JPH0452771A - Combination selection system for appearance and function in information processor - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To automatically select the combination of an appearance which is familiar to a user with a function by providing a similarity calculation part selecting a function or an appearance which is most similar to the instructed appearance of function and a control means setting the function selected in the similarity calculation part to correspond to the appearance. CONSTITUTION:When the appearance 3 or the function 2 is instructed at first, the similarity calculation part 6 refers to an appearance attribute list 5 and a function attribute list 4, automatically selects the function 2 or the appearance 3 which is most similar to the appearance 3 or the function 2 which is instructed at first. The appearance 3 and the function 2 are caused to correspond in the control part 7. Thus, a user does not need to store the correspondence of the appearance 3 and the function 2, and he is released from a trouble. Even if the new function 2 is added, he can use the device by using the appearance which is familiar with for a long time and therefore the burden of the user can be reduced.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION [Industrial Field of Application] The present invention relates to a method for selecting a combination of appearances and functions in an information processing device having a plurality of appearances and a plurality of functions. , usually has multiple functions such as a database function, a word processor function, a graphic editor function for drawing figures, and a communication function.

On the other hand, information processing equipment needs to present information to the user using a display device, and it is desirable that the method of presenting the information and the operability are both familiar to the user, and various metaphors are used as a method for this purpose. Proposed. For example, in personal computers, etc., a desktop metaphor has been adopted that makes the computer look like a desk by displaying the state of the desk on the display screen, and the present applicant has previously filed a patent application. 1
In No. 222497, a television metaphor was proposed in which a picture of a television is displayed on a display screen.

As described above, various appearances are known as forms of presenting information to the user, and information processing devices usually have a plurality of appearances, and present an appropriate metaphor environment by switching metaphors according to the user's task. It is made possible.

[Problems to be Solved by the Invention] Incidentally, in conventional information processing devices, one appearance is associated with one function in advance. for example,
An icon 30 that resembles paper as shown in FIG. 6(a) is associated with a word processor, and when the icon 30 is designated, a message as shown at 32 appears on the display screen 31 as shown in FIG. 6(b). A metaphorical environment with the appearance of a typical document is presented in which documents can be created.

However, in conventional information processing devices, the correspondence between appearance and function is fixedly set in advance on a one-to-one basis, resulting in the following problems. In other words, although information processing devices currently have many functions and are expected to continue to increase in the future, if there is a fixed one-to-one correspondence between appearance and function, it is difficult for users to It was extremely troublesome to have to memorize and identify which features correspond to all the appearances.

Furthermore, in the past, each appearance and each function were managed by name, and corresponding appearances and functions had to be given names according to certain conventions.
If you are forced to change the name for some reason, and you change the name to a name that violates the above agreement for the appearance and function that have been associated in advance, a situation may arise where the appearance is visible but the function does not work. This can cause confusion for users who are not accustomed to operating computers.

Furthermore, in conventional information processing devices, a certain appearance and a certain function are fixedly associated with each other, but the correspondence may not necessarily be familiar to the user. For example, the appearance and word processor function in Figure 6(a) are easily understood by many users;
Moreover, although it is a familiar feature, many users may be confused when the word processor function is associated with the appearance shown in FIG. 6(C).

This is because what a designer imagines when mapping a certain appearance is different from what a user imagines when seeing a certain appearance, but it is impossible to completely eliminate this. Therefore, not only is it a very difficult design problem to determine what kind of appearance should correspond to a certain function, but the result of the mapping is not necessarily something that is familiar to the user. As a result, it has been pointed out that the computer is inconvenient for the user and hinders the user's efforts to understand the computer.

The present invention solves the above-mentioned problems, and aims to provide a method for selecting a combination of appearance and function in an information processing device that can automatically select a combination of appearance and function that is familiar to the user. It is something.

[Means for Solving the Problems] In order to achieve the above object, the appearance and function combination selection method in an information processing device of the present invention provides an interactive information processing device that independently includes an appearance group and a function group. An appearance attribute list for each appearance, a functional attribute list for each function, and a similarity calculation that selects the function or appearance that has the highest similarity to the specified appearance or function by referring to the appearance attribute list and the functional attribute list. and a control means for associating the pre-instructed appearance or function with the function or appearance selected by the similarity calculation section.

[Operations and Effects of the Invention] In the present invention, when an appearance or function is first specified, the similarity calculation unit refers to the appearance attribute list and the function attribute list and selects the appearance or function that is most similar to the first specified appearance or function. Functions or appearances with a high degree of similarity are automatically selected, and these appearances and functions are associated with each other by a control means.

Therefore, the user does not have to memorize the correspondence between appearances and functions as in the past, and is freed from the hassle.

Moreover, even if a new function is added, the user can use it with a familiar appearance, which can reduce the burden on the user.

Furthermore, in the present invention, appearance and function are not managed by name but by attribute, so even if the name of appearance or function is changed, the combination of appearance and function with the highest degree of similarity is selected. It is something.

Furthermore, since the appearance attribute value and the function attribute value can be arbitrarily rewritten, the user can modify the attribute value if the correspondence between appearance and function does not meet the user's wishes.

[Example] Examples will be described below with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 1 is a diagram showing the configuration of an embodiment of a method for selecting a combination of appearance and function in an information processing device according to the present invention.
2 is an input/output device, 2 is a functional group, 3 is an appearance group, 4 is a functional attribute list, 5 is an appearance attribute list, 6 is a similarity calculation unit, and 7 is a control means.

In the configuration shown in FIG. 1, an input/output device 1 serves as an interface between a user and a computer system, and is composed of input devices such as a keyboard and pointing device, and output devices such as a CRT display and a printer.

Function group 2 is a general term for a plurality of functions, and is a collection of various functions such as a word processor function, a graphic editor function, various database functions, and a communication function.

Appearance group 3 is a general term for a plurality of appearances, and is a collection of various appearances such as a desktop metaphor and a television metaphor. The appearance group 3 is independent from the function group 2.

The functional attribute list 4 is a table in which attribute value sets for each attribute are written for each function, as shown in FIG. 2(a). FIG. 2(b) is a diagram showing a specific example of a function attribute list, and shows the type of information processing and the information An example of an attribute value set is shown when considering two attributes called types. According to this, the text database registration function is characterized as having 0% of the generation, search, and communication characteristics and 100% of the storage characteristics with respect to the information processing type attribute. Regarding the attribute of information type, visual characteristics and auditory characteristics are both characterized as being 50%. This is because the text database registration function, from the perspective of the type of information processing, has the characteristic that it cannot generate information, search for information, or communicate information, but can only store information. Also, from the perspective of the type of information, it means that visual information and auditory information can be handled in the same way. The same applies to other functions.

The appearance attribute list 5 is a table in which attribute value sets for each attribute are written for each appearance, as shown in FIG. 3(a). FIG. 3(b) is a diagram showing a specific example of an appearance attribute list, and considers two attributes, information processing type and information type, for six types of appearance: vTR1 telephone, newspaper, magazine, television, and radio. An example of an attribute value set is shown below. According to this, regarding the appearance of a newspaper, regarding the attribute of information processing type, generation and communication characteristics are 0%, storage characteristics are 20%, and retrieval characteristics are 80%. Furthermore, regarding the attribute of the type of information, the visual characteristic is 100% and the auditory characteristic is 0%. This is -
Newspapers do not directly generate information for boat fishing,
Although it does not communicate information, it has the characteristics of searching for articles, and it is also thought that information can be accumulated by writing, so from the perspective of a type of information processing, The characteristics of information generation and information communication are 0%, and the ratio of information storage and retrieval is approximately 2:8. Furthermore, since the information that can be handled in newspapers is visual information, not auditory information, from the perspective of the type of information, visual characteristics are set at 00% and auditory characteristics are set at 0%. . The same applies to other appearances.

Note that the number N of appearances may be the same as or different from the number N of functions, but as will be clear from what will be described later,
The number M of attributes set for both must be the same.

Further, the attribute values written in the functional attribute list as shown in FIG. 2(b) and the appearance attribute list as shown in FIG. 3(b) can be modified arbitrarily by the user. for example,
A user who determines that the ratio of accumulation and search for newspaper appearances is 3-near can modify the attribute value of the accumulation item to 30% and the attribute value of the search item to 70%, and thereby, It is possible to achieve a combination of functionality and appearance that meets the individual user's wishes.

The similarity calculation unit 6 calculates the similarity between appearance and function, and selects the combination of appearance and function that has the highest degree of similarity, and sets the attribute value of the i-th item of attribute m of appearance X to A. (x
, m, +), function) ", if the attribute value of the first item of attribute m is F (y + m, i) and is 7, appearance X and function y
The degree of similarity between is calculated using the following equation (1).

Σ(Σn+In (A (x, m, j), F(y, m,
j)) ) = (]) Add l However, ΣA (x, m, i) = 100 - (
2) ΣF (y, m, 1) == 100
- (3).

Specifically, it is as follows. Now, suppose that the function y is a video database search, and the appearance Suppose that At this time, m=1 means the type of information processing, m=
2 means the type of information. Also, when m=1, i=
1, 2, and 3.4 mean generation, storage, retrieval, and communication, respectively, and when m=2, i=1 and 2 mean vision and hearing, respectively. Therefore, if calculated using equation (1), the degree of similarity between the TV appearance and the video database search function is 20.
It becomes 0.

The degree of similarity between function and appearance is calculated as described above, but if the function to be used is specified first, the degree of similarity calculation unit 6
will calculate the similarity between the specified features and all appearances. Then, the similarity calculation section 6 determines the appearance with the maximum similarity as the best combination with the function Y, and notifies the control means 7 of the appearance.

The control means 7 centrally manages the entire information processing apparatus.

Next, the operation of the configuration shown in FIG. 1 will be explained.

First, the user specifies the function or appearance to be used using the input/output device 1. Now, assuming that a certain function Y is designated, the control means 7 activates the similarity calculation section 6.

As a result, the similarity calculation unit 6 takes in the attribute value set of each attribute related to the function Y from the functional attribute list 4, further takes in the attribute value set of each attribute related to all appearance from the appearance attribute list 5, and performs the above-mentioned In this way, the similarity between function Y and all appearances is calculated, and the appearance with the highest similarity to function Y is selected. Specifically, it is as follows.

Assume that text database search is first specified as a function. At this time, the similarity calculation unit 6 takes in the attribute value set related to the text database search shown in FIG. 2 (1) from the functional attribute list 4, and also takes in all the appearance attributes shown in FIG. A text database search function that imports a set of attribute values related to a VTR.

The degree of similarity with each appearance of a telephone, newspaper, magazine, television, and radio is calculated using the (+) formula. The calculation results are shown in Figure 4 (
As shown in a), the similarity calculation unit 6 determines that the combination with the television appearance that has the maximum similarity is the best one, and notifies the control means 7 of the combination.

As a result, the control means 7 selects the text database search function from the function group 2, selects the appearance of the television from the appearance group 3, and associates them with each other.

As a result, the fifth screen appears on the screen of the display device of input/output device 1.
A picture of a television as shown in the figure is displayed, and the text database search function operates.

Furthermore, when the text database registration function is specified, the degree of similarity with each appearance is as shown in FIG. 4(b), so in this case, the similarity calculation unit 6
TR will be selected.

Note that although the above description assumes that the function is specified first, when appearance is specified, the function with the highest degree of similarity is similarly selected.

In the manner described above, the best combination of function and appearance can be achieved.

One embodiment of the present invention has been described above, and next, another embodiment will be described. The configuration of this embodiment is similar to that shown in FIG. 1, but the similarity calculation performed by the similarity calculation section 6 is different from the above embodiment. That is, attribute 1, attribute 2. ..., weight W(m) for each attribute of attribute A (however, 1.JW(m
)=1), and the degree of similarity is calculated using the following equation (4).

In other words, for example, if there are two attributes, the type of information processing and the type of information, the weight W(m) By adopting this parameter, it is possible to reflect the user's preferences regarding attributes.

Although the embodiments of the present invention have been described above, it will be obvious to those skilled in the art that the present invention is not limited to the above embodiments, and that various modifications can be made.

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

FIG. 1 is a diagram showing the configuration of an embodiment of a method for selecting a combination of appearance and function in an information processing device according to the present invention, FIG. 2 is a diagram for explaining a functional attribute list, and FIG. 3 is an appearance attribute list. 4 is a diagram for explaining an example of similarity calculation, FIG. 5 is a diagram for explaining an example of the appearance of a TV, and FIG. 6 is a diagram for explaining a conventional example and its problems. It is a diagram. 1... Input/output device, 2... Function group, 3... Appearance group, 4... Function attribute list, 5... Appearance attribute list,
6... Similarity calculation unit, 7... Control means. Applicant: Hideo Sugai (7 others), Patent Attorney, Personal Information Environment Association, Figure 1, Figure 2

Claims (3)

[Claims] (1) In an interactive information processing device that independently includes an appearance group and a function group, an appearance attribute list regarding each appearance, a function attribute list regarding each function, and instructions are obtained by referring to the appearance attribute list and the function attribute list. a similarity calculation unit that selects a function or appearance that is most similar to the appearance or function that has been selected; and a control unit that associates the predetermined appearance or function with the function or appearance selected by the similarity calculation unit. A method for selecting a combination of appearance and function in an information processing device, characterized in that: (2) The method for selecting a combination of appearance and function in an information processing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the attribute values written in the appearance attribute list and the function attribute list are modifiable. (3) A method for selecting a combination of appearance and function in an information processing apparatus according to claim 1 or 2, wherein the attributes are weighted.