Document Manager 3D Spatial Browsing Interface
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing document management and browsing systems are inefficient for navigating through large collections of documents, making it difficult for users to find specific content, especially when documents are displayed in a tree structure or as icons.
Innovation Solution
A system that utilizes a touch-sensitive display to present documents in a two-dimensional or three-dimensional arrangement, allowing users to browse and manage documents through a graphical user interface with customizable sorting orders and preview sizes, enabling easier selection and viewing of documents.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Quantity of substance
If documents are displayed in a tree structure or as icons to manage large collections, then the quantity of documents that can be managed increases, but the difficulty of finding specific content increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent transforms the traditional two-dimensional icon or tree structure display into a three-dimensional spatial arrangement where documents are positioned in virtual 3D space. This dimensional enhancement allows documents to be organized along multiple spatial axes (x, y, and z coordinates), enabling more intuitive navigation and search capabilities while managing large document collections. Users can navigate through documents by moving through 3D space rather than scrolling through flat lists or expanding tree nodes.
2Ease of operation
If icon based browse window is used to display documents, then the ease of operation is improved, but the productivity decreases when browsing through tens, hundreds or thousands of documents
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements dynamic document arrangement where the 3D spatial positions of documents automatically adjust based on user interaction patterns, selection history, and document metadata. Documents that are frequently accessed or recently modified are dynamically repositioned to more accessible locations in the 3D space. The system also dynamically responds to user gestures, allowing rapid navigation through document collections by interpreting touch movements as navigation commands that update document positions and focus points in real-time.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent replaces traditional mechanical navigation methods (clicking, scrolling, expanding tree nodes) with gesture-based control in the 3D space. Users can perform sweeping gestures, pinching motions, or other tactile interactions that directly manipulate the 3D document arrangement. This substitution of mechanical point-and-click operations with continuous gesture-based control enables faster navigation through large document collections while maintaining ease of operation through intuitive touch interactions.
Data Source
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AI summary
The invention relates to a method for browsing documents with respect to a display screen with a computing device. The method comprises: providing a browsing region on the display screen, displaying, within the browsing region, a plurality of images on the display screen in a two-dimensional arrangement, where in the two-dimensional arrangement the images are arranged in a horizontal direction and a direction, each of the images pertaining to an document and providing a preview of the document, receiving a first user input identifying within the browsing region first particular image from the images displayed in the two-dimensional arrangement, and displaying, in response to the first input, the plurality of images on the display screen in a three-dimensional arrangement, where in the three-dimensional arrangement the images are arranged in the horizontal direction and the vertical direction, the images are having a size which decreases from the first particular image being largest in both the horizontal direction and the vertical direction and where images being displayed larger overlap adjacent images being displayed smaller in the horizontal direction and the vertical direction such that only a portion of the images being overlapped is exposed.