JPH07129355A - Device and method for displaying screen - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To execute multiwindow display with high operability without being restricted only by membership.. CONSTITUTION:When an window 2 is displayed as auxiliary information for an window 1, a new window 3 is displayed. In this case, application for displaying the window 3 acquires management information for the window 2. When the window 1 is erased, the window 2 to be a slave window for the window 1 is managed by the management information acquired by the application of the window 3 and continuously displayed without being erased. The startup frequency of the application is recorded and the icons of the application started in accordance with the frequency are collectively displayed on a window. Thereby application to be frequently used can easily be specified.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a screen display device and method in, for example, an electronic computer.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art With the widespread use of electronic computers, a high-definition display screen and an environment in which the display screen can be divided into a plurality of display areas (windows) for use have become widespread. In the window management method that provides such an operating environment, conventionally, the logical relationship for controlling the display of a window has been prepared only by a simple parent-child relationship in which the window that generated a certain window is the parent. Also,
The parent-child relationship of such windows was uniquely determined when the program was executed and could not be changed.

Conventionally, in a general graphical user interface environment, applications are displayed as icons or related applications are grouped and displayed on a display device. This grouping is either registered when installing the application or must be registered individually by the user.

[0004]

In the above-mentioned conventional window management system, the ease of use for the user may be limited when a plurality of windows are developed on a high definition display device. It was For example, in FIG. 1A, a window 1 displays a document creation program that is creating a document, and a window 2 provides auxiliary information about the document creation program that does not depend on the document 1. In this case, window 2 has a relationship as a child window of window 1. At this time, when the document creating program for newly creating the document 2 is executed as shown in FIG. 1B and the window 3 appears, there is no relation between the window 2 and the window 3. As shown in FIG. 1C, when the editing of the document 1 is completed and the window 1 is deleted, the window 2 is also deleted according to the parent-child relationship of the windows. When the user wants to display the auxiliary information regarding the document creation program, the user must request the display as a child window from the document creation program window 3 during the creation of the document 2 again.

The present invention has been made in view of the above-mentioned conventional example, and when performing work by expanding a plurality of windows, there is no restriction on the operation depending on the parent-child relationship of the windows, and the degree of freedom of operation and the operation can be improved. It is a first object of the present invention to provide a screen display device and method with improved ease.

Further, in the above-mentioned conventional graphical user interface, grouping is only displayed for each application or as an icon of an application arbitrarily registered by the user. There was a drawback that had to be found from inside.

The present invention has been made in view of the above-mentioned conventional example, and it is a second object of the present invention to provide a screen display device and method in which frequently used applications are grouped and represented as icons to improve operability. The purpose of.

[0008]

[Means for Solving the Problems] and

In order to achieve the above object, the screen display device of the present invention has the following structure.

A multi-window type screen display device for displaying a screen by dividing it into a plurality of display areas, wherein display means for displaying the window and simultaneously displaying when the window is displayed by the display means. And a means for controlling the simultaneously displayed windows by the management information acquired by the acquisition means.

With this configuration, even if the window is displayed independently of the displayed window, it is possible to obtain and manage the information for managing the window.

A screen display device for displaying a plurality of applications as icons, recording means for recording the frequency of the activated applications, and a high-frequency application recorded in the recording means are registered as a group. The registration means and the display means for displaying the application registered in the registration means in one window are provided.

With this configuration, icons of frequently used applications can be collectively displayed in one window, and operability is improved.

The screen display method of the present invention has the following configuration.

A multi-window screen display method for displaying a screen by dividing it into a plurality of display areas, wherein a display step of displaying the window and a window displayed by the display step are simultaneously displayed. The process includes the step of acquiring management information of the existing window and the step of controlling the simultaneously displayed windows by the management information acquired in the acquisition step.

With this configuration, even if a window is displayed independently of the displayed window, it is possible to obtain and manage information for managing the window.

In addition, in the screen display method of displaying a plurality of applications as icons, a recording step of recording the frequency of the activated applications and an application frequently recorded in the recording step are registered as a group. A registration process and a display process for displaying the application registered in the registration process in one window are provided.

With this configuration, icons of frequently used applications can be collectively displayed in one window, and operability is improved.

[0018]

First Embodiment A window display method in a computer will be described below as a first embodiment of the present invention with reference to the accompanying drawings.

FIG. 2 is a block diagram of a computer which is an embodiment of the present invention.

In the illustrated configuration, the computer is an electronic computer controlled by the microprocessor CPU 21 for performing calculations, and is a read-only storage device ROM.
22 and a readable / writable storage device RAM 23
A display device 24 for displaying characters and figures on the screen, and a keyboard 25 operated by a person to input data and the like. The input device may include a keyboard, a mouse, a tablet, or the like. In addition, the external storage device 2
Reference numeral 6 denotes a storage device such as a disk. The RAM 23 or ROM 22 stores programs and data, and the CPU 21 executes the programs stored in the RAM 23 or ROM 22. External storage device 26
Is to store data and programs. The display device 24 visually notifies the user of information.

The operation of this embodiment having the above configuration will be described with reference to FIG. FIG. 3 is a flowchart showing the operation of this embodiment. This flowchart shows the CPU 21
Is realized by executing a program stored in the ROM 22 or the RAM 23.

The program shown in this flowchart is executed when a window is created in a multi-window operating environment. The executed program is
First, the program that created the currently displayed window is determined (step 1).

Next, information for managing the window is acquired from the determined program, that is, the program that created the window (step 2). This information may be set in advance when the program is supplied, or the management information itself may not be set. If it is not set, the information of the specified value is used.

Finally, the state of the window is controlled based on the window management information obtained in this way, and the process is terminated (step 3).

As described above, in the window display processing method of this embodiment, the window being displayed can be discriminated and the window management information can be referred to thereby to control the state of the window. Therefore, by utilizing the window management information, you can make one window a child of another window without leaving the control of the window to a simple parent-child relationship, or leave it on the screen even if the parent window ends. It becomes possible to share, share multiple parent windows, and share multiple child windows.

FIG. 4 shows an example of the operation that occurs when the window display method of this embodiment is executed. A window created by a program that is commonly used by word processing programs can be erased even when one word processing program ends by setting child windows that are shared by the windows of multiple word processing programs with window management information. It will not be done. Therefore, it is not necessary to newly execute the commonly used window program each time the word processing program is completed.

As described above, when a plurality of windows are expanded and work is performed, the degree of freedom in operation and the ease of operation can be increased.

[0028]

[Second Embodiment] Next, a window display method according to a second embodiment of the present invention will be described in detail.

FIG. 6 is a conceptual diagram of hardware for realizing the window display method of this embodiment. This system includes a central processing unit 21 for controlling the entire system and an input device 2 for inputting a keyboard and a mouse.
2, an output device 23 for displaying or printing, and a storage device 24 for storing data and programs. The storage device 24 stores a usage frequency accumulation file 65 that records past usage frequencies for each application.

FIG. 7 shows an example in which frequently used icons are displayed in the high usage window. The high usage window is a window for displaying icons corresponding to frequently used programs, and in FIG. 7, the icon 3 having the highest usage frequency is used in the high usage window 31.
The second and second highest icon 33 is displayed.

Next, the operation for performing the display as shown in FIG. 7 will be described.

FIG. 5 is a flow chart showing the operation flow of this embodiment. This flowchart shows the central processing unit 6
It is realized by executing the program by 1. Display device 23 typified by CRT which is a frequently used icon
In order to display, the steps described in FIG. 1 are executed.

First, when the graphical user interface environment is activated, the file 66 accumulating the past usage frequency of each application is read from the storage device 24 as usage frequency data (step S11).

Next, based on the read usage frequency, the application with the higher usage frequency is registered in the high usage window (step S12). In this case, a table for registering the application for the high usage window may be prepared in the storage device 64, and the table may be registered.

Subsequently, the application registered in the high usage window in step S12 is displayed as an icon (step S13).

Next, the application is managed and a request is made to the system such as the OS which provides the execution environment which application is being executed, and the name of the application being executed is received as a response to the request ( Step S14).

It is determined whether the received message is the end message of the graphical user interface (step S15).

If the message is an end message, the usage frequency data is written to the usage frequency accumulation file 66 and the processing ends (step S19).

If it is not the end message, it is determined whether the application name received just is related to the execution of the system or not (step S16). If not related, a constant is added to the usage frequency data for each application (step S17). This usage frequency data is the usage frequency for each application. If it is related, step S17 is not executed. Step S1
6 and step S17 are repeated for the number of applications received in step S15. The process returns to step S14 at a constant time t1. In addition, the process returns to step S12 at regular intervals of time t2 to update the high usage window.

Incidentally, the input device may be a position designating device such as a mouse or a light pen, as well as an input device such as a keyboard. Further, the output device includes a CRT and a liquid crystal display. Further, the central processing unit may be a personal computer, a workstation or the like, and the storage device may be a hard disk device, a magneto-optical disk or the like. The general icon indicates an application and data that can be handled by the central processing unit, and an operating environment corresponding to the application and data.

The present invention may be applied to a system including a plurality of devices or an apparatus including a single device. Further, it goes without saying that the present invention can be applied to the case where it is achieved by supplying a program to a system or an apparatus.

[0042]

As described above, according to the screen display device and method of the present invention, it is possible to increase the degree of freedom of operation and the ease of operation when expanding a plurality of windows to perform work. There is an effect.

Further, by expressing frequently used applications as icons and grouping them, the user can access the applications used for normal business from this high usage window, and the operability can be improved. There is an effect to say.

[0044]

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a diagram showing an example of the operation of a conventional technique.

FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing an example of a configuration of an electronic computer to which the first embodiment is applied.

FIG. 3 is a flowchart of the first embodiment.

FIG. 4 is a diagram showing an example of an operation according to the first embodiment.

FIG. 5 is a flowchart showing a flow of operations of the second embodiment.

FIG. 6 is a conceptual diagram of hardware for executing a flowchart.

FIG. 7 is a diagram showing a display example of a high usage window.

[Explanation of symbols]

 21 CPU, 22 ROM, 23 RAM, 24 display device, 25 keyboard, 26 external storage device.

Claims (4)

[Claims] 1. A multi-window screen display device for displaying a screen by dividing the screen into a plurality of display areas, the display means displaying the window, and the display means simultaneously displaying the window when the window is displayed. Acquiring means for acquiring management information of the window being displayed, means for controlling the simultaneously displayed window by the management information acquired by the acquiring means,
A screen display device comprising: 2. A screen display device for displaying a plurality of applications as icons, wherein recording means for recording the frequency of activated applications, and applications with high frequency recorded in the recording means are registered as a group. A screen display device comprising: registration means and display means for displaying an application registered in the registration means in one window. 3. A multi-window screen display method for displaying a screen by dividing the screen into a plurality of display areas, wherein a display step of displaying the window and simultaneous display when the window is displayed by the display step. The step of acquiring management information of the window being displayed, the step of controlling the simultaneously displayed windows by the management information acquired in the acquisition step,
A screen display method comprising: 4. A screen display method for displaying a plurality of applications as icons, wherein a recording step of recording the frequency of activated applications and a high-frequency application recorded in the recording step are registered as a group. A screen display method comprising: a registration step; and a display step of displaying an application registered in the registration step in one window.