JPH04156589A - Character string display system - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To make it possible to cancel an key input manipulation whose display direction is designated, by providing means for determining whether a vertical writing display or a horizontal writing display is carried out in accordance the shape of the frame of a character string input area when the latter is visually set. CONSTITUTION:There are provided a display section 3 for displaying character data, an indicating means for visually indicating a position on the display section 3, and an area frame setting means for setting an area frame on the display section 3. If the longitudinal length of an area frame set by the area frame setting means is longer than the crosswise length thereof, character string are longitudinally laid on the display section 3 for display, but if the longitudinal length of the area frame is shorter than that, character rows are laid crosswise on the display section 3. Further, the character string to be displayed are laid within the set area frame at uniform intervals.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION (A) Field of Industrial Application The present invention relates to a character string display method in a document editing device such as a word processor or DTP.

(B) Conventional technology In conventional word processors, an area frame is set in a part of the document editing screen, and within the area frame, character string data input in an input area outside of this area frame and data stored in advance on a floppy disk or ROM are stored. When extracting and displaying character string data stored in the The method used was to select and specify the display direction. Therefore, the operator is forced to perform complicated operations such as setting the area frame on the editing screen, displaying the menu screen, and instructing the display direction using cursor keys or the like.

(c) Problems to be Solved by the Invention The present invention has been made in view of the above circumstances, and it is necessary to specify the display direction when setting an area frame on the editing screen and displaying a character string within the area frame. The technical challenge is to eliminate the need for the operator to manually operate the keys.

(d) Means for Solving the Problems In order to solve the above problems, the present invention provides a display section for displaying character data, an instruction means for visually indicating a position on the display section, and an instruction means for visually indicating a position on the display section. an area frame setting means for setting an area frame on the display section by instructing the area frame,
If the vertical length of the area frame set by the area frame setting means is longer than the horizontal length, the character strings are displayed vertically on the display section so that the horizontal length is the vertical length. If the character string is longer than the length in the direction, the character string is displayed on the display section by arranging the character strings in the horizontal direction.

Further, the character strings to be displayed are arranged at equal intervals within the set area frame.

(E) Function According to the present invention, when visually setting a character string input area on a display, the display direction can be changed by determining whether to perform vertical writing display or horizontal writing display depending on the shape of the area frame. By omitting the key manual means or menu display means for specifying the key, manual key operation is unnecessary.

(F) Example Hereinafter, the character string display method of the present invention will be explained according to FIGS. 1 to 6.

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a document editing device for editing a document using a character string display method according to the present invention.

In the figure, (1) is a control unit which controls each part of the apparatus according to a system program stored in ROM (2). (3) is a display unit, which is an LCD or CRT display device. (4) is an input unit, which is a pointing device using a mouse or a cursor key on a keyboard.

(5) is an image cursor control section and input section (4)
The image cursor is moved and the display is controlled pixel by pixel on the display unit (3) based on the information inputted by. (6) is a region frame size determination section, which compares the vertical and horizontal sizes of the set region frame based on the coordinate values to which the image cursor has moved when setting the region frame. (7) is a format setting section that sets and stores the format of the character string to be displayed.

(8) is a format calculation part that calculates the format from the size of the area frame and the length of the character string, and the format setting part (7) calculates the character pitch and character size so that the character string fits in the area frame. Output.

(9) is a text RAM that stores characters as code information. In this embodiment, since the display screen is divided into two, the edit text RAM (9a) and the sample text RAM (9a)
b) It is divided into (10) is a VRAM in which image data is written in order to be displayed on the display section (3). (11) liVRAM control unit and VRAM
(10) Control the data to be written in 4-knee. (12)
is a font ROM in which a conversion table for converting character code information into character image information corresponding to character code information is stored. (13) is the VR for the entire screen area
This is a coordinate conversion control unit that converts the AM position and text position, and displays it on the display unit (3) based on the position information stored in the RAM (9a) (data for writing to the VRAM (10)). (14) is a text cursor control unit that controls the movement position of the text cursor based on the format information of the display unit (3). (15a)
) to (15d) are data buffers, BUF1 in (15a) is for saving the entire image information of VRAM (10), and BUF2 in (15b) is for saving VRAM (10).
RAM (10) is used to save and store part of the image information, (15c) BUF3 is used to store the position information of the created area frame, and (15d)
) is for storing the vertical and horizontal size information of the created area frame.

The apparatus operates according to the flowchart shown in FIG.

FIG. 3 shows the state of the display section (3) of the apparatus in this embodiment.

The display screen (16) of the display section (3) is divided into two areas: a sample text area (17) and an edit text area (18). An example in which character string data written in the sample text area (17) on the right half of the display screen (16) is moved and displayed on the edit text area (18) will be explained according to the flowchart in FIG. 3. I do.

Here, the character string data on the sample text area (17) is a predetermined fixed sentence, and a plurality of sentences are displayed. Character code information, position information,
Information about the number of characters per line, the number of lines, and the size of the image data is written.

First, in step S], sample text area (17)
Move the text cursor over any of the character string data displayed on the screen using the text cursor control unit (14), and select the target by manually operating the keys using the input unit (4) or by operating the click button of the mouse. Specifies string data.

In step S2, the character code information, position, and size information of the character string data pointed by the text cursor are retrieved from the sample text RAM (9b).

In step S3, the coordinate conversion unit (13) converts the position information of the sample text area (17) into position information from the beginning of the VRAM (10) corresponding to the entire display screen.

In step S4, the contents of the sample text RAM (9b) obtained in step S2 are referenced, the specified character string is cut out as image data, and the buffer BUF2 (1
5b).

In step S5, the entire data of the VRAM is stored as image information in the buffer BUFI (15a). □ In step S6, an input signal by manual keystroke or mouse movement is detected. When the input signal is detected, the image cursor control unit (5) moves the image cursor based on the input signal in step S7. In step S7, the position information is converted to position information based on the head position of VRAM (1O), updated, and written to BUF3 (15c). In step S8, the contents of BUFI (15a) are written to VRAM (10). Furthermore, in step S9, the VRAM (
10) Write the contents of BUF2 (15b) in the upper position.

By repeating steps 85 to S8, the character string displayed in the sample text area (17) can be moved while being visually displayed on the display screen (16).

When the position to be moved on the edit text area (18) is determined by this operation, the position of the upper left end of the area frame is determined by pressing the mouse click button or execution key of the input unit (4). This coordinate value is buffer B'UF
3 (15c). Thereafter, the control moves to step 510, and the coordinates of the positional information from the beginning of the VRAM (10) are converted into the positional information (X6, Y,) of the editing text area (18). Furthermore, the image cursor control section (
5), the cursor is moved, and in steps Sll to S14, the lower right end for setting the area to be displayed in the edit text area (16) is determined.

In step 512, the coordinates (a, b) of the lower right corner of the area frame with (x,,y,) as the origin are stored in the buffer BUF4 (15d).

In step 513, data of a rectangle with opposite vertices of (x,, y,) and (a, b) is calculated in order to create data for displaying the area frame.

In step S14, this rectangular data is written into the VRAM (10) to display the area frame.

The area frame is set by repeating steps Sll to S14, and once the area frame is determined, pressing the execution key of the input section (4) or the mouse click button (a
, b) are determined.

In step 515, the values of the determined vertical and horizontal sizes a and b of the area are read from the BUF4 (15d) and output to the area frame size determination unit (6).

The area frame size determination unit (6) compares the thickness of a and b, and if the value of a is larger than the value of b, that is, if the width of the area frame is longer than the height, the size of the character string is determined in 816 steps. Information about the number of characters n in one line and the number m of lines is retrieved from the text RAM.

In step S17, the position of each character (XC++t VC++) in row i and column j is calculated using the first formula below so that the character string fits horizontally within the area frame of vertical a and horizontal
(10) Convert to write address.

In step 818, the format information within this area frame is stored in the format setting section (7).

In step S22, the VRAM controller (11)
M write address and character code information read from sample text RAM (9b) with 523 steps.
In 24 steps, pattern data is obtained by referring to the pattern information conversion table in the font ROM (12).

In step S25, the pattern data is stored in VRAM (10).
Write in the position corresponding to each character read in step 522.

This operation causes the edit text area (1) of the display section (3) to
8), character strings are displayed at equal intervals within the area frame as shown in FIG.

In addition, as a result of comparing the sizes of a and b in step 515, if the value of b is larger than the value of a, that is, if the height of the area frame is longer than the width, then in step 519, 1 of the character string is
Information about the number of characters n in a line and the number m of lines is retrieved from the text RAM.

In step S20, use the second formula below to calculate the position it (XC1, Yc,) of each character in row i and column j so that the character string fits horizontally within the area frame of vertical a and horizontal column. VRAM
(10) Convert to write address.

In step S21, this format information is stored in the format setting section (7).

Similarly to the case where a is larger than b, in step S22, the VRAM write address and the character code information read from the sample text RAM (9b) in step S23 are sent to the VRAM control unit (11) in 824 steps. ) to obtain pattern data by referring to the pattern information conversion table.

At step 525, the pattern data is stored in VRAM (10).
Write in the position corresponding to each character read in step 522.

This operation causes the edit text area (1) of the display section (3) to
8), character strings are displayed at equal intervals within the area frame as shown in FIG.

In addition, if you try to fit the character string within the set area frame and the characters overlap, that is, if the font pattern is larger than the character pitch, you can select an even smaller font pattern as shown in Figure 6. can prevent overlapping.

(g) Effects As described above, according to the present invention, there is no need for manual key means or menu display means for the operation of specifying the direction in which a character string is displayed, so the hardware required for this operation can be omitted. , it is possible to save memory for storing programs.

In addition, the operability is improved, and especially when a mouse is used to set an area, there is no need to manually press keys or display a menu screen, so the operability is particularly excellent. Also, when moving and displaying a pre-prepared character string as in this example,
Since one type of sample data can be converted into multiple displays and formats, the display area of the sample screen for displaying samples can be used effectively, and operator operations can be made more efficient.

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a device for implementing the character string display method of the present invention, FIG. 2 is a flowchart of a control program for the character string display method, and FIG. 3 is a display device of the present embodiment. FIG. 4 is a diagram showing the display result when the width of the area frame is longer than the height, and FIG. 5 is a diagram showing the display result when the width of the area frame is longer than the width. FIG. 6 is a diagram showing a display result when the area frame setting is small. 1... Control unit, 2... ROM, 3... Display unit, 4
...Input section, 5...Image cursor control section, 6
. . . Area frame size determination section, 7. Format setting section, 8.
...Format calculation section, 9...RAM, 10...VRAM
, 11 --- VRAM control unit, 12... font R
OM. Applicant Sanyo Electric Co., Ltd. 1 other representative Patent attorney Nishino Severe punishment (2 others) Figure 3 + 8 17 16 Figure 4 Figure 5

Claims (2)

[Claims] (1) A display section that displays character data, an instruction means that visually indicates a position on the display section, and an area frame setting section that sets an area frame on the display section by giving an instruction using the instruction means. , and if the vertical length of the area frame set by the area frame setting means is longer than the horizontal length, the character strings are displayed vertically on the display section, and the horizontal A character string data display method characterized in that when the length of is longer than the length in the vertical direction, the character strings are displayed side by side in the horizontal direction on the display section. (2) The character strings to be displayed are arranged at equal intervals within the set area frame.
Data display method described in section.