Abstract: A facility for exchanging context attributes is described. A characterization module receives an invocation request to provide an attribute value that was generated by a requesting attribute consumer. The received invocation request identifies the attribute whose value is to be provided. In response to receiving the invocation request, the characterization module provides a value for the identified attribute to the requesting attribute consumer.

Abstract: A method for providing help services in a graphical user interface-based computer application includes providing a first display portion and a second display portion. The first display portion provides standard application services and the second display portion provides dedicated help services based on the standard application services provided in the first display portion. The method also includes determining a user interaction via the first display portion, and, based on the user interaction, providing a standard application service associated with the computer application in the first display portion. Furthermore, the method includes providing dedicated help services in the second display portion based on the standard application service provided in the first display portion.

Abstract: A digital content distribution system that is suitable for outputting digital content in a layout that is easy to view for a user is provided. The system can include a content distribution terminal that creates digital content by determining an output layout for the digital content, based on other-user-unique information and other-user-designated information in a user information record database, and distributes the created digital content based on a distribution address for the user information used for the creation.

Abstract: Techniques are disclosed for improving navigation through content in a user interface that has been rendered in a content aggregation framework (such as in a portal page provided by a portal system). The navigation order for the aggregated content is set dynamically, using programmatic operations, based on input supplied in a markup language document. The navigation order may therefore be efficiently controlled, even though the content which is aggregated may originate from multiple independent sources.

Abstract: A system and method are disclosed whereby the normal mechanism for color inheritance for the Swing application program interface (API) is altered to provide consistency with legacy Java applications in which the graphical user interface (GUI) is based on the abstract windowing toolkit (AWT) in legacy applications. According to the system and method disclosed herein, if the background color of a GUI object (such as a button) is explicitly declared, the object will be displayed with that color. Otherwise, the object inherits the background color defined by global settings in the Swing API. If no such settings are in effect, the object inherits the background color of its parent (as is the case in legacy AWT-based applications). This modification is available in an extension to Swing, referred to herein as AWTSwing.

Abstract: In a cursor-based computing environment having a display, a user definable interface (UDI) is displayed upon activation by a user. The UDI has a plurality of levels each having a plurality of buttons and is displayed in a selectable position about a pointer position in a display area to reduce pointer commute. The user selects a visual appearance and shape of the UDI, and the number of buttons. The user assigns a command to each of the plurality of buttons at each of the plurality of levels by dragging and dropping from one or more applications of the apparatus.

Abstract: A schedule management system in a managing party connects via a network to one or more managed parties. The system comprises a schedule table for storing a schedule created by the managing party. The created schedule is transferred to a common schedule table provided on a server. The server is provided outside the managing party. The system provides each of the managed parties with an inquiry means for inquiring the schedule stored in the common schedule table. When the schedule stored in the schedule table is modified for some reasons, the modified schedule is transferred to the common schedule table. Thus, the managed party can view the latest schedule. Furthermore, each of the managed parties transfers modification data via the modification means. The system modifies the schedule stored in the schedule table with the received modification data. The system further displays the progress in a hierarchical format.

Abstract: Image browsing through memory-stored items, such as a library of images or desktop windows, is efficiently performed by arranging images in partially overlapping fashion and generating a second-level image for each overlapped image that is contacted by a user-manipulated cursor. The second-level image is a “transitory” image, since it is removed as soon as the cursor is displaced from the corresponding first-level image. Thus, by placing the first-level images in a diagonally extending stack, straight line movement of the cursor will initiate a sequential presentation of transitory images for the images in the stack. In one embodiment, the display also includes an incrementing icon and a decrementing icon that are employed to provide substitute stacks. Moreover, a third-level image is formed in a separate window when the user selects one of the images from the stack. This third-level image has more permanency, since it remains in the display window after the stack has been substituted.

Abstract: A new class of avatars (“organizational avatars”) created in accordance with the present invention holds a value or a significance independent from their use in a virtual environment, unlike the generic avatars whose value is limited to their being used in a chatroom. For example, an organizational avatar may be in the image of a trademark (which may be copyrighted), such as Mickey Mouse, Colonel Sanders, or Pikachu (a Pokemon character). The organizational avatars may represent certain organizations, typically the organizations that own trademark and/or copyright rights to the images used to form the avatars in virtual environments. Therefore, users of virtual environments can interface various companies by interacting with organizational avatars. Alternatively, organizational avatars may represent users independent of the organization, but under a contract with the organization that owns the image the avatars depict.

Abstract: A system and method for navigating between hyperlinks and frames on a Web page within a Web browser in a client system in communication with one or more server systems. A plurality of hyperlinks and frames are displayed on a display of a user device via the Web browser, with each hyperlink and frame representing information about their location stored in one of the server systems. A user input entered from a remote input device is received by the client system. Based on the user input, a determination is made of which one of the hyperlinks or frames is to be marked as the active frame or link, and that hyperlink or frame is then marked. An indicator is then displayed on the display device indicating to the user that the selected hyperlink or frame has been made active.

Abstract: A scrollable selection highlighter for viewing and selecting an element in a list of elements on a data processing device display. A selection highlighter may be stationary near the middle of the display while the list of elements moves in response to user input if the first and last elements in the list are not at the top or bottom positions of the display. If the first element in the list is at the top of the display, the selection highlighter may move above the middle position while the list of elements remains stationary. If the last element in the list is at the bottom of the display, the selection highlighter may move below the middle position while the list of elements remains stationary.

Abstract: A user interface for managing connections across multiple cross connects of a communication network. The user interface provides for creating, viewing and removing connections in the cross connect. The user interface displays the relative position of cross connects along the communication network. Time slots for communicating ports are adjacently displayed so that mis-configured connections may be easily recognized.

Abstract: A system, method and computer program in which a user by selecting a single keystroke may automatically place the cursor in a desired field on an active screen or execute another function or screen. This system, method and computer program utilizes a keystroke database in which keystrokes are associated with active screens and either fields on those active screens or functions that may be executed. Any given keystroke may have a different function or field location associated with it depending upon the screen that is currently active.

Abstract: A node-link structure is displayed within a display area, having a narrow rectangular shape with an edge along one side acting as a horizon of a hyperbolic space half-plane. Lower level node features that share a parent node feature have centers of area positioned on the display in order along a line parallel with the horizon, with sufficiently similar spacings along an axis perpendicular to the horizon from the region around a parent node feature, and with sufficiently similar spacings in a dimension parallel to the horizon from adjacent node features along the line, that the lower level node features sharing the parent node feature are perceptible as a group of related node features. The half-plane model with compression is used for layout of the node-link data, and the hyperbolic layout data is mapped to a Euclidean space for display.

Abstract: An information processing apparatus includes a tuner receiving a signal according to a received broadcast, a first processing part performing a desired processing on the signal supplied from the tuner, converting the signal into a first signal of a given format, and outputting the first signal, a second processing part converting the signal supplied from the tuner into a second signal of the given format and outputting the second signal, and an output part selectively outputting one of the first and second signals. The first and second processing parts are startable independently of each other.

Abstract: A method, system and program product for determining differences between an existing graphical user interface (GUI) mapping file and a current GUI is provided. Specifically, under the present invention, a first list of objects based on an existing GUI mapping file (i.e., pertaining to a previous version of a software program) is recursively generated. A second list of objects based on a current GUI (i.e., pertaining to a current version of a software program) is also recursively generated. The two lists are then compared to determine if any GUI objects have been changed (added or removed) between the previous and current versions of the software program.

Abstract: A method of dialing is disclosed which attempts to “guess” as to which number the user is attempting to dial into a communication device, such as a cellular telephone. From the idle mode (200), the user punches the digits of the number (201), and a list of possible candidate numbers is created (203), (204), or (205). This list of candidate numbers is displayed to the user as candidates are added to the list (206), or not displayed if there were no acceptable candidate numbers (207). If one of the candidate numbers is one of the numbers displayed, the user can select the number in order to have that number dialed. Otherwise, if the number cannot be predicted before completion of entering the number, then the number is entered into the outgoing call log for possible suggestion later if the user dials the number again.

Abstract: An image processing apparatus is constructed by: a receiving unit for receiving scene data describing a 3-dimensional scene, media data associated with the scene data, and copyright-protected data; a scene decoder for forming copyright-protected scene data and copyright-unprotected scene data from the scene data on the basis of the copyright-protected data; and a renderer for rendering the 3-dimensional scene on the basis of the media data, the copyright-protected scene data, and the copyright-unprotected scene data.

Abstract: The display device for tomographic image has a display, a hard disk, a mechanical slide-bar for setting a display speed for series of tomographic images and a controller. This device is used for displaying tomographic images in the manner of paging on the display for the series based on a speed set by the mechanical slide-bar.

Abstract: An alternate display content controller provides a technique for controlling a video display separately from and in addition to the content displayed on the operating system display surface. Where the display is a computer monitor, the alternate display content controller interacts with the computer utility operating system and hardware drivers to control allocation of display space and create and control one or more parallel graphical user interfaces in addition to the operating system desktop. An alternate display content controller may be incorporated in either hardware or software. As software, an alternate display content controller may be an application running on the computer operating system, or may include an operating system kernel of varying complexity ranging from dependent on the utility operating system for hardware system services to a parallel system independent of the utility operating system and capable of supporting dedicated applications.