US 6,057,842 AGranted

Display layout generator for graphical representations

AssigneeQuickBuy, Inc.

InventorsKenneth Charles Knowlton, Gary Steven Miliefsky

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Abstract

A visual link mechanism residing in a local system for identifying addresses of locations in the plurality of remote systems wherein the local system is connected through a network to the plurality of remote systems. The visual link mechanism includes a visual link library and a network access mechanism responsive to a visual link including a displayable graphic icon for accessing the location represented by a selected graphic icon. Various structures of visual links are described, each being an entity existing independently of the system environment in which it resides, and the network access mechanism includes a layout table for storing a plurality of plans for arranging and displaying a plurality of visual link graphic icons in a display, a visual links organizer, a visual link screen saver, and a hash protection mechanism for detecting the unauthorized construction or modification of visual links or other forms of files. Also described is a visual link capture engine for extracting graphics information from a data file and generating a corresponding graphic icon and a display layout generator for generating display layouts of sets of predetermined numbers of displayable visual objects.

For use in a data processing system including a memory for storing programs and files containing data and a processor for operating on the data under control of the programs, a display layout generator for generating layouts of sets of predetermined numbers of displayable visual objects of predetermined dimensions into a display area of predetermined dimensions, comprising:

a possible layouts generator for
receiving a display space definition defining the dimensions of the display area and a visual object definition defining the numbers and dimensions of the visual objects to be arranged in the display area, and
generating all possible layouts of the visual objects in the display area by
placing in a layout a visual object and searching forward with a next visual object to identify a placement of the next visual object, and
backtracking on each next placed visual object by removing the next placed visual object and selecting and placing a different next visual object, until
all combinations of visual objects and placements of visual objects have been exhausted,
a layout memory for storing each arrangement of the set of visual objects in the display area generated by the possible layouts generator,
a layout test mechanism for testing each new layout by comparing each new layout with previously existing layouts to determine when the new layout has a subpopulation of a previously existing layout or matches a previously existing layout and when the previously existing layout has a subpopulation of the new layout, wherein a subpopulation is a subset of the visual objects,
a layout previous/new selector for selecting the new layout or the previously existing layout by discarding the new layout when the new layout has a subpopulation of a previously existing layout or matches a previously existing layout and replacing the previously existing layout with the new layout when the previously existing layout has a subpopulation of the new layout,
a layouts comparator for comparing pairs of layouts stored in the layout memory and discarding any layout that contains a subpopulation of another layout, and
a layout table for storing final layouts for use in generating visual displays of the sets of visual objects in the display area.

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Abstract

Claims6