JPH06289834A - Input device and display device - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To provide the input device and display device on which icons displayed on a screen can easily be selected. CONSTITUTION:Those devices are provided with a display which displays plural icons I1, I2... corresponding to processing objects such as files on the screen and also displays a cursor C indicating one icon, a pointing device which is used to input information corresponding to at least the movement quantity and movement direction of the cursor on the screen corresponding to the quantity and direction of operation by an operator, and a system unit which specifies the icon 12 at the nearest position to a specific position P1 on the contour of the icon I1 when the cursor C reaches the specific position P1 and controls to jump the cursor C to the position of the icon I2.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to an input device and a display device suitable for use in, for example, a personal computer or a workstation.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art As is well known, in the field of personal computers, workstations and the like, various input devices and display devices making full use of a graphical user interface (GUI) have been developed. Particularly in recent workstations, various processing targets such as files are graphics such as icons (hereinafter simply referred to as icons).
Is displayed on the display, and the operator can operate the pointing device such as a mouse to move the cursor displayed on the display and select the icon.

[0003]

In the above-mentioned conventional input device and display device, the cursor displayed on the display is moved in proportion to the operation amount of the mouse or the like. Therefore, it is easy to select an icon when a small number of icons with a relatively large area are displayed on the screen, but when a large number of small icons are displayed on the screen, when selecting individual icons. Strict alignment of the cursor is required. That is, the conventional input device and display device may not be able to easily select the icon displayed on the screen, and there is a problem that the operability is not excellent.

The present invention has been made under such a background, and an object thereof is to provide an input device and a display device capable of easily selecting an icon displayed on a screen.

[0005]

In order to solve the above-mentioned problems, the present invention provides an icon display means for displaying a plurality of icons on the screen, each icon corresponding to a processing target such as a file, and a cursor for pointing the icon. A cursor display means for displaying on the screen, cursor movement instruction means for inputting at least information corresponding to a movement amount and a movement direction of the cursor in the screen according to an operation amount and an operation direction by an operator, It is characterized by further comprising: cursor control means for specifying an icon to be newly designated by the cursor on the basis of information input by the cursor movement instruction means, and for causing the cursor to jump to the position of the icon.

[0006]

According to the present invention, the icon display means displays on the screen a plurality of icons each corresponding to a processing target such as a file, and the cursor display means displays a cursor indicating the icon on the screen. Then, the cursor movement instruction means inputs at least information corresponding to the movement amount and movement direction of the cursor within the screen according to the operation amount and the operation direction by the operator, and the cursor control means causes the cursor movement instruction Based on the information input by the means, the cursor specifies an icon to be newly designated and jumps the cursor to the position of the icon. This eliminates the need for the operator to precisely position the cursor when moving the cursor to the desired icon position.

[0007]

Embodiments of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings. FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing the configuration of an embodiment of the present invention. In this figure, 1 is a system unit such as a personal computer. The system unit 1 includes a CPU (central processing unit) 2 and a memory 3
Etc. are built in, and each part of the device described below is controlled. The details of the operation of the CPU 2 will be described later.

Reference numeral 4 is a display capable of displaying multiple windows. This display 4 is based on the display data supplied from the system unit 1, and as shown in FIG.
In addition to displaying ..., a cursor C for designating these icons I, I, ... is displayed. Further, 5 is a pointing device such as a mouse or a trackball. The operator operates the pointing device 5 to move the cursor and selects a desired icon displayed on the display 4.

Next, the operation of this embodiment will be described with reference to the flow chart shown in FIG. First, when this apparatus is powered on, the CPU 2 activates the control program and advances the processing to step SP1 of the selection processing routine shown in FIG. In step SP1, pointing
It is determined whether the device 5 has an operation event.

If there is no operation event, the result of this judgment is "No", and the judgment in step SP1 is carried out again. That is, here, the determination process of step SP1 is repeated until there is an operation event. Then, if there is an operation event, the determination result here becomes "Yes", and the process proceeds to step SP2. In step SP2, it is determined whether or not the operation event at this time is an operation for moving the cursor.

If the operation event is an operation for moving the cursor, the result of this judgment is "Yes", and the routine proceeds to step SP3. At step SP3, it is determined whether or not the cursor C is in the window W1.
That is, in this embodiment, each window W
The cursor control method is changed between 1 and W2, and the determination is made here to select the subsequent cursor control method.

Here, if the cursor C is in the window W2, the result of this determination is "No", and step S
Go to P4. At step SP4, an icon to which the cursor C should be moved is searched for in response to the operation of the pointing device 5. Then, the cursor C is jumped to the position of the searched icon (for example, the center of the icon). In this case, various methods are conceivable for the icon search, but for example, the search methods shown in the following (1) to (3) can be adopted.

(1) First, the first method is cursor C
The icon whose position is closest to the position of the icon (for example, the center of the icon) is selected. For example, as shown in FIG. 4, the cursor C is displayed only when the cursor C is positioned inside the icon, and the pointing C
It shall move according to the operation of the device 5. That is, when the pointing device 5 is operated and the cursor position reaches the predetermined position P1 of the outline of the icon I1,
Even if the pointing device 5 is operated further, the cursor C does not go outside the icon I1. Then, the cursor position P1 at this time and the other icon I2
Compare the distances L1, L2, ..
Select the closest icon. In this case, since the closest one is the icon I2, the icon I2 is selected and the cursor C is jumped to that position.

(2) Next, in the second method, as shown in FIG. 5, the window is divided into areas A1, A2, ... When the cursor position enters another area (A3 in the figure) according to the operation of, the icon I3 belonging to the area A3 of the movement destination is selected. However, in this case, the cursor C is not displayed in proportion to the operation amount of the pointing device 5, but is always at the center position of the icon, or when the cursor C is positioned inside the icon as in the first method. Only displayed. That is, the icon I3 belonging to the area A3 is selected on the condition that the cursor position has entered another area A3, assuming that the cursor C is displayed in proportion to the operation amount of the pointing device 5. The cursor C is jumped to that position.

(3) Next, a third method is to select an icon to be moved according to the direction and speed (or acceleration) of the pointing device 5 being operated. For example, the direction of movement from the cursor position is up, down,
It is defined by being divided into eight parts of left, right, upper left, upper right, lower left and lower right, and as shown in FIG. 6, when the cursor C is located on the icon I1, the pointing device 5 is lower right. When operated in the direction of, the icon I4 in that direction is selected and the cursor C is jumped to that position. Furthermore, it is also possible to combine the operation direction of the pointing device 5 and the operation speed (or acceleration) and select the icon to which the cursor C should be moved based on these. For example, as shown in FIG. 7, when the pointing device 5 is vigorously operated in the right direction at a predetermined speed (or acceleration) or more while the cursor C is located at the icon I1, the icon in that direction is displayed. I3 is skipped, the icon I5 further ahead is selected, and the cursor C is jumped to that position.

Now, when the cursor C is jumped in step SP4 (see FIG. 3), the CPU 2
The process returns to step SP1 again, and the operation event waiting state is entered. In step SP4,
When the icon for moving the cursor C to the position corresponding to the operation of the pointing device 5 is not found (for example, when there is no other icon in the window W2), the cursor C is not moved. Then, the process returns to step SP1.

If the cursor C is in the window W1 in step SP3, the determination result here is "Yes", and the process proceeds to step SP5. At step SP5, the cursor C is moved in proportion to the operation amount of the pointing device 5. That is, in this case, instead of jumping the cursor C as in step SP4, the cursor C is moved by the same cursor control method as in the conventional case. At this time, for example, the movement amount of the cursor C may be different for the operation amount of the pointing device 5 inside and outside the icon. By making the amount of movement outside the icon larger than the amount of movement inside the icon, the cursor C can be moved quickly between the icons. Then, the processing of the CPU 2 returns to the step SP1 again, and enters the operation event waiting state.

In step SP2, if the operation event is not the operation for moving the cursor but the operation for instructing the icon by the pointing device 5 (for example, clicking the mouse button), the judgment here is made. The result is "No", and the process proceeds to step SP6. At step SP6, a process target such as a file corresponding to the icon where the cursor C is currently positioned is selected.

Next, when proceeding to step SP7, a process corresponding to the selection of the icon such as file editing is performed.
Then, the processing of the CPU 2 returns to the step SP1 again, and enters the operation event waiting state. Thus, in the selection processing routine, cursor movement and icon selection processing are performed according to the operation event of the pointing device 5 and the current cursor position.

As described above, in this embodiment, the cursor control method is changed depending on which of the windows W1 and W2 the cursor C is located in. In particular, when the cursor C is in the window W2, an icon to which the cursor C should be moved is searched for according to the operation mode of the pointing device 5, and the cursor C is jumped to the icon of the movement destination. . As a result, even when many small icons are present in the window, strict alignment of the cursor C, etc., which is required in the conventional case, is unnecessary, and the icon can be easily selected.

In the above embodiment, when the two windows W1 and W2 are displayed, the normal cursor movement according to the operation amount and the cursor movement due to the jump between the icons are switched. However, the present invention is not limited to this. Alternatively, more windows may be displayed so that one of the two types of cursor movement can be selected in each window. Further, the cursor C may be jumped between the icons only when the operation of moving the cursor is performed while pressing a specific switch (for example, a mouse button) provided on the pointing device 5.

Further, in calculating the coordinates of the destination icon in the search for the icons shown in (1) to (3) above, if the icons are arranged in advance on the grid at predetermined intervals, the coordinates can be calculated. The burden of calculation is reduced, and the icon can be searched easily and at high speed. Further, the above-described icon search methods (1) to (3) are merely examples, and the icons may be searched by other methods.

[0023]

As described above, according to the present invention, when the operator moves the cursor to the position of a desired icon, the operator does not need to strictly align the cursor, and therefore the operator can display it on the screen. The effect that the selected icon can be easily selected is obtained.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing the configuration of an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a diagram showing an example of a window displayed on a display in the embodiment.

FIG. 3 is a flowchart showing a control program selection processing routine executed by a CPU in the embodiment.

FIG. 4 is a diagram showing an example of cursor control by a first icon searching method in the embodiment.

FIG. 5 is a diagram showing an example of cursor control by a second icon search method in the embodiment.

FIG. 6 is a diagram showing an example of cursor control by a third icon searching method in the embodiment.

FIG. 7 is a diagram showing an example of cursor control when a combination of an operation direction and an operation speed of a pointing device is adopted in the third icon searching method.

[Explanation of symbols]

1 ... System unit, 2 ... CPU, 3 ... Memory, 4 ... Display, 5 ... Pointing device, C ... Cursor, I, I1 to I6 ... Icon,
W1, W2 ... Window

Front page continued (72) Inventor Osamu Oshima 10-1 Nakazawa-cho, Hamamatsu-shi, Shizuoka Yamaha stock company (72) Inventor Junichi Fujimori 10-1 Nakazawa-machi, Hamamatsu-shi, Shizuoka Yamaha stock company

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. An icon display unit for displaying a plurality of icons corresponding to processing targets such as files on a screen, a cursor display unit for displaying a cursor indicating the icon on the screen, and at least the screen of the cursor. Cursor movement instruction means for inputting information corresponding to the movement amount and movement direction in the cursor in accordance with the operation amount and operation direction by the operator, and based on the information input by the cursor movement instruction means, the cursor is newly added. An input device and a display device, comprising: a cursor control unit that specifies an icon to be designated and jumps the cursor to the position of the icon.