Abstract: A system and method for copying formatting information between group editable Web pages is provided. The system includes a web server and devices, such as computers, which can communicate via a network. Users at the computers can access one or more of the Web pages and request that the accessed page's formatting information be copied over to one or more specified target Web pages. The Web server is configured to extract a first set of formatting information, such as HTML formatting templates, from a source web page displayed on one or more computers in the network. Further, the Web server replaces a corresponding second set of formatting information in the target Web page(s) with the first set of extracted formatting information.

Abstract: A computerized two-dimensional illustration system composes an image of a scene with layered synthetic graphics filters or lenses. The scene is defined by an ordered list of shapes. Some of the shapes in the ordered list of shapes are lenses. Each lens is a shape that has a fill color which is an operator rather than a constant. The operator of a selected lens performs a filtering function on the shapes ordered below it in the list of shapes. To compose a selected lens in the scene, the system first computes an under-list of shapes for the selected lens. The under-list of shapes is used to identify those shapes in the ordered list of shapes to which the filtering function of the selected lens may apply. Depending on the filtering function of a lens, the lens composes in either a back-to-front order or a front-to-back order. A lens composes in a back-to-front order by freezing lenses in the under-list before applying the filtering function of the lens to shapes in the under-list.

Abstract: A computerized two-dimensional illustration system composes an image of a scene with layered synthetic graphics filters or lenses. The scene is defined by an ordered list of shapes. Some of the shapes in the ordered list of shapes are lenses. Each lens is a shape that has a fill color which is an operator rather than a constant. The operator of a selected lens performs a filtering function on the shapes ordered below it in the list of shapes. To compose a selected lens in the scene, the system computes an under-list of shapes for the selected lens. The under-list of shapes identifies shapes in the ordered list of shapes to which the filtering function of the selected lens may apply. After computing the under-list for a selected lens, the system freezes the shapes in the under-list and applies the filtering function of the selected lens to the shapes in the under-list. When a lens is frozen, it is replaced with a list of shapes that are formed independently of other shapes in the list of shapes.

Abstract: A software architecture is provided for allowing users to impart various types of button behavior to ordinary human interpretable elements of electronic documents by associating hidden persistent character string button attributes to such elements. This architecture permits such buttons to be edited and searched through the use of the edit and search routines that are ordinarily provided by standard document editors.

Abstract: A method of operating a processor control machine, and a machine having a processor for producing human perceptible output related to an image display feature presented in an original image using the model data structure (the model) from which the original image was produced. In response to the display of an output producing region displayed coextensively with the first image segment including a display feature representing a data item in the model, a human perceptible output is produced using the data item. This is done at the same time as the first image is being displayed, giving the perception to a machine user of providing information related to the display feature in the first segment. The human perceptible output is a second image displayed by the output producing region, called a viewing operation region, or VOR. The VOR consists of one or more explicit input regions and one or more explicit output regions, spatially separated from the one or more input regions.

Abstract: A user interface technique operates in the environment of a processor-controlled machine for executing a program that operates on a set of underlying data and displays a visible representation thereof. The user simultaneously and independently moves the tools with one hand, normally the non-dominant hand (e.g., a right-handed user's left hand) and operates on the visible representation with the other, normally the dominant hand. In a specific implementation, the input devices include a trackball for positioning the tools and a mouse for positioning a cursor and initiating actions.

Abstract: A user-directed method for operating a processor-controlled machine permits a user to operate on an object-based model data structure from which a first image has been produced in order to produce a second image for display in the spatial context of the first image, and then to interact with objects in the displayed second image. The method is cooperates as cooperating with the functionality of an application program, such as a graphical object editor. The user requests the display of a viewing operation region (VOR) coextensively with a first image segment of the first displayed image. In response to the user's request signal, a viewing operation associated with the VOR operates on the object-based model data structure that produced the first image to produce an output model data structure from which is produced a second view, or image, of the portion of the first image coextensively positioned with the VOR, displaying the second view in the VOR.

Abstract: A user interface technique operates in the environment of a processor-controlled machine for executing a program that operates on a set of underlying data and displays a visible representation thereof. The system further provides a visual depiction of a set of tools. The tools include click-through tools that can be combined with other tools (including other click-through tools) to provide composite tools. A click-through tool includes a generally transparent delineated active area that is movable so that it can be placed over a desired portion of the visible representation. When the user interacts with the visible representation through the active area, the action takes on an attribute of the particular click-through tool. A click-through tool can be superimposed on another click-through tool, whereupon an action taken through the two click-through tools onto the visible representation takes on attributes of both tools.

Abstract: A user interface technique operates in the environment of a processor-controlled machine for executing a program that operates on a set of underlying data and displays a visible representation thereof. The system generates a visual depiction of a movable sheet having a number of delineated regions (active areas), responds to a first set of signals for positioning the sheet relative to the visible representation, responds to a second set of signals characterized by position information (typically cursor position) relative to the sheet and the visible representation, and generates a third set of signals to the program. The third set of signals depends on the relative position of the sheet and the visible representation and on the position information that characterizes the second set of input signals. The delineated regions may be thought of and referred to as click-through tools.

Abstract: A multi-user multi-device system enables a plurality of users to control a single screen. Each user has one or more input devices, which can be used to control one or more stored applications. At any time, the system produces a consistent view of all applications on the single screen. The input from each user produces a response customized to the preferences of that user. Each user can inform the system of which devices that user is using. Inputs to the system initiate the building of Event Records that are queued and then directed to specific applications. The screen is updated, and the coordinates of child applications are determined, only during pauses in the operations of all applications.

Abstract: A method is disclosed for operating a processor-controlled machine to produce a composite view of an original, or first, image by combining the functions of multiple viewing operations and using the model data structure from which the first image was produced (called the "FIMDS".) A first viewing operation region (1VOR) in a first viewing position in the display area of the display device has displayed in the 1VOR a second image produced according to a first viewing operation (VO1), associated with the 1VOR, that maps the FIMDS to image definition data defining the second image. Request signal data is received from a signal source to present a second viewing operation region (2VOR) in the display area coextensive with at least a portion of the 1VOR, forming a composite viewing operation region in the overlapping region.

Abstract: A multi-user multi-device system enables a plurality of users to control a single screen. Each user has one or more input devices, which can be used to control one or more stored applications. At any time, the system produces a consistent view of all applications on the single screen. The input from each user produces a response customized to the preferences of that user. Each user can inform the system of which devices that user is using. Inputs to the system initiate the building of Event Records that are queued and then directed to specific applications. The screen is updated, and the coordinates of child applications are determined, only during pauses in the operations of all applications.

Abstract: A portable device for silent graphical communication. The device has a display screen on which a user may scribble notes and information using a stylus. These notes, which are then broadcast by the device, are received by other similar devices and displayed on the screens of the other devices. User of the other devices can respond to the received information by scribbling their own notes. The ensuing conversations may be password protected.

Abstract: An information retrieval system and method are provided in which an operator inputs one or more query words which are used to determine a search key for searching through a corpus of documents, and which returns any matches between the search key and the corpus of documents as a phrase containing the word data matching the query word(s), a non-stop (content) word next adjacent to the matching word data, and all intervening stop-words between the matching word data and the next adjacent non-stop word. The operator, after reviewing one or more of the returned phrases can then use one or more of the next adjacent non-stop-words as new query words to reformulate the search key and perform a subsequent search through the document corpus. This process can be conducted iteratively, until the appropriate documents of interest are located. The additional non-stop-words from each phrase are preferably aligned with each other (e.g., by columnation) to ease viewing of the "new" content words.

Abstract: Provision is made for search digital synthetic graphics data (e.g., displayed single page scenes, multi-page files or multi-file databases) to find graphical patterns which match a user specified graphical search pattern. Furthermore, there is support (i) for performing pre-recorded macro operations on all or some of the matches that are found, or (ii) for substituted user-specified replacements for some or all of the geometric characteristics and graphical properties of the pattern matches that are found.