuation marks;

receive an indication of a user selection of a particular graphical key among the plurality of graphical keys; and

output, for display, a modified version of the character string that includes a punctuation mark that corresponds to the particular graphical key.

20. The non-transitory computer-readable data storage medium of claim 19, wherein the character string is a first character string and the instructions, when executed, further cause the computing device to:

determine, in response to receiving one or more indications of user input to enter a second character string, based on the corpus, one or more punctuated versions of the second character string, each of the one or more punctuated versions of the second character string including one or more punctuation marks not present in the second character string;

output, for display, the one or more punctuated versions of the second character string; and

responsive to receiving an indication of user selection of a particular character string from among the one or more punctuated versions of the second character string, output, for display, the particular character string in place of the second character string.

21. The non-transitory computer-readable data storage medium of claim 20, wherein the instructions, when executed, further cause the one or more processors to:

determine, based on data regarding past usage by the user of the one or more punctuated versions of the second character string, a ranking order of the one or more punctuated versions of the second character string; and

output, for display, the one or more punctuated versions of the second character string ordered according to the ranking order of the one or more punctuated versions of the second character string.