Expedited selection of items from a list within a drop down menu of an eye diagram analyzer

#We have two threads to identify before they are woven together in a preferred embodiment. The first of these is a certain collection of issues concerning economy of action and ease of use while selecting items from a menu to control the behavior of some system, (possibly, but not necessarily, a measurement system) and which could be solely software, purely an apparatus, or some combination thereof. The menu is created by the execution of software or firmware by a processor, which could be a separate computer or perhaps an embedded system within an apparatus. It is also possible that the apparatus is a peripheral attached to a separate computer. The second thread is the particular example of such a menu item selection scheme found in the eye diagram analyzer of the incorporated Applications. To fully appreciate the example the reader needs to know a little bit about how an operator would like to use that piece of equipment. It will be appreciated, of course, that such an example is merely illustrative of a larger class of circumstances, for which a generalization will be offered. However, it is perhaps easiest to first approach the idea by way of a definite example, and that is our plan.

#Drop-down menus displayed on a computer screen and actuated by a combination of screen pointer icon movements (e.g., according to corresponding motion with a mouse) and accompanying mouse clicks (appropriate pressing of a switch on the mouse) are commonplace. The existence of the menu is indicated by some legend (perhaps in a box), which might be the name of the menu, or, the name of a most recently selected item contained within the menu. In either case the ususal operation is for an operator to position the screen pointer icon (sometimes called a mouse sprite) over the legend and then perform a click. The entire menu then appears. The menu is a list of choices, and if there are more items in the menu than will fit in the space allocated for displaying the list, a scroll bar also appears and allows other portions of the complete list to become a selected subset that is the portion that is displayed. Thus, the entire list can still be accessed, even if it is just a portion at a time via scrolling. In any event, positioning the screen pointer icon over an item in the displayed list of the menu typically causes that item to be highlighted as a potential selection. Clicking an item actually selects it, whereupon the selected choice is put into effect, and the menu might then close itself automatically.

#All of the major computer operating systems have, as part of their window management systems, Graphical User Interfaces (GUIs) which operate in this or a very similar way. And it is not so much that it does not work; it does. But using it does require that the operator's attention be directed to the menu presentation itself, and that correct mouse/screen pointer icon motion be produced. While that is happening the operator cannot be observing something else, which is perhaps something visible in another window or in a region elsewhere on the screen, or perhaps some indication/result in an apparatus separate from but controlled or affected by the mechanism of which the menu is a part. That is, it might be the case that the operator is physically unable to simultaneously view both the menu and the affected result. Furthermore, the operator's underlying purpose in all this is to cycle through all or some of the possible menu choices (make trial selections) with the aim of determining if one or more of them “makes a difference” in the affected result. The operator does not particularly care about the order in which the choices are tried; he just wants to find out which selections “make a difference,” if any. He may, however, have an opinion or educated guess about where in the list of menu choices would be a good choice to begin the trial selections, so as to save some time and effort.

#FIG. 1 is a simplified block diagram depicting a menu-driven Eye Diagram Analyzer coupled to a System Under Test and measuring a composite eye diagram having a highlighted channel selected in accordance with the invention;

#FIG. 2 is a more detailed view of the eye diagram and control menus for the Eye Diagram Analyzer of FIG. 1, and is a composite eye diagram indicative of at least one defective component signal in the system Under Test;

#FIG. 3 is an expansion of a drop down menu having arbitrarily ordered menu items related to the implementation of an associated result, and which are automatically and sequentially selectable in accordance with the invention;

#Refer now to FIG. 1, wherein is depicted a simplified block diagram 1 of an example hardware environment wherein automatic sequential selection and implementation of items in an arbitrarily ordered list of menu items is useful. In particular, data signals within a System Under Test (SUT) 2 are coupled by a plurality of probe connections 3 to a respectively associated plurality of channels within an Eye Diagram Analyzer (EDA) 4. The EDA has a display 5 upon which are visible various menus 6 and other Graphical User Interface (GUI) elements 6 in order that within a window 7 various displayed results 8 may be presented. In this particular example the displayed results that are most of interest are composite eye diagrams having a highlighted channel that has been selected during a process of discovery to learn which data signal(s) is(are) operating defectively. As part of the equipment to manipulate the GUI the EDA 4 is equipped with a pointing device 9, of which there are several possible varieties, and which in this example happens to be a mouse.

#As mentioned above, the EDA is a menu-driven apparatus. And while it is not our specific intent to instruct the reader on the measurement of eye diagrams, it is still the case that our initial example of making and using the invention is drawn from one aspect of such measurement. To this end, FIG. 2 is a somewhat detailed depiction of a window (5, 10) containing various menus and results for a composite eye diagram measurement. We shall dwell here only briefly; just long enough to enable the general reader to appreciate the operation and utility of what is to follow. The example is very similar to one that is described in more detail in the incorporated “COMPOSITE EYE DIAGRAMS”, and those who may be curious about all the ancillary stuff we won't mention can refer to that disclosure.

#To begin, then, a couple of notes are in order about the actual composite eye diagram 25 depicted in the measurement window/region (7, 11). First, it is a composite eye diagram. That means that it is the “merging” or “overlaying” of several (and perhaps a great many) individual “component” eye diagrams. Next, the “trace” that is the visible substance of the composite eye diagram 25 is depicted in the drawing as parallel lines. In reality, is it actually formed by (usually) adjacent pixels of particular (i.e., a combination of assigned and computed) colors and intensities. We can't, of course, get away with that in a Patent, so we depict it as shown. The eye diagram 25 is a composite, since selected legend 20 in menu 19 is “<All 64 bits>”. It is a “simple” composite in that it does not include the highlighting of a selected channel, since box 24 (“Highlight channel in composite”) has not been checked. (The particular collection of controls related to the eye diagram 25 that appear on the screen and within window 10 is determined by which “tab” has been selected; in this example the “Display” tab has been selected, and is in front of all the other tabs.) The sixty-four bits referred to by legend 20 are known as “Group1”, according to legend 14 in menu 13. All this means is that there is a user defined collection of sixty-four related data signals that are conveniently grouped together and given a label. That label is “Group1”, and the mechanics of defining Group1 are outside the scope of our present interest. There might be other groups, and the Menu Expansion control (button) 16 will expose a drop down menu beneath legend 14 to reveal what other labeled groups may have been defined and are selectable in place of Group1 as the source for the displayed composite eye diagram. We shall touch on the other menu controls 17 and 18 at a later time.