JPH07210573A - Information retrieval device and its control method - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE: To provide an information processor and a control method for the same with which the information element of a retrieving object can be designated with high operability and simple configuration, without requiring much cost. CONSTITUTION: Information requiring novels is stored in a ROM 4 and is displayed by a display driver 5 in units of one page. When the turning of a page is instructed from a keyboard 1, the next page is displayed. Therefore, by measuring the instruction intervals of page turns, the reading time of an operator per page is calculated. When any specified key is operated for investigating the detailed information on any specified character string in a certain page after that page is displayed, based on the time required from the display of that page to the execution of that operation and the read time for one page, the reading location of the operator at that time is calculated and a cursor for designating the character string is displayed at that position. Therefore, the number of times to operate the move key of the cursor for designating the character string can be decreased.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to an information retrieving apparatus and a control method thereof, and more particularly to an information retrieving apparatus for retrieving and displaying and outputting information stored in a storage medium in advance and a control method thereof.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art Conventionally, in an information retrieval device such as an electronic dictionary, headline information (keywords or headwords) and corresponding information (notation, meaning, parallel translation, examples, etc.) are stored in a storage medium (ROM, CDROM, etc.). It is known that the headline information is stored in the storage device, the headline information is searched by a predetermined method, and the searched headline information and corresponding information corresponding to the searched headline information are output using a display device or the like.

Some of these electronic dictionaries have a function of searching the information such as reading and meaning by designating the displayed character string.

Apart from that, recently, there is an electronic book in which the entire contents of a book such as a novel is digitized and displayed using a display device such as a liquid crystal. This is to turn an electronic text into pages. You can read the contents while displaying them one by one as you feel.

[0005]

Generally, in order to specify a part of the displayed contents, a pointing means such as a touch pen or a mouse can be easily used. However, such a means is required. If we try to realize it, the product cost will increase. Therefore, a cursor key or the like is often used to control the position of the displayed cursor and specify a part of the information.

However, the larger the amount of information to be displayed at one time, the more time the cursor moving operation has to be repeatedly executed to move the cursor to desired data, which is a problem. .

[0007]

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION The present invention has been made in view of the above problems, and an information processing apparatus and a data processing apparatus which can specify an information element to be searched with a high operability with a simple structure and without cost. It is intended to provide a control method.

In order to solve this problem, the information retrieval device of the present invention has the following configuration. That is, in an information search device that displays information including a character string on a predetermined display device, specifies a desired information element displayed on the display device, and searches and outputs detailed information for the specified information element, A first measuring means for measuring a time required for the operator to read the information displayed on the display device; and for searching detailed information for an information element in the displayed information,
Second measurement means for measuring the time required until the information element search operation is performed, and the interpretation displayed on the display device based on the time obtained by the first and second measurement means. Cursor display means for predicting the position and controlling and displaying the cursor position for identifying the information element based on the prediction result.

Further, the control method of the information retrieval apparatus of the present invention comprises the following steps. That is, a control of an information retrieval device that displays information including a character string on a predetermined display device, specifies a desired information element displayed on the display device, and retrieves and outputs detailed information for the designated information element. In the method, a first step of measuring a time required for an operator to read the information displayed on the display device, and a search operation of the information element for searching detailed information for the information element in the displayed information Based on the second step of measuring the time required until is performed and the first and second steps, the prediction position displayed on the display device is predicted, and the prediction result A third step of controlling and displaying a cursor position for identifying the information element based on

In the configuration or process of the present invention, the time required to read the information displayed on the display device is measured. Then, when attempting to specify the information element for which detailed information is to be confirmed, the time taken until the operation is performed is measured, and the operator's interpretation position is determined based on these measured times. Predict. And at the predicted position,
Display a cursor to identify an information element.

[0010]

Embodiments of the present invention will be described in detail below with reference to the accompanying drawings.

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of the information retrieval apparatus of the embodiment, and FIG. 2 is an external view of the apparatus. In the figure, reference numeral 2 is a CPU such as a microprocessor, which executes each process of the program 4a stored in the ROM 4 according to an input from the keyboard 1. Here, the keyboard 1 is connected to the CPU 2 via the interface means. Further, this CPU has a time measuring means such as a timer.

In the ROM 4, a dictionary storage area 4b storing heading information and corresponding information in addition to the above programs.
Is stored and the character string designated by the keyboard 1 is used to search the information in the dictionary storage area 4b. The ROM 4 also stores an information storage area 4c that stores the contents of a book and the like, and when the key 1a is turned on, the contents are displayed on the display 6.

The RAM 3 has an input buffer 3a for temporarily storing input data from a keyboard, a display buffer 3b for expanding data to be displayed, a work area 3c for storing other variables necessary for information retrieval processing, and ,
A stack 3d and the like are provided.

The display 6 is an LCD panel or a CR.
It is composed of a T display and the like, and is driven via the display driver 5.

In the external view of the apparatus shown in FIG.
Are the keyboard 1 and the display 6 in FIG. 1, respectively. The keyboard 1 is a key 1b for turning on / off the power of the apparatus, a cursor movement key 1b for moving the cursor up / down and left / right, a clear key 1c for clearing processing, a designation key 1d for starting the designation of a character string, and a next page. Next page key 1e, page up 1 page, previous page key 1f
Etc. When specifying a character string, key 1d
The key 1f functions as a key for performing start / end processing of character string range selection, the key 1f functions as a search key for performing a search using a specified character string, and the key 1b functions as a key for changing the character string range. To do.

FIG. 3 shows a state in which the designation of the character string is started by the designation key 1d, and the cursor 7 appears on the upper right of the display, "above". The cursor 7 is moved by the cursor movement key 1b to move it to the position of the desired character string.

FIG. 4 shows how the cursor 7 is moved to the character "Mixed". When the key 1d is pressed here, range designation is started and "range designation" is performed at a predetermined position on the display unit 6.
Message is displayed and lit.

In FIG. 5, the range is changed by the cursor movement key 1b (to specify the end of the range), and the cursor 7
Shows that "crowded" is specified by.

When the search key 1f is pressed, the search is executed, and the character string in the dictionary storage area 4b and the corresponding information such as reading and meaning are searched. Figure 6
Indicates that the character string “crowded” is searched and its reading, notation, and meaning are displayed.

However, when the character string is designated in this way, the character string to be designated is indicated by the cursor, and when the cursor is moved to the desired character string, the position where the cursor first appears is the top of the page. Since it is fixed to, the cursor movement key 1b must be pressed many times,
It takes a long time to operate.

Further, if the cursor is displayed at the center position of the screen, the key operation accompanying the maximum movement is more advantageous than displaying it at the top of the screen, but this is not a fundamental solution.

Therefore, in the present embodiment, a timer in the CPU 2 is used to store in advance in the control program a clocking means for calculating the average time Tm for turning pages. Then, this average time Tm is stored in the work area of the RAM 3, and the designation key 1 is pressed after the previous or next page display instruction key is pressed to turn the page.
The appearance position of the cursor is changed by comparing the time Ts required until d is pressed (hereinafter referred to as the designated start time) with the average time Tm. In other words, it is intended to eliminate the above-mentioned problem by indirectly recognizing which part of the screen the user is currently reading and displaying the cursor at that position. Various methods can be considered for calculating the average value Tm. For example, you can add the average value of the page turn times up to the previous page and the current page turn time, and divide it by 2. The number of pages turned in the past and the total time taken to read them can be stored in sequence. You can then divide the total time each time by the number of pages.

In the embodiment, the ratio of the average time Tm (corresponding to the page turning time) and the designated start time Ts is used to find the corresponding character string on the display page, and the cursor is moved to the character string. Shall appear.

FIG. 7 shows the average page turning time Tm of 3
When the designated start time Ts is 0 seconds and 13 seconds, the cursor 7 appears on the character “suburb” corresponding to the ratio of Tm and Ts on the display page. Needless to say, this Tm varies from person to person.

The contents of the operation processing of the CPU 2 in this embodiment (the relevant program is a part of the control program 4a in the ROM 4) will be described below with reference to the flowchart of FIG.

First, a key input process is performed in step S1, and the key is discriminated in step S2.

Here, when the key 1e or the key 1f is pressed, it is determined whether or not the character string designation process is being performed in step S.
If it is not specified, the previous page or the next page is turned (step S).
4). Next, the average page turning time Tm is calculated in step S5, and the timer is set again in step S6. Then, it progresses to step S17 and the display buffer 3b.
A process of displaying the contents set in the display 6 on the display 6 is performed.

Normally, this process is repeated while the pages are being turned, and the average page turning time Tm is continuously calculated.

Now, the character string designating process will be described. The designation process is the designation key 1d during the normal display process.
Starts when is pressed.

First, it is determined in step S8 whether or not the range is being specified. If not, the display flag of "range being specified" is turned off in step S9. Next step S1
At 0, the position where the cursor appears is calculated. When the position of the cursor is determined by this processing, the process proceeds to step S11 and the cursor position is set. If the cursor movement key is pressed during the designation process, after the determinations in steps S13 and S14, the process proceeds to step S15 to move the cursor.

Next, a description will be given of when the range is being specified.
To start the range designation, the designation key 1d is pressed during the designation process,
In step S8, it is determined that the range is not being specified, and the range specification is started. In step S12, the "range specification" display flag 8 is turned on. This is the case, for example, when the designation key 1d is pressed in FIG. 3, the cursor is moved to "mixed" by the cursor movement key, and the designation key 1d is pressed again. When the cursor movement key is pressed while the range is being specified, the process proceeds to step S16 after the determinations in steps S13 and S14, and the specified range is changed by the cursor. If the search key 1f is pressed when the character string is designated by the cursor, step S
After the determination in 3, the process proceeds to step S7, and the search process is executed. Through the above processing, the appearance position of the cursor is determined, the range of the character string is specified, and the specified character string is searched.

As described above, according to the present embodiment, the operator is currently reading about the page turning time Tm and the time from when the page is displayed to when the search operation is performed. Since the cursor is found at that position and the cursor is displayed at that position, it is possible to simplify the operation of moving the cursor (the number of times the cursor key is pressed) to actually select the character string to be searched.

<Description of Other Embodiments> FIG. 9 shows a case where an underline 9 is used instead of a cursor to indicate a character string to be designated. Also, to show these specified strings,
It goes without saying that emphasized characters and italic characters may be used.

Further, FIG. 10 shows an example in which the appearance position of the cursor 7 is not aligned with the character string obtained by the ratio of Tm and Ts, but is aligned with the head of a line in which the character string is present.

By doing so, it is easy to find the cursor, and the movement of the cursor is basically only downward so that the operation is easy. Of course, the same can be said at the end of line.

Further, FIG. 11 shows the English translation information of "crowded", and as the information related to the character string designated in this way, there are other examples showing how to use the character string. If the specified character string is name information or the like, it may be an address book or the like.

Further, in calculating the page turning average time Tm, a more accurate average time Tm may be obtained by excluding the character string designation and the search time.

To calculate the average time Tm for turning pages, the average time Tm may be calculated using a predetermined value in the first arbitrary page (since Tm cannot be calculated particularly in the first page). .

Further, in order to calculate the average time Tm for turning pages, the average time Tm may be calculated for a first arbitrary page using a value input by the user in advance.

Further, in calculating the average time Tm of page turning, the time information regarding the page with a large deviation, that is, the page that took a very long time or the page that was read very quickly is used for the calculation of the average time. It doesn't matter if you don't.

Furthermore, in calculating the page turning average time Tm, the more accurate average time Tm may be obtained by excluding the time information regarding the last viewed page.

Further, the designated information to be displayed is not limited to the character string and may be image information such as an illustration. Further, at this time, for example, when the illustration of “dinosaur” is designated and the search process is executed, information about the dinosaur may be displayed.

In the above example, it is described that information such as a story is stored in the ROM, but it is desirable that this ROM (particularly the text portion of the story) is removable. Especially, these days, as typified by CDROM,
The capacity is enormous, and it is possible to view various information by changing the medium.

Further, if the present apparatus is owned by an individual and is used by the individual, the time required for page turning is almost constant even when the medium is replaced and another story is read. Will be. Therefore, if the page turning average time Tm is stored in the non-volatile memory (EEPROM or RAM to which the backup power supply is connected), the cursor can be displayed at the correct position even if it is the first page.

Further, in the embodiments, novels such as stories have been described as an example, but the present invention is not limited to this, and any kind of information may be used. The point is that the displayed information only needs to have characters.

Further, in the embodiment, the example in which the program for performing the above processing is stored in the ROM has been described. However, it is stored in a floppy disk, a hard disk or the like, and RA
Of course, it may be realized by loading it in M.

Therefore, the present invention may be applied to a system composed of a plurality of devices or an apparatus composed of a single device. The present invention can also be applied to the case where it is achieved by supplying a program to a system or an apparatus.

[0048]

As described above, according to the present invention, the information element to be searched can be specified with good operability with a simple structure and without cost.

[0049]

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block configuration diagram of an apparatus according to an embodiment.

FIG. 2 is an external view of an apparatus according to an example.

FIG. 3 is a diagram for explaining an outline of a selection operation of a character string that is a search target element in the embodiment.

FIG. 4 is a diagram for explaining an outline of a selection operation of a character string that is a search target element in the embodiment.

FIG. 5 is a diagram for explaining an outline of an operation of selecting a character string that is a search target element in the embodiment.

FIG. 6 is a diagram showing an example of a display state of search results in the example.

FIG. 7 is a diagram showing an example of the state of the screen at the start of the operation of the search target in the embodiment.

FIG. 8 is a flowchart showing a procedure of a character string search process in the embodiment.

FIG. 9 is a diagram showing a state of a character string selection screen in another embodiment.

FIG. 10 is a diagram showing a state of a character string selection screen in another embodiment.

FIG. 11 is a diagram showing a display state example of search results in another embodiment.

[Explanation of symbols]

 1 keyboard 1a ON / OFF key 1b cursor movement key 1c clear key 1d designation key and range selection start / end key 1e next page key 1f previous page key and search key 2 CPU 3 RAM 3a input buffer 3b display buffer 3c work area 3d stack 4 ROM 4a Program storage area 4b Dictionary storage area 4c Information storage area 5 Display driver 6 Display 7 Cursor

Claims (4)

[Claims] 1. An information search for displaying information including a character string on a predetermined display device, designating a desired information element displayed on the display device, and retrieving and outputting detailed information for the designated information element. A first measuring means for measuring a time required for the operator to read the information displayed on the display device; and a search for the information element for searching detailed information for the information element in the displayed information. Second measuring means for measuring the time required until the operation is performed, and based on the time obtained by the first and second measuring means, predict the reading position displayed on the display device, An information retrieval apparatus comprising: a cursor display unit that controls and displays a cursor position for identifying the information element based on the prediction result. 2. The information displayed on the display device is information in which character strings such as novels are continuous, and the first measuring means measures an average value of time intervals of page turning instructions, and the second measuring means. The information retrieval apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the information retrieval apparatus measures the time required from the display of the page information until the retrieval operation is performed. 3. An information search for displaying information including a character string on a predetermined display device, designating a desired information element displayed on the display device, and retrieving and outputting detailed information for the designated information element. In the control method of the device, a first step of measuring a time required for the operator to read the information displayed on the display device, and the information element for searching detailed information for the information element in the displayed information, A second step of measuring the time required until the search operation is performed, and based on the time obtained by the first and second steps, predict the reading position displayed on the display device, A third step of controlling and displaying a cursor position for identifying the information element based on the prediction result, and controlling the information retrieval apparatus. 4. The information displayed on the display device is information in which a character string of a novel or the like is continuous, the first step measures an average value of time intervals of page turning instructions, and the second step measures pages. 4. The method for controlling an information retrieval device according to claim 3, wherein the time required from the display of the information in (1) to the retrieval operation is measured.