|Publication number||US7765488 B2|
|Application number||US 12/130,951|
|Publication date||Jul 27, 2010|
|Filing date||May 30, 2008|
|Priority date||Jun 19, 2003|
|Also published as||US20040261039, US20080229237|
|Publication number||12130951, 130951, US 7765488 B2, US 7765488B2, US-B2-7765488, US7765488 B2, US7765488B2|
|Inventors||William G. Pagan|
|Original Assignee||International Business Machines Corporation|
|Export Citation||BiBTeX, EndNote, RefMan|
|Patent Citations (37), Referenced by (7), Classifications (15), Legal Events (2)|
|External Links: USPTO, USPTO Assignment, Espacenet|
Under 35 USC §120, this application is a continuation application and claims the benefit of priority to U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10/464,900, filed Jun. 19, 2003, entitled “METHOD FOR ORDERING ON-SCREEN WINDOWS FOR DISPLAY”, all of which is incorporated herein by reference.
Almost all of today's personal computers are controlled by operating systems that have a window-based user interface. Most of these operating systems are capable of multitasking in which multiple programs execute simultaneously, and each program displays a window on a display screen for user interaction. The ability to resize application windows and change style and size of fonts are the significant advantages of a GUI versus a character-based interface. Window-based GUIs have become the standard way users interact with computers, and the major GUIs include Windows™ and Mac™ along with Motif for UNIX and the GNOME and KDE interfaces for Linux.
Depending on the number of computer programs running, the display screen 16 may display any number of open windows 18 a and 18 b (collectively referred to as windows 18), each awaiting user input. Example types of computer programs include spreadsheets, word processors, and Web browsers.
Depending on the arrangement and number of windows 18 displayed, it is common for the windows 18 to overlap so that some windows 18 partially or completely obscure other windows 18. To manage the display of windows 18, the operating system typically views the windows 18 as a stack and maintains an ordering of the windows 18 with respect to display depth.
The mouse 14, or other type of input device, may be used to move a mouse pointer 20 among the various windows 18. The user typically activates a particular window 18 by clicking the mouse pointer 20 anywhere on the window 18. When a window 18 is activated, Le., becomes the active window 18 a, it is displayed in its entirety on top of all other windows 18 b and is the only window that can receive user input. The user typically interacts with the active window 18 a by selecting or entering data in the window 18, or by selecting menu functions associated with the window 18.
Although windows 18 can be moved to open areas of the screen and/or resized, the current window management schema makes it difficult for user to juggle more than a very few windows 18 at a time without obscuring other windows 18 that are being used. When one window 18 a that the user wishes to interact with is obscured by another, the user must take extra steps to return the window 18 b to the forefront. This can be terribly annoying at times, particularly as the number of windows 18 being juggled increases.
One attempted solution to this problem is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,046,001, which describes a method for accessing selected windows in a multitasking system. In this method, user inputs are monitored to determine the position of a cursor, and as the cursor passes over each window, the window is automatically promoted to the top display position and made active. The problem this method, however, is that the user can quickly lose control of which windows are promoted to the top of the display. Consider for example, the situation where there are many tiled windows displayed and the user needs to move the cursor to the side of the display screen 16 to select a program icon. Assuming that the cursor passes over each of the tiled windows on its way to the icon, each of the windows would pop to the top of the display in quick succession whether the user wanted them to or not. Rearranging the depth order of the windows in this fashion without user consent could be distracting and annoying to the user in certain situations.
Accordingly, what is needed is an improved system for ordering on-screen windows. The system should retain the original depth ordering of the windows, but also allow inactive windows to be used as though they were active. The present invention addresses such a need.
The present invention provides a system for ordering onscreen windows for display in which an active window partially overlaps an inactive window and hides a portion of the inactive window. The movement of a mouse pointer is monitored to determine its location on the screen. In response to the inactive window being selected with the mouse pointer, the inactive window is given focus to enable the inactive window to receive event signals even though a portion of the inactive window remains hidden.
According to the system disclosed herein, the present invention enables a user to interact with inactive windows as though they were active without upsetting the original display depths of the windows. In addition, the user must physically select an inactive window to provide it focus before hidden parts of the inactive window can be made to appear, thereby overcoming the problems inherent in automatically bringing to the forefront any window that the mouse pointer passes over.
The present invention relates to a system for managing the display of windows in a window-based computer system. The following description is presented to enable one of ordinary skill in the art to make and use the invention and is provided in the context of a patent application and its requirements.
Various modifications to the preferred embodiments and the generic principles and features described herein will be readily apparent to those skilled in the art. Thus, the present invention is not intended to be limited to the embodiments shown, but is to be accorded the widest scope consistent with the principles and features described herein.
The present invention provides an improved system for managing windowbased environments that reduces the need for a user to mandate the position, dimensions, layered depth (i.e., the number of windows that a particular window is from being in the forefront, or the number of windows away that the particular window is from being the active window), and maximized/minimized status. The present invention accomplishes its objectives by changing what occurs when an inactive window is clicked, and how the window then behaves when the window is not in the forefront.
The present invention provides a mechanism that allows the user to interact with an inactive window as though the window was at the forefront without changing the relative display depths the windows. This mechanism is referred to as giving an inactive window focus and operates as follows. When the user moves the mouse pointer over an inactive window and clicks on a visible portion of the inactive window, the inactive window is given focus, meaning that the window receives even signals, even though the window is not the “active” window and displayed in the forefront. Once the window is given focus and the user passes the cursor over a hidden portion of the inactive window, the hidden portion of the inactive window is temporarily revealed on the display for user interaction. Once the user moves the cursor away this revealed portion of the window, that portion of the window returns to its hidden state. If the cursor is removed from within the boundaries of the inactive window, focus is automatically returned to the active window.
Thus, because the present invention requires the user to physically select an inactive window before focus is given to that window, the present invention does not suffer the problem of the method that automatically brings a window to the forefront when the mouse pointer is passed over the window. And because the window with focus is not automatically displayed in the forefront and its hidden portions are only temporarily revealed during a mouse pointer pass over, the present invention does not permanently change the relative display depths of the windows.
Referring to both
If the user has selected the title bar, typically by clicking on it, then the inactive window 24 is made the active window in step 62 and brought to the forefront of the screen, as shown in
Referring again to
Referring again to
Should the mouse pointer 20 pass from portion 26 to portion 32, then portion 26 would return to its hidden state, and portion 32 would be displayed. A system for ordering on-screen windows has been disclosed. The present invention has been described in accordance with the embodiments shown, and one of ordinary skill in the art will readily recognize that there could be variations to the embodiments, and any variations would be within the spirit and scope of the present invention. Accordingly, many modifications may be made by one of ordinary skill in the art without departing from the spirit and scope of the appended claims.
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|U.S. Classification||715/790, 715/858, 715/794, 715/804, 715/768|
|International Classification||G06F3/048, G06F9/44, G09G5/14, G06F3/00, G09G5/00|
|Cooperative Classification||G09G5/14, G06F9/4443, G06F3/0481|
|European Classification||G06F3/0481, G06F9/44W|
|Jan 20, 2014||FPAY||Fee payment|
Year of fee payment: 4
|Nov 10, 2014||AS||Assignment|
Owner name: LENOVO INTERNATIONAL LIMITED, HONG KONG
Free format text: ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNORS INTEREST;ASSIGNOR:INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS MACHINES CORPORATION;REEL/FRAME:034194/0291
Effective date: 20140926