RU2748857C1 - Method for displaying shortcut for launching applications or other functionality on screen of information system for various purposes - Google Patents

Abstract

FIELD: informatics.SUBSTANCE: invention relates to the field of informatics. The method includes preparing a looped animated video for each application or device functionality, setting the correspondence between the video and the application or device functionality, extracting the parameters necessary for the rasterization algorithm from the looped animation clip, selecting the optimal ones, taking into account the requirements for the animation clip and the requirements for ensuring maximum performance, and energy saving of the device, parameters for the rasterization algorithm by extracting and defining the characteristics of the graphic terminal, rasterization of a looped animation clip by the rasterization algorithm, displaying a looped animation clip on the graphical user interface.EFFECT: invention is aimed at providing possibility of displaying an animation clip as a shortcut for launching applications or other functionality on the screen of the user device, while providing improved power saving for the user device.1 cl, 2 dwg

Description

The invention relates to the field of informatics, in particular to means for displaying shortcuts of applications and / or functions on mobile devices and other information systems for various purposes when launching applications and / or certain functionality on the screen of a mobile device or other information system of the user.

The technical result consists in reducing the launch speed of the application and / or other device functionality by displaying the application launch shortcut and / or other functionality without using additional text or other information encoding, while providing improved energy saving for the user's device.

The method includes matching the main function of the application / functionality and a specially formed looped animation image that is displayed on the device screen instead of the standard application launch icon.

The present invention can find application in the creation and operation of information systems for various purposes, both mobile (wearable) terminals, and including complex control consoles for automobile, aviation, marine and other equipment, in which there is a need for the user to select and launch any function or launch any application from the list of applications, including those with functionality unfamiliar to the user (used for the first time) and there is no possibility, or the scenario of use does not imply, to use detailed annotations for each launch shortcut and / or the task is to ensure maximum energy saving for the device.

The present invention is based on the task of creating such a method for launching applications / functionality that would have the following properties:

• Unambiguous comparison of the main function of the required application / functionality and its launch shortcut

• Comprehensibility of the main function of the functional, regardless of the user's native language or cultural affiliation

• Understandability of the launch shortcut regardless of the age of the user

• No need to use text for the launch shortcut

• The speed of perception of the main function by any person

• Ability to simultaneously display a large number of shortcuts on one screen

• Minimal load on the central and graphic processor of the device

• Ability to use this display algorithm on the widest possible range of mobile terminals and control consoles

FIELD OF TECHNOLOGY

The invention relates to the field of informatics, in particular to means for displaying shortcuts for launching applications and / or certain functionality on the device screen and providing energy saving when displaying a graphical user interface.

LEVEL OF TECHNOLOGY

Currently, with the development and complication of technology, the standard interface for user interaction with a complex device is a graphical interface. Elements are displayed on the device screen - shortcuts for each function of the device and / or for launching applications installed on the device. The user interacts with the shortcuts by clicking or double-clicking on them, calling the corresponding function or launching the application.

Typically, each shortcut is a combination of a still image and text that explains the function being launched or contains the name of the application.

Modern devices can contain dozens or even hundreds of functions / applications, so it is obvious that this way of displaying is irrational from the point of view of the density of launch shortcuts and from the point of view of quick perception of information.

It is very difficult to concisely and accurately name a function / application, so that the user can understand the functionality without launching a shortcut. In addition, a localization problem arises, since the names of functions / applications must be translated into the user's native language and it is necessary to provide the user with the opportunity to select the language before the user begins to interact with the device.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

The interface construction system described below in the description of the invention, as well as the developed energy saving methods, provide a basis for defining, creating and executing a graphical user interface of devices for launching functions and / or applications.

The present invention describes technologies for constructing

user interface for calling functions and / or applications, implementations are described, according to which it is possible to achieve a significant

power saving for portable devices when building an interface. In addition, technologies are described that can be used to select the animation mode of the shortcut depending on the characteristics and current state of the device on which the interface is displayed.

From the prior art known "Method and device for displaying an icon", patent for invention RU No. 2611988, priority from 04.24.2013, date of state registration from 01.03.2017. The method includes tracking an event that is executed on the icon and manipulating the displayed icon; if the event that controls the displayed icon is tracked, determining the animation display parameters in accordance with the properties of the icon; and controlling the displayed icon to animate it in accordance with the animation display parameters.

Known solution "Content-based depictions of computer icons", US patent for invention US No. US5479602A, date of state registration 12/26/1995. The solution is to generate an icon image when predefined events occur, such as closing a document or file associated with the icon. This image can be created in the form of a bitmap or full size image. An image is created by dividing a view into several equal segments, measuring the percentage of different colors (black-white, gray, or color) in each segment, and assigning one color value to each display item or pixel in the item.

Also known ANIMATED WORK TABLE, patent for invention RU No. 2463661, priority date 03.01.2007, publication date 10.10.2012. The technical result is to increase interactivity and visual quality while reducing the complexity of processing an animated desktop. An animated desktop including a moving image may be presented on a display screen of a processing device. Foreground elements can appear on the surface of an animated desktop.

A significant disadvantage of these solutions is that they use the automatic creation of icon images, which does not allow for the meaningfulness of animated images. The known solutions are primarily aimed at creating launch icons for documents and other system objects, while the proposed solution is primarily aimed at launching applications and device functions.

Another equally important disadvantage is that these solutions do not pay due attention to the energy efficiency and performance of the proposed approaches, which sharply limits the applicability of these solutions.

The problems of the invention are solved and the disadvantages of the prototypes are eliminated in the method of displaying a shortcut for launching applications or other functionality on the screen of an information system for various purposes, implemented according to the present invention, characterized in that it includes the following steps:

- preparation of a looped animated video for each application or device functionality;

- setting the correspondence between the video and the application or device functionality;

- displaying a looped animation clip on the graphical user interface.

This method differs in that before displaying a looped animation clip, it is rasterized, and for rasterization, an analysis is performed by extracting parameters such as the size of the animation clip, the number of frames in the video and the animation speed for the rasterization algorithm, the characteristics of the graphics terminal of the device are determined for the rasterization algorithm. such as: the screen resolution of the graphic terminal in pixels, the screen density - the resolution in pixels per inch, the maximum number of launch shortcuts on the graphic user interface vertically and horizontally, the refresh rate of the graphic terminal screen. The input parameters for the animation rasterization algorithm are selected taking into account the requirements for the animation and the requirements for ensuring maximum performance and energy saving of the device, if this is relevant for this device.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF DRAWINGS

A detailed disclosure of the invention is presented with reference to the accompanying images. The use of the same reference numbers in different places in the description of the invention and in different drawings may indicate similar or identical elements.

Fig. 1 (figure 1) - General scheme of the invention

Fig. 2 (Fig. 2) - Algorithm for rasterization of a vector animation clip

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

In order to understand the objects, technical solutions and advantages of the present invention more clearly, embodiments of the present invention will be described in detail below with reference to the drawings.

The general scheme of the invention is shown in Fig. one.

The invention operates on a user's device 101. The device can be a mobile (wearable) user terminal equipped with a screen or a stationary terminal for controlling devices, application launch mechanisms, or another terminal that has a graphical interface for interacting with the user.

The invention operates in the environment of the Operating System 102, which can be any operating system having a graphical interface 103 for interacting with a user. Such operating systems include systems of the class Android, iOs, Windows, Linux.

The graphical user interface 103 in modern operating systems 102 is most often a graphical field that depicts elements 104 with which the user interacts in one way or another (by means of a cursor, touch panel, or otherwise). Elements 104 with which the user interacts can be graphic, text, or graphic-text images.

When developing the present invention, the goal was to create such a method for launching applications / functionality (user interface) so that the following tasks were solved:

• Unambiguous comparison of the main function of the required application / functionality and its launch shortcut

• Comprehensibility of the main function of the application / functionality, regardless of the user's native language or cultural affiliation

• Comprehensibility of the application launch shortcut regardless of the user's age

• No need to use text for the launch shortcut

• The speed of perception of the main function by any person

• Ability to simultaneously display a large number of shortcuts on one screen of the device

• Minimal load on the CPU and GPU of the device to ensure power saving of the device

• Ability to use this method on the widest possible range of mobile terminals and control consoles

As a solution to the problems described above, the following solution was developed - a method of displaying a shortcut for launching applications or other functionality on the screen of an information system for various purposes - for effective interaction of the operating system with a user, abandon all text labels on launch shortcuts and replace graphic images (icons) with special looped animations, each of which most accurately reflects the functionality of the function or application being launched.

Animations mapped to a launch shortcut are created by the graphic designer for each function and for each application separately. When creating an animation video, you must be guided by the following construction principles:

• Animation video must be created in the form of vector animation for the same scaling on different devices of users

• The duration of the animation of the video should not exceed 3 seconds

• The video should be as clear and understandable as possible for each user, regardless of cultural and racial background, reflect the essence of the corresponding functionality or application

• The first and last frames of the clip must be the same; the roller must be looped back.

The requirement to create an animation clip in vector format is due to the need to operate the used algorithm on the largest possible number of terminals of different sizes and characteristics. However, if you directly draw this vector animation in the graphical user interface, then with a large number of launch shortcuts, this will cause an excessive load on the graphics and central processor. Therefore, an integral part of this invention is a mechanism for preparing animation for display in a graphical user interface - rasterization.

Rasterization is an algorithm for preparing a vector animation clip for display in a graphical interface, due to which the smoothness, speed, interactivity and energy saving of the presented invention are ensured.

The algorithm itself is shown in Fig. 2, below each step of this algorithm will be considered in more detail. The rasterization algorithm itself can be launched both at the start of the graphical interface, and in the background, to speed up the "cold start" of the operating system of the device.

The algorithm itself runs the same for each launch shortcut. Since the algorithm is independent, it is permissible to execute the algorithm both sequentially and in parallel for all labels.

At the beginning of the algorithm, a vector animation clip is loaded, it is parsed and analyzed (step 1). The following parameters are retrieved for the video:

• The size occupied by the animation clip

• Number of frames in the video

• Animation speed

The next, most important, step of the algorithm (step 2) is to determine the parameters of the graphical terminal, which displays the graphical user interface and shows an animation clip. The parameters are defined by calling the system procedures of the operating system. The following parameters are collected and stored:

• Screen resolution of the graphical terminal in pixels

• Screen density - resolution, in pixels per inch

• Maximum number of launch shortcuts per GUI vertically and horizontally

• Refresh rate of the graphic terminal screen

The next step in the algorithm determines the physical parameters

devices 101 required to provide power saving algorithms (step 3). The algorithm, by calling the system procedures of the operating system, determines the type of terminal: mobile (portable) or stationary terminal. If the device is powered by batteries, then their residual charge is determined. It also determines the type and performance of the device's CPU.

Based on the parameters collected in the previous three steps, the fourth step of the algorithm determines the input parameters for the animation rasterization algorithm. These parameters are selected primarily taking into account the provision of maximum performance and energy saving of the device, if this is relevant for this device.

At the fifth step of the algorithm, the animation is directly rasterized - i.e. translation of animation from vector to raster - binary format. The following parameters are received at the input of this step:

• The size in pixels that the animation should have

• The number of frames per second that the movie should have

Vector video is rasterized by

sequential calculation of the required frame offset from the beginning of the video, virtual rendering of this frame on the canvas and saving the resulting frame into a separate sequence of frames.

As a result of the rasterization algorithm, an array of raster frames is obtained that are most optimally formed for a given device and graphic term. Subsequent animation is performed by sequentially copying raster frames from the generated array to the screen, synchronized with the screen refresh rate.

Claims (11)

A method of displaying a shortcut for launching applications or other functionality on the screen of an information system for various purposes, characterized in that it includes the following steps: preparation of a looped animated video for each application or device functionality; setting the correspondence between the video and the application or device functionality; extracting parameters necessary for the rasterization algorithm from a looped animation clip, such as the size of the animation clip, the number of frames in the clip and the animation speed; selection of the optimal parameters for the rasterization algorithm, taking into account the requirements for the animation clip and the requirements for ensuring maximum performance and energy saving of the device, by extracting and determining the characteristics of the graphic terminal of the device, such as the screen resolution of the graphical terminal in pixels; screen density - resolution in pixels per inch; the maximum number of launch shortcuts on the GUI vertically and horizontally; the refresh rate of the display of the graphic terminal; rasterization of a looped animation clip by the rasterization algorithm, using the parameters obtained in the previous stages; displaying a looped animation clip on a graphical user interface.

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