Abstract: A method of simultaneously displaying day calendar information on the screen of an interactive terminal of an information handling system along with data being processed by an application program. The day calendar data is displayed in a first view port in a compressed format which indicates busy and free time periods, while data from an application program is displayed in a second viewport. The information in the two simultaneously displayed viewports provides an improved interactive user interface in that the terminal user does not have to interrupt the task that he is working on to determine the availability of a certain time period. When the terminal is interconnected to other terminals by a network, the method provides an indication in the first viewport for the terminal user that is actively engaged in an application program, that a second user of a terminal on the network has calendared an event on the first user's calendar.

Abstract: A method of simultaneously displaying day calendar information in first and second view ports, each of which displays it's calendar data in a different format. The information in the two simultaneously displayed view ports is functionally interrelated to provide an improved interactive user interface.The first viewport has a time structured format which displays a sequence of predesignated time slots, each of which represents a fixed period of time, such as 30 minutes. Each time slot is allocated to one display line in the viewport. If the number of time slots allocated between the beginning and end of a calendar day is greater than the number of display lines in the viewport, then the information is scrollable so that the entire day may be viewed by the operator. The first viewport also includes at least one column that is used to display a vertical busy bar adjacent to a time slot which indicates that the slot is already scheduled.