Region Menu With Live Preview And Translucency
Find Innovative SolutionsGenerate Solutions
Solution Overview
Problem
User interfaces with numerous menu items become difficult to navigate due to the complexity of traditional menu systems, especially when using expandable submenus, which obscure content and require more mouse movement to access menu items.
Innovation Solution
Implementing a region menu system with closely spaced regions that invoke associated menus upon cursor entry, allowing for live previews of menu items and partial translucency to reveal underlying content, reducing the need for extensive mouse movement and improving accessibility.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Device complexity
If traditional menus with expandable submenus are used to organize numerous menu items, then the number of top-level menu items can be reduced, but the menu items in submenus become harder to navigate and require more mouse movement
Solution Approach 1:
The menu is divided into multiple sections, each containing a subset of menu items. Users can navigate between sections using keyboard shortcuts or mouse wheel, allowing direct access to any menu item without extensive mouse movement. This segmentation maintains organization while improving accessibility.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent introduces a vertical scrolling dimension to the horizontal menu structure. Instead of requiring lateral mouse movement across expandable submenus, users can scroll vertically through sections and use keyboard shortcuts for horizontal navigation, creating a multi-dimensional navigation space that reduces mouse travel distance.
2Loss of information
If menus are made opaque to ensure visibility of menu items, then menu items are clearly visible, but the underlying content becomes obscured
Solution Approach 1:
The menu implements dynamic opacity changes based on user interaction. When the mouse hovers over a menu item, that specific item becomes fully opaque for clear visibility, while other items and the background maintain partial transparency. This selective opacity change ensures both menu item visibility and underlying content visibility simultaneously.
3Quantity of substance
If menu items are closely spaced to fit more items in the menu, then more menu items can be accessed, but the menu becomes more difficult to navigate
Solution Approach 1:
The menu provides immediate visual feedback when the mouse enters a region or hovers over a menu item. The highlighted item expands or changes appearance, giving users clear feedback about their current selection. This feedback mechanism compensates for close spacing by making item boundaries and current selection unambiguous despite compact layout.
Solution Approach 2:
The menu displays tooltips or preview information before the user commits to selecting an item. As the mouse hovers over a menu item, additional information or a preview of the item's function appears, allowing users to confirm their intended selection before clicking, thereby reducing navigation errors in densely packed menus.
Data Source
Figure 1
Figure 2
Figure 3
AI summary
A region menu is used to easily access menu items. Generally, the region menu includes a number of regions with associated menus that are located close to an initial mouse position from where the region menu is evoked. Hovering over any of the regions of the region menu displays the menu item that is associated with the region. Additionally, hovering over a menu item within one of the regions of the displayed region menu may activate a live preview showing a projected result of what would occur should that menu item be selected. During a live preview, a portion of the region menu becomes translucent such that content beneath the menu becomes visible.