US 6,781,575 B1Granted

Method and apparatus for organizing addressing elements

AssigneeHandspring, Inc.

InventorsJeffrey Hawkins, Robert Haitani, Art Lamb

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Abstract

A method and apparatus for organizing and accessing addressing elements is herein disclosed. In many situations in use of a handheld computer, for example, it is desirable to obtain quick and easy access to addressable resources from among a list of such resources. In the case of a handheld computer including a telephone, for example, a user may wish to quickly and easily dial certain telephone numbers through use of a “speed dialing” system. An exemplary speed dialing system herein described includes a plurality of speed dial pages which can be selected by the user for display on a touch sensitive screen. Each speed dial page has an arrangement of speed dial buttons, and each speed dial button can be assigned a label, that is displayed on or adjacent the button, and a telephone number that is dialed when the button is pressed using the touch sensitive screen. The assignment of labels and telephone numbers can be arranged among the buttons by the user to aid the user in recalling where (e.g. which page and which button location) particular telephone numbers are and so enable quick and easy access by the user. These principles are similarly applicable to Internet bookmarks, for example, and software application shortcuts.

Claims17

Dependent claims

A method for enabling user-configurable access to actionable addresses in a computer system, said computer system having a screen for displaying iconographic data and text, said computer system also having a user input device enabling a user to interact with the computer system using components displayed on the screen, the method comprising:

displaying a first of a plurality of action pages on the screen, each action page having a plurality of activatable elements in a pre-defined layout comprising a plurality of editable positions on said screen, each activatable element may be assigned correspondence with a user defined label displayed with the activatable element and a user defined actionable address;
displaying action page icons associated with other action pages in said plurality of action pages on the screen of the first action page, said action page icons illustrating a miniaturized view of said activatable elements in said pre-defined layout of editable positions on an associated action page, displaying said associated action page in response to a user input through said user input device selecting one of said action page icons;
and in response to moving of a selected one of said activatable elements on said first action page to a selected action page icon by a user through said user input device, removing the selected activatable element from said first action page and placing said selected activatable element into a next available editable position on an action page associated with said selected action page icon.

A handheld computer system, said handheld computer system comprising:

a processor, a screen display, a user input device and communications circuitry all coupled to inter-operate with one another;
a graphical user interface comprising a plurality of action pages for display on the screen, each action page having
a plurality of activatable screen elements in a pre-defined layout comprising a plurality of editable positions with each screen element having a user assignable to a label that is displayed with the screen element and an actionable address that is executed upon activation of the screen element using the user input device, and
a plurality of action page icons, each of said action page icons having an associated action page, said action page icons illustrating a miniaturized view of said activatable elements in said pre-defined layout of editable positions on said associated action page, said handheld computer system displaying an associated action page in response to a user selection of one of said action page icons;
and
a screen element movement handling routine, said removing a selected screen element from a displayed action page and placing said selected screen element into a next available editable position on an action page associated with a selected action page icon in response to user input moving said selected screen element on said displayed action page to a selected action page icon with said user input device.

3 more elements

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.