JPH04128919A - Pointing cursor display method and data processor - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To improve the operability of a data processor by changing the shape so as not to hide the data display when displaying shape in which another data display being displayed on a screen is hidden by a pointing cursor when the pointing cursor is displayed. CONSTITUTION:As the shape of the pointing cursor indicating an indication point, for example, patterns of arrow head shape indicating (from upper right), (from lower right), (from upper left), and (from lower left) are prepared, and when the pointing cursor of shape indicating from the lower right is used and when another data is hidden under the cursor, the cursor is changed to the pointing cursor of shape indicating from the lower left, thereby, the data hidden under the cursor can be observed. In such a way, since the data being displayed on the screen is prevented from being hidden under the pointing cursor, the convenience of using can be improved.

Description

[Detailed Description of the Invention] [Industrial Application Field] The present invention relates to a data processing apparatus such as a CAD system, a personal computer, or a word processor that is equipped with a pointing device, and in particular, it relates to a data processing apparatus such as a CAD system, a personal computer, a word processor, etc., which is equipped with a pointing device, and in particular, a method for making a pointing cursor and other data easier to see on the screen. The present invention relates to a pointing cursor display method suitable for.

[Prior Art] Cursors of data processing devices include block cursors used when inputting text data, and pointing cursors of pointing devices such as trackballs and mice. This pointing cursor
The shape is stored in the storage device as a predetermined pattern, and when the central processing unit calculates the pointing point to be displayed on the screen in response to the operation of the pointing device, the pointing point is pointed to, for example, by an arrow. In other words, the pointing cursor has an "arrow" shape. There are various shapes for this, such as arrows and shapes pointed with a finger.Also, there are also multiple shape patterns that are used to change the shape of the pointing cursor to another shape when a certain command is input. It's starting to look like this.

In addition, as prior art related to cursor display, for example, Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 59-68054, Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 63-158625,
JP-A-63-282524, JP-A-60-24773
There are No. 0 etc.

[Problems to be Solved by the Invention] When a pointing cursor is displayed on a screen, it is generally displayed over other data displayed on the screen, such as text data or image data. In addition, although there is a method in which the pattern of the display shape changes every time a command is input, the shape remains constant while moving on the screen, which may cause inconvenience. For example, in the case of an arrow-shaped pointing cursor, if the pointing cursor is arrow-shaped pointing from the bottom, if the pointing point is at the bottom edge of the screen, the pointing cursor will be displayed off the screen. In other words, it is no longer displayed. This is inconvenient because the operator does not know where the pointing cursor is. Also, if the pointing cursor is displayed over other data,
When it is necessary to operate a mouse or the like while looking at other data, the operation must be done by feel, which results in a lack of accuracy. For example, when drawing a "circle" using the mouse cursor, there is an area where the line drawn while the mouse cursor goes around the mouse cursor is displayed overlapping the mouse cursor, and you cannot see the line drawn in that area. , move the mouse cursor to extend the line.

This makes it impossible to input accurate circles.

An object of the present invention is to provide a pointing cursor display method that makes it easier to see the pointing cursor and other data and improves the operability of the data processing device, and to provide a data processing device that employs this method.

[Means for Solving the Problem] The above object is to change the shape of the pointing cursor to hide the data display if other data display displayed on the screen is hidden by the pointing cursor. This can be achieved by changing the pointing cursor to a different shape, or by rotating the pointing cursor to an arbitrary angle or mirror image position around the indicated point.

The above purpose is also to divide the screen into multiple zones, change the shape of the pointing cursor depending on the zone of display position when displaying the pointing cursor, or rotate the pointing cursor to an arbitrary angle or mirror image position around the indicated point. This is achieved by displaying the

The above purpose is also to change the display shape of the pointing cursor to the shape displayed on the screen when the pointing point of the pointing cursor reaches the edge of the screen and the pointing cursor is no longer displayed on the screen, or to change the display shape of the pointing cursor to the shape displayed on the screen. This is achieved by rotating the displayed shape around the indicated point to an arbitrary angle or a mirror image position and displaying it as a shape displayed on the screen.

[Action] For example, the shape of the pointing cursor that points to the indicated point is "from the upper right" or "from the lower right."

Prepare an arrow-shaped pattern that points from the top left and from the bottom left, and if you are using a pointing cursor that points from the bottom right and other data is hidden below this, the pointing cursor will point from the bottom left. By changing to a shaped pointing cursor, the data hidden underneath becomes visible.

The same effect can be obtained by rotating the specified point by an arbitrary angle to a position where the lower data is not hidden, or to a mirror image position, without preparing a plurality of shape patterns. Additionally, when the pointing cursor approaches the edge of the screen, for example, when the pointing cursor that points to the point from below approaches the bottom edge of the screen, the pointing cursor changes to the pointing cursor that points from above to the point that points from above, making it possible for the pointing cursor to become invisible. It disappears.

[Example] Hereinafter, one embodiment of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 1 is a configuration diagram of a data processing device to which a pointing cursor display method according to an embodiment of the present invention is applied. This data processing device includes an input device 1 such as a pointing device such as a mouse, and a pointing device 1.
a position calculation device 2 for calculating the position indicated by the pointing cursor, a device 3 for rotating the display position pattern, that is, the display shape pattern of the pointing cursor by an arbitrary angle or converting it to a mirror image position, and a memory for storing the shape pattern of the pointing cursor. A device 4, a control device 5 that controls each of these devices, and data and block cursors.

It consists of a display device 6 that displays a pointing cursor on the screen. In this embodiment, the pointing cursor is displayed as follows using such a data processing device.

For example, when using an "arrow" as the pointing cursor shape, conventionally, as shown in Figure 2(a),
With respect to the point indicated by the pointing device, that is, the position source data O, an arrow is used to point to this point O from the lower right.

In this embodiment, in addition to this, FIGS. 2(b) and 2(C).

As shown in (d), point the indicated point O "from the bottom left."

Pointing cursor shapes that point "from the top left" and "from the top right" are prepared in the storage device. These cursor shapes are rotated by 90 degrees around the indicated point O. In this embodiment, four types of cursor shapes are prepared in advance in the storage device, but each shape may be prepared by rotating the shape by, for example, 45 degrees. Also, instead of preparing multiple cursor shape patterns, for example, only the shape shown in FIG. 2(a) is registered in the storage device,
If necessary, a shape obtained by rotating this shape by an arbitrary angle around the designated point 0 may be determined by calculation, and the determined shape pattern may be displayed.

Next, the reason why a plurality of pointing cursors having different shapes in different directions are prepared or the pointing cursor is rotated by an arbitrary angle and displayed as described above will be explained. The relationship between the four cursor directions in Figure 2 above is shown in Figure 3.
Shown in Figure (a). If the cursor shown in FIG. 2(a) is displayed as shown in FIG. 3(b), the pointing cursor will hide the data "1" below. This makes it difficult to understand the data displayed on the screen, and
It is inconvenient to use this hidden data as a reference when performing operations using the pointing cursor. Therefore, in this embodiment, the pointing cursor is rotated to a position that does not hide the data below, as shown in FIG. 3(C). In this embodiment, the shape is changed to that shown in FIG. 2(b). Whether or not data overlaps the pointing cursor can be easily detected by comparing the position where the pointing cursor is displayed and the display coordinates of its pattern with the display coordinates of the data displayed on the screen. Furthermore, when the pointing cursor is rotated, it can be detected whether or not there is other data below by comparing the coordinates.

The above example is a case where the text data is hidden by the pointing cursor. For example, when drawing a curve using the trajectory of the pointing cursor, if the drawn curve overlaps with the pointing cursor, the direction in which the curve extends cannot be determined. , which is inconvenient. Therefore, when drawing a "circle" for example, the pointing cursor is controlled to continuously rotate around the designated point according to the movement of the trajectory so that the pointing cursor always points to the center of the circle. This prevents the drawn line from being hidden by the pointing cursor.

FIG. 4 is a diagram showing the pointing cursor pointing to the four corners of the screen. When pointing to the four corners with the pointing cursor shown in FIG. 2(a), when pointing to the upper left corner as shown in 4a of FIG. 4, the entire pointing cursor is displayed. However, when pointing to the other corners 4b, 4c, and 4d, the pointing cursor protrudes from the screen and is not displayed. Therefore, in this embodiment, the first
When the pointing cursor points to the lower right corner using the conversion device 3 shown in the figure, the pointing cursor in FIG. 2(a) (previously shown in FIG. 4(a)) is changed to
The image is converted to a mirror image position symmetrical to the Y axis and displayed as shown in . When pointing to the lower right corner, the pointing cursor shown in FIG. 5(b) is converted to a mirror image position symmetrical to the X axis and displayed as shown in FIG. 5(d). When pointing to the lower left corner, use Figure 5 (a
) is converted to a mirror image position symmetrical to the X axis and displayed as the pointing cursor in FIG. 5(C). This prevents the pointing cursor from going off the screen and becoming invisible. In this embodiment, the basic pointing cursor is converted to a mirror image position and displayed, but it is also possible to use the pointing cursor shown in FIG. 2 to display as shown in FIG. 6(d). be.

In FIGS. 4 and 5, only the four corners have been explained, but for example, as shown in FIG. 6(a), the screen is divided into four, and in the upper left zone 4e, the pointing cursor 4a
)), in the lower left zone 4g use the pointing cursor 4C° (Fig. 5(C)), in the upper right zone 4f use the pointing cursor 4b° (Fig. 5(b)), and in the lower right zone 4h use the pointing cursor 4C° (Fig. 5(C)). 4d'
(Using Figure 5(d)). Change the shape of the pointing cursor when it crosses the boundary line when moving between each zone.

In FIG. 6(b), the screen is divided into nine parts of 3×3. And the four corner zones 4e'4f'4g'
, 4h', use the same pointing cursor as in Fig. 6(a) to move the zones 4i and 4j between these.
, 4, at 41.4m, the pointing cursor of the previous zone from which the boundary line was moved will continue to be used, and when entering the four corner zones, the pointing cursor defined in that zone will be used. .

In the above embodiment, the pointing cursor is changed when entering the zone, but the minimum requirement is that when the pointing cursor leaves the screen, it can be made visible by rotating its shape, etc. If only the pointing cursor shown in FIG. 5(a) is displayed on the entire screen, as shown in FIG. 6(c), the lower edge line of the screen is used.

When the line that is offset by a predetermined distance (distance at which the pointing cursor is displayed) from the right edge line of the screen is reached, the fifth
It is also possible to make it similar to the pointing cursor in Figures (b), (c), and (d).

In each of the embodiments described above, the condition for rotating the shape of the pointing cursor or converting it to a mirror image position is when the pointing cursor hides other data or enters a predetermined zone. It goes without saying that these operations, such as rotation and mirror image transformation, may be performed by specified input.

FIG. 7 is a flowchart showing a processing procedure when the control device shown in FIG. 1 executes the pointing cursor display method described above. First, in step 1, position original data (indicated point data) is input from a pointing device. Then, the coordinate position when displaying this on the screen is calculated (step 2). Next, from the storage device,
) is read out (step 3).

Then, in the next step 4, it is determined whether the rotation and mirror image position conversion conditions are satisfied. The conditions include whether or not there is an operator's designated input, whether or not other data is hidden, or whether or not it is within a predetermined zone. If this condition is not met, the process jumps to step 6 and the coordinate position obtained in step 2 is set to the coordinate position shown in Fig. 5 (b).
) display the pointing cursor.

If the conditions in step 4 are satisfied, the process proceeds to step 5, where the pointing cursor shown in FIG. 5(a) is rotated and its mirror image position is converted. Here, mirror image position conversion will be explained as an example. For example, point the pointing cursor as shown in Figure 5(b).
When converting like this, the display pattern is changed to (x, y
), (-x, y) (left and right mirror images), (
x, -y) (upper and lower mirror images), or (-y, x) (rotation: change Fig. 5(a) to Fig. 5(d)). Then, the pattern after one rotation after the conversion is displayed at the coordinate position obtained in step 2.

[Effects of the Invention] According to the present invention, the data displayed on the screen will not be hidden by the pointing cursor, and there will be no situation where the pointing cursor will come off the screen and not be displayed, resulting in improved usability. There is.

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a data processing device according to an embodiment of the present invention, and FIGS. 2(a), (b), and (e). (d), Figure 3 (a), (b), (c), Figure 4
figure. Figure 5 (a), (b), (c), (d),
6(a), (b), (c), and (d) are explanatory diagrams of a pointing cursor display method according to an embodiment of the present invention, and FIG. 7 is an explanatory diagram of a pointing cursor display method according to an embodiment of the present invention. It is a flowchart which shows a processing procedure. DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1... Input device, 2... Position calculation device, 3... Display position pattern rotation/mirroring device, 4... Display position pattern storage device, 5... Control device, 6... Display Device. Agent Patent Attorney Tadashi Akimoto Actual Figure Figure (a) (b) (c) (a) (b) (d) (C) Figure (a) (b) (C) (d) a 4b'4c'4d' Figure (C) (d)

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. In a pointing cursor display method in which a pointing cursor displayed on the screen is moved on the screen according to the operation of a pointing device, when the pointing cursor is displayed, other data displayed on the screen is A pointing cursor display method characterized by changing the shape of the pointing cursor to a shape that does not hide the data display when the pointing cursor hides the data display. 2. In a pointing cursor display method in which a pointing cursor displayed on the screen is moved on the screen according to the operation of a pointing device, when the pointing cursor is displayed, other data displayed on the screen is hidden by the pointing cursor. In this case, the pointing cursor is displayed by rotating the pointing cursor to an arbitrary angle or a mirror image position around the indicated point. 3. In a pointing cursor display method in which the pointing cursor displayed on the screen is moved on the screen according to the operation of the pointing device, the screen is divided into multiple zones, and when the pointing cursor is displayed, the shape of the pointing cursor is changed depending on the zone of the display position. A pointing cursor display method characterized by changing. 4. In the pointing cursor display method in which the pointing cursor displayed on the screen is moved on the screen according to the operation of the pointing device, the screen is divided into multiple zones, and when displaying the pointing cursor, the pointing cursor is moved depending on the zone of the display position. A pointing cursor display method characterized by rotating and displaying a pointing cursor at an arbitrary angle or a mirror image position around a pointing point. 5. In a pointing cursor display method in which a pointing cursor displayed on the screen is moved on the screen according to the operation of a pointing device, when the pointing point of the pointing cursor reaches the edge of the screen and the pointing cursor is no longer displayed on the screen, the pointing A pointing cursor display method characterized by changing the display shape of the cursor to the shape displayed on the screen. 6. In a pointing cursor display method in which a pointing cursor displayed on the screen is moved on the screen according to the operation of a pointing device, when the pointing point of the pointing cursor reaches the edge of the screen and the pointing cursor is no longer displayed on the screen, the pointing A pointing cursor display method characterized by rotating the display shape of the cursor around its indicated point to an arbitrary angle or a mirror image position and displaying it as a shape displayed on a screen. 7. In a data processing device that is equipped with a pointing device as an input device and displays a pointing cursor on the screen, if other data displayed on the screen is hidden by the pointing cursor when the pointing cursor is displayed, the pointing cursor is A data processing device characterized by comprising means for changing the shape of a cursor to a shape that does not hide the data display. 8. In a data processing device that is equipped with a pointing device as an input device and displays a pointing cursor on the screen, if other data displayed on the screen is hidden by the pointing cursor when the pointing cursor is displayed, the pointing cursor is 1. A data processing device comprising means for displaying a cursor by rotating it to an arbitrary angle or a mirror image position around an indicated point. 9. In a data processing device that is equipped with a pointing device as an input device and displays a pointing cursor on the screen, the screen is divided into a plurality of zones, and when the pointing cursor is displayed, there is provided means for changing the shape of the pointing cursor depending on the zone at the display position. A data processing device comprising: 10. In a data processing device that is equipped with a pointing device as an input device and displays a pointing cursor on the screen, when the screen is divided into multiple zones and the pointing cursor is displayed, the pointing cursor is centered around the indicated point depending on the zone of the display position. 1. A data processing device comprising means for rotating and displaying at an arbitrary angle or a mirror image position. 11. In a data processing device equipped with a pointing device as an input device and displaying a pointing cursor on the screen, when the pointing point of the pointing cursor reaches the edge of the screen and the pointing cursor is no longer displayed on the screen, the display shape of the pointing cursor is changed. A data processing device characterized by comprising means for changing the shape to be displayed on a screen. 12. In a data processing device equipped with a pointing device as an input device and displaying a pointing cursor on the screen, when the pointing point of the pointing cursor reaches the edge of the screen and the pointing cursor is no longer displayed on the screen, the display shape of the pointing cursor is changed. A data processing device characterized by comprising a means for rotating the indicated point to an arbitrary angle or a mirror image position and displaying it as a shape displayed on a screen.