Patent Application
20110107223
A portion of the disclosure of this patent document contains material which is subject to copyright protection. The copyright owner has no objection to the facsimile reproduction by anyone of the patent document or the patent disclosure, as it appears in the Patent and Trademark Office patent file or records, but otherwise reserves all copyright rights whatsoever. Copyright Apple Computer, Inc., 2002.
The present invention relates to methods, such as user interfaces, for presenting presentations and more particularly, relates to presenting slide presentations.
Slide presentation programs are computer programs that enable a user to create, edit, manage, and perform “presentations” on a computer. One example of a popular slide presentation program is Microsoft PowerPoint, available from Microsoft Corporation, of Redmond, Wash. A slide presentation includes a set of electronic “slides,” each slide corresponding to one screen or page of output. An electronic slide may also be converted to a 35-mm slide or overhead transparency and displayed in a standard slide projector or overhead projector. Each slide contains one or more objects, such as text, graphical images, or graphical animation. A slide may also include a sound object that is played when the slide is displayed during a “slide show” performance.
A slide presentation program “performs” a “slide show” by sequentially displaying a series of slides contained within the slide presentation. The slides are displayed on a display screen, which may be part of a computer monitor or a separate surface onto which an image is projected. During a performance of a slide show, a speaker controls the performance by invoking commands to advance the slide show. A command can be entered using a keyboard, a mouse, or other suitable input device. Alternatively, an author of a slide presentation can include slide “timings” with each slide. A slide timing corresponding to a slide indicates the number of seconds that the slide is displayed before the slide presentation program automatically advances to the next slide. During a performance of a slide show, the slide presentation program automatically advances to the next slide when the existing slide's timing ends.
A slide can include one or more display objects that are incrementally displayed during a slide show. For example, a slide may initially appear with one bullet item. Sequential advancement of the slide show causes additional bullet items to be displayed. Display objects, such as bullet items, that are incrementally displayed are referred to as “builds.” However, conventional slide presentation programs typically present slides through a “next” button such that a new slide replaces an old slide without a transition between the new and old slides. It is desirable to be able to present a presentation through an object having a transition to phase in the new slide and phase out the old slide.
The present invention relates to various aspects for presenting presentations via a three-dimensional (3-D) manner. In one aspect of the invention, an exemplary method of the invention displays a first presentation page in a display area of a data processing system. Next, a second presentation page angles into the display area as the first presentation page angles out and turns off from the display area through a 3-D object, as though they are sides of a revolving 3-D object. In one particular embodiment, the 3-D object is a 3-D cube, a flipping panel, or tiles shimmering or flipping across the display area. In a further embodiment, the revolving 3-D object may occupy an area larger than the original display area during the transition.
The present invention also discloses machine readable media which may be executed by a processor to perform the above methods. Other features of the present invention will be apparent from the accompanying drawings and from the detailed description which follows.
The present invention is illustrated by way of example and not limitation in the figures of the accompanying drawings in which like references indicate similar elements.
In the following description, numerous details are set forth to provide a more thorough explanation of the present invention. It will be apparent, however, to one skilled in the art, that the present invention may be practiced without these specific details. In other instances, well-known structures and devices are shown in block diagram form, rather than in detail, in order to avoid obscuring the present invention.
Some portions of the detailed descriptions which follow are presented in terms of algorithms and symbolic representations of operations on data bits within a computer memory. These algorithmic descriptions and representations are used by those skilled in the data processing arts to most effectively convey the substance of their work to others skilled in the art. An algorithm is generally conceived to be a self-consistent sequence of operations leading to a desired result. The operations are those requiring physical manipulations of physical quantities. Usually, though not necessarily, these quantities take the form of electrical or magnetic signals capable of being stored, transferred, combined, compared, and otherwise manipulated. It has proven convenient at times, principally for reasons of common usage, to refer to these signals as bits, values, elements, symbols, characters, terms, numbers, or the like.
It should be borne in mind, however, that all of these terms and similar terms are to be associated with the appropriate physical quantities and are merely convenient labels applied to these quantities. Unless specifically stated otherwise as apparent from the following discussion, it is appreciated that throughout the description, discussions utilizing terms such as “processing” or “computing” or “calculating” or “determining” or “displaying” or the like, refer to the action and processes of a computer system, or similar data processing device, that manipulates and transforms data represented as physical (e.g. electronic) quantities within the computer system's registers and memories into other data similarly represented as physical quantities within the computer system memories or registers or other such information storage, transmission or display devices.
The present invention also relates to apparatuses for performing the operations described herein. An apparatus may be specially constructed for required purposes, or it may comprise a general purpose computer selectively activated or reconfigured by a computer program stored in the computer. Such a computer program may be stored in a computer readable storage medium, such as, but is not limited to, any type of disk including floppy disks, optical disks, CD-ROMs, and magnetic-optical disks, read-only memories (ROMs), random access memories (RAMs) such as Dynamic RAM (DRAM), EPROMs, EEPROMs, magnetic or optical cards, or any type of media suitable for storing electronic instructions, and each of the above storage components is coupled to a computer system bus.
The algorithms and displays presented herein are not inherently related to any particular computer or other apparatus. Various general purpose systems may be used with programs in accordance with the teachings herein, or it may prove convenient to construct a more specialized apparatus to perform the methods. The structure for a variety of these systems will appear in the description below. In addition, the present invention is not described with reference to any particular programming language. It will be appreciated that a variety of programming languages may be used to implement the teachings of the invention as described herein.
A machine-readable medium includes any mechanism for storing or transmitting information in a form readable by a machine (e.g., a computer). For example, a machine-readable medium includes read only memory (“ROM”); random access memory (“RAM”); magnetic disk storage media; optical storage media; flash memory devices; electrical, optical, acoustical or other forms of propagated signals (e.g., carrier waves, infrared signals, digital signals, etc.).
Embodiments of the invention allow a user to create a presentation, such as a slide presentation, in a three-dimensional (3-D) manner on a data processing system. In one embodiment, a presentation page is attached to a surface of a 3-D object and the presentation page is presented by rotating or flipping the 3-D object to phase the presentation page into a display area. Meanwhile, an existing presentation page may be phased out of the display area on another surface of the 3-D object through the rotation.
Slide organizer 102 allows a user to organize slides in the presentation. The slide organizer 102 allows a user to “indent” the slides such that more than one slide may be grouped together. In one embodiment, some slides may be hidden when the user does not want them to appear in the slideshow. In one embodiment, the slide organizer 102 has two views: navigator view, which is useful for graphic intensive presentations, as shown in
Notes field 103 is an area in which a user can type or view notes for each slide. These notes are not visible in the slide show presentation but can be viewed on an alternative display or printed as a talking aid to use during the slideshow presentation. In addition, the exemplary GUI 100 includes a tool bar 104 to provide one-click access to actions that a user would use when creating presentations. One or more buttons may be added to or removed from the tool bar 104. In one embodiment, among other things, the tool bar 104 includes buttons 105 to select a theme to create a master slide. Furthermore, the exemplary GUI 100 further includes one or more inspectors, such as a build inspector 107 and a table inspector 108, to control the appearance of each slide.
According to one embodiment, when a slide presentation is created, a master document is created. The entire slideshow, including all of the graphics and any chart data, are contained within the master document, which can be easily moved from one computer to another. If a user adds movies or sound to the document, the user may choose to save them as a part of the master document. Once the presentation is finished, the presentation can be viewed in several ways. In one embodiment, a user can watch the presentation on a computer. Alternatively, the presentation can be viewed by projecting it from a computer to a screen, printing it, or exporting it to other applications, such as QuickTime available from Apple Computer, Inc., PowerPoint available from Microsoft Corporation, or a PDF format defined by Adobe System Incorporated. As a result, the presentation can be viewed on other computer platforms. Furthermore, the presentation may be viewed or played remotely over a network via a video conferencing program. The network may be an Internet or, alternatively, an Intranet within an organization.
When a user starts to create a presentation, the user may select a theme for the presentation. By using a theme, a presentation may be created with a cohesive look and feel with little or no design work for the user.
When a theme is selected, a slide 210 appears in the slide organizer 203. A user can begin working in slide 210 as a first slide, adding text, graphics, and sound. More slides may be added to the project. Each theme may include a family of master slides. Each master slide may have a different layout for title and body text, as well as blank areas for graphics. A slide inspector 202 associated with a master slide (e.g., slide 210) may be displayed and used to control the appearance of the master slide. In one embodiment, each slide shown in the slide organizer 203 is associated with a corresponding slide inspector, such as slide inspector 202.
In one embodiment, among other components, slide inspector 202 includes a field, such as a pull-down menu 206, to set a background of the slide. For example, a user may choose to have the background filled with a color or colors. Alternatively, a user may insert an image specified by the user as the background of any individual slide. A preview of the background of the slide may be shown as a thumbnail in a field 207.
In one embodiment, the slide inspector 202 includes a transition field 204 to allow a user to specify a transition of a slide when it is presented. In another embodiment, the transitions of a slide include a 3-D cube that allows a new slide to phase into a display area on one surface of the 3-D cube while an existing slide is phasing out from the display area on another surface of the 3-D cube. As a result, an old slide angles and turns off the screen (e.g., the display area) as a new slide angles on the screen, as though they are sides of a revolving cube. In an alternative embodiment, the slides may be construed as a 3-D panel, such that a new slide is phased into the display area by flipping the panel to show the other side of the panel which contains the new slide. As a result, an old slide angles and turns off the screen as a new slide angles on screen, as though they are two sides of a revolving coin. In a further embodiment, new slides are built on square tiles that shimmer across the display area. In yet another embodiment, a new slide may move in from one direction to cover the contents of the previous slide. In a yet further embodiment, a new slide draws in a sweep from one direction, as the previous slide is erased from the same direction. In yet a further embodiment, a new slide grows from the center of the previous slide outward to fill the display area. Alternatively, a previous slide may shrink away to the center of the display area and reveal the next slide. Other transitions apparent to those with ordinary skill in the art may be utilized.
In addition, the slide inspector 202 includes a direction field 205 to specify a direction of a transition selected from the transition field 204. Furthermore, the slide inspector 202 includes a speed field 209 to control the speed of the transition specified in the transition field 204. A user may drag the slider to adjust the speed of the transition. A preview of the slide may be presented as a thumbnail in field 208.
Referring now to
According to one embodiment, to add visual interest to the slide presentations, a user can create objects builds on each slide. Object builds allow a user to animate the elements on a single slide one at a time or in groups in any order. For example, a user might have an image move in from a left side of the screen and then, line by line, display the bulleted text that goes alongside it. Object builds can be configured through a build inspector 230. Object builds include a build-in animation 232 to move slide elements on the screen and a build-out animation 233 to move elements off screen. A preview of the slide presentation can be viewed as a thumbnail in a preview area 231. Each of the build-in and build-out animation allows a user to select an animation from the build style pop-up menu 234. A user may select graphic objects, bulleted text, labels, or other text objects, and sound objects from the build style menu 234. A user may also choose the direction from which the object is moved onto the slide from the direction pop-up menu 235. The speed of the animation may be adjusted through the speed slider. Once a user has selected a build style for each of the items on the slide that the user wants to animate, those items may be assigned to an order using the order pop-up menu 237. Some of those items may be delivered in a manner (e.g., by column or by row) configured by delivery pop-up menu 238. When a slide is played, the objects will move onto the screen in the order set up by the build inspector. Similarly, build-out animation can be configured by a corresponding tab 233.
As discussed above, according to one embodiment, the transitions of a slide include a 3-D cube that allows a new slide to phase into a display area on one surface of the 3-D cube while an existing slide is phasing out from the display area on another surface of the 3-D cube. As a result, an old slide angles and turns off the screen (e.g., the display area) as a new slide angles on the screen, as though they are sides of a revolving cube, as shown in
In an alternative embodiment, the slides may be construed as a 3-D panel, such that a new slide is phased into the display area by flipping the panel to show the other side of the panel which contains the new slide. As a result, an old slide angles and turns off screen as a new slide angles on screen, as though they are two sides of a revolving coin, as shown in
In a further embodiment, new slides are built on a plurality of tiles that shimmer or flip across the display area, as shown in
Referring to
Note that while
As shown in
In one embodiment, the display device 708 may include an OpenGL compliant accelerated graphic adapter. The presentation program which employs the above user interfaces may communicate with the graphic accelerator through an OpenGL API (application programming interface) to further improve the transition between a new presentation page and an old presentation page.
Although the above GUIs are described with a 3-D object, it would be appreciated that other objects, such as two-dimensional (2-D) objects, may be utilized. For example, according to one embodiment, a new slide may move in from one direction to cover the contents of the previous slide, as shown in
In the foregoing specification, the invention has been described with reference to specific exemplary embodiments thereof. It will be evident that various modifications may be made thereto without departing from the broader spirit and scope of the invention as set forth in the following claims. The specification and drawings are, accordingly, to be regarded in an illustrative sense rather than a restrictive sense.
This application is a continuation of co-pending U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10/337,767, filed Jan. 6, 2003, entitled “User Interface for Presenting Presentations” and assigned to a common assignee of the present application
| Number | Date | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Parent | 10337767 | Jan 2003 | US |
| Child | 12987986 | US |
