JPH03250214A - Guidance display system for man-machine interface - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To reduce the burden of work by activating the guidance clear of a part positioned in the past when a mouse is moved between the respective parts of a display picture to be displayed as the aggregate of the parts, activating the guidance display of a currently positioning part, and displaying the guidance character string. CONSTITUTION:A terminal control program 1 executes display control and information input control. A component program 2 is formed as the aggregate of structures equipped with data and functions to couple components constituting the part by steps. A paste board program 3 is formed as the aggregate of structures to display and control the respective parts of the component program 2, and a control program 4 controls the OS processings of the paste board program 3, component program 2 and terminal control program. When the mouse is moved between the respective parts of the display picture to be displayed as the aggregate of the parts, the guidance clear of the part positioned in the paste is activated, the guidance display of the currently positioning part is activated and the guidance character string is displayed. Thus, the burden of work is reduced.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION A. Field of Industrial Application The present invention relates to a man-machine interface, and particularly to a guidance display method for building and operating an application.

B0 Summary of the invention The present invention provides a man-machine interface that uses a mouse to create display screen data and perform input/output processing, in which each function is a collection of parts having a hierarchical structure and activation function.
Each part has a function for displaying guidance, and by displaying guidance for the part where the mouse is located as you move the mouse between displayed parts, you can easily build and operate applications using the mouse. This reduces the burden.

C1 Conventional technology Man-machine interfaces allow information (commands, data) to be exchanged interactively using a display device (output device), mouse, keyboard (input device), etc. in order to facilitate the exchange of information between humans and computers. performs input and output,
Information output from a computer is displayed on a display device using text and graphic functions, and input information from humans is often done by positioning the screen or selecting parts.

The man-machine interface software to realize the processing described in L includes a terminal control function that controls various terminals such as a display device and a mouse, an input information recognition function such as cursor coordinate detection, and support for the human input information. It has a command processing function that generates commands to application programs, outputs responses to display devices, etc., and also has auxiliary functions when people create application programs and protection functions against erroneous operations.

Here, as a command processing function, the input/output control that displays information output to the display device as a component image and selects the component with a cursor etc. emphasizes the component to facilitate human recognition operations. has a window processing function.

For example, as shown in the display screen in FIG.
To display aa"'-'zzzzz and prompt the selection input, in addition to displaying part B, a cursor part CB indicating the item display position, a title part T indicating the part title,
A switch component SW for inputting selection confirmation and a cursor position component CP indicating the current position of the cursor are displayed.

Such display data for each component is created by determining the relationship and positional relationship between the components, and this display data is collectively incorporated into the command processing function section along with programs and data for input/output processing.

D1 Problems to be Solved by the Invention When constructing or operating an application computer using a conventional man-machine interface, the larger the application, the more input and output parts such as menus and editors are required. Machine interface configuration becomes complex. For this reason,
It is difficult for the user to understand how to use these input components to input data, and the user is forced to perform the work manually and with great effort.

An object of the present invention is to provide a guidance display method that reduces the workload in building and operating an application.

In order to achieve the above-mentioned object, the present invention provides a method for creating display screen data in a man-machine interface that exchanges information in an interactive manner through output processing to a display device and input processing from a mouse, etc. The function and the input/output information processing function are configured as a collection of multiple parts, each part is a structure having a hierarchical structure and an activation function, and each part has a guidance display function, a guidance clear function, and a guidance character string. , when the mouse moves between parts on the display screen displayed as a collection of parts, it starts clearing the guidance of the parts located in the past, starts the guidance display of the parts currently located, and clears the guidance string. Each part should be a structure with a hierarchical structure and activation function to perform input/output processing, each function should be realized by combining parts, and input/output processing should be determined by the hierarchical structure of each part. Each part is provided with a guidance display function, a guidance clear function, and a guidance character string, so that when the mouse is moved on the display screen of each part, a guidance display of the part on which the mouse is positioned is obtained.

F. Embodiment FIG. 1 is a software configuration diagram showing an embodiment of the present invention. The terminal control program 1 controls the display of the display device and the input of information from the mouse and keyboard.

The component program 2 is a collection of structures having data and functions that hierarchically connect components constituting a part.

The pasteboard program 3 is a collection of structures for displaying and managing each part of the component program 2. The management program 4 includes the pasteboard program 3, component program 2, and terminal control program O.
This is a program that manages 8 types of processing.

In the software configuration described in L, the structure of the pasteboard program 3 has, for example, each slot name and function shown in the table below.

Table 1 Structure of a window that displays components On the other hand, the component program 2 includes primitive components as shown in the table below.

Table 2 Types of Components These components can be used alone as constituent parts of a man-machine interface, but in most cases, these components are constructed in combination. The combined components are also treated as separate components.

The above components and components that combine them are made into structures with slot names and functions shown in the table below.

Table 3 Component structure In the table below, The guidance components in Table 2 include The slots shown in the table below will be provided.

Table 4 Guidance-specific slots Among these slots, text-string is a slot that stores a character string to be displayed as guidance, and compo
nent is a slot into which the component that owns the displayed string is inserted. Further, the display character string is given when or after the guidance component is generated.

In this embodiment having the configuration described above, the display screen shown in FIG. 7 is created using the components shown in Table 2 according to the procedure shown in FIG. 2.

First, open the pasteboard program 3 window (wi
ndow) and generates a window that displays the component on the display device G (see Figure 2 (a)).
)). Next, a component to be displayed in the window is generated (FIG. 2(b)).

To do this, each slot of the structure of the component program 2 is defined in sequence. l;t in Figure 2(b)
It shows the screen state where each component consisting of a menu confirmation switch with a scroll bar has been created, defines the parent-child relationship and positional relationship (relative coordinates) for each component, and determines the hierarchical relationship of each component. FIG. 2(C) shows the connected components and their hierarchical relationships, and each component such as a scroll bar, menu, and switch is drawn on the display screen with defined positional relationships, sizes, etc. Further, the hierarchical relationship of each component is defined within the structure as shown in FIG. 2(d).

To draw a component, start a drawing relationship using the component to be drawn as an argument. Considering the parent-child relationship of the components, that function fills the background from the parent to the child, starts the drawing function of the component from the child to the parent, and draws the frame. If a component does not have a drawing function, it only fills the background and draws the frame. For example, the triangular display of a scroll bar is specified as the component's drawing function when the component is generated.

Next, to display the components of the created composite part on the pasteboard and activate the components for input/output control, an interrupt function of the pasteboard program is activated, which enables the mouse. In response to mouse operations, the pasteboard program processes the pointer function (mouse movement interrupt function) shown in FIG. First, step S
1), Variable (new) at the current location s as the mouse moves
is the past variable (odd), and the component variable (compo) that becomes the current coordinate is the current variable (ne
w) (step S2). After updating such variables, it is determined whether the current variable (new) and the past variable (old) belong to the same component (step S3);
If it is different, it recognizes that the mouse has moved to another component, clears the guidance part by invoking the exit function based on both variables (new and old), and erases the guidance for the previous component from the screen (step S4). Next, based on both variables, enter
By invoking the er function, a character string is displayed on the guidance component corresponding to the new component (step S5).
.

Through the pointer function processing described above, each time the mouse moves into a new component, guidance associated with that component is displayed.

The activation process of the enter function described above is performed in the procedure shown in FIG. The enter function is activated when the mouse moves from a parent to a child in a component's hierarchy, that is, when the mouse moves from outside a component to the component in question, and the enter function is activated when the mouse moves from a parent to a child in a component's hierarchy, and the parent-child relationship list (
list up to the pasteboard) (step 5ll)
), it is determined whether this list includes the variable old of the component where the mouse has been positioned so far (step 512), and if it is not included, the enter function of the component on the 11 side of the list is activated (step 5).
13) When the enter function is activated, the process starts again from step Sll.

This kind of processing means that moving the mouse changes the parent-child relationship (old
It becomes effective when the value becomes large enough to prevent the following: For example, as shown in Fig. 5, which shows the positional relationship between the mouse and the component, when the mouse moves from point P1 to point P, the parent-child relationship list of component A becomes components A, B, C, and the pasteboard. Humboonent D is not included. At this time, the enter function of component B and the enter function of component A are activated from the parent-child relationship list of component A, and the corresponding guidance character string display is switched.

Next, when the enter relationship of the parent-child relationship list is activated, the guidance display checks whether there is a guidance part and character string for each component, and if there is a character string, it is displayed. To clear the guidance, use e when starting the exit function.
The same exit check as when starting the ``ter'' function is determined from the parent-child relationship and cleared.

FIG. 6 shows the movement relationship between components and the mouse to explain a guidance display example.

(1) When the mouse moves from component A to component B at the same level (indicated by an arrow ■), the following guidance is displayed.

Component A's exit function...Guidance G's clear Component B's enter function...
..."This is B (2) When moving to the parent component C indicated by the arrow ■, the next guidance will be displayed.

Exit function of component B... Clear guidance (3) Child component B indicated by arrow ■
When moving to , the next guidance will be displayed.

Enter function of component B... "This is B" (4) Components D to C indicated by arrow ■
When moving to A via , the next guidance display will appear.

Enter function of component C... "This is C" Enter function of component A...
..."This is A. (5) When moving from component A to component D via C, as indicated by the arrow ■, the following guidance will be displayed.

exN function of component A... Clear guidance component C exit function...
Guidance Clear H1 Effects of the Invention As described above, according to the present invention, each function for realizing a man-machine interface is configured as a collection of multiple parts, and each part is formed into a structure having a hierarchical structure and an activation function. Moreover, each part has a function for displaying guidance, and as the mouse moves between displayed parts, the previous guidance is cleared and the guidance of the part where the mouse is located is displayed, making it easier to build and operate applications. The guidance display for parts is automatically switched depending on the position of the mouse, and the operator can recognize the functions and contents of parts from the on-screen guidance without having to read the manual, and also has the following effects.

(1) By changing the guidance of a component according to the flow of mouse operations, the guidance character string of the component can be made different depending on the mouse operation when the component is generated, and an appropriate guidance display for each operation stage of the component can be obtained.

(2) Since guidance can be set for each composite part and each primitive part, different guidance can be displayed for each part that makes up the composite part.

(3) Since the guidance is switched based on the positional relationship between the part itself and the mouse, it is possible to eliminate mistakes with explanations of adjacent parts.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a software configuration diagram showing an embodiment of the present invention;
Fig. 2 is a procedure diagram for creating display screen data, Fig. 3 is a processing flowchart of the pointer function in the embodiment, Fig. 4 is a processing flowchart of the enter function in the embodiment, and Fig. 5
The figures are a diagram showing the positional relationship between the mouse and the components in FIG. 4, FIG. 6 is a diagram showing an example of movement of the components and the mouse in the embodiment, and FIG. 7 is a display screen diagram of the man-machine interface. 1...Terminal control program, 2...Component program, 3...Pasteboard program, 4.
...Management program. Fig. 1 Software configuration of the embodiment Fig. 4 Management program Fig. 2 Display meat surface data #, original image (a) (b) (c) (d) Window Fig. 3 Pointer function processing flowchart 1. Fig. 4 Enter function processing flowchart Fig. 5 Mouse and components (17w relationship diagram Fig. 6 = 1> Boonen 1 and mouse transfer example) Jr-J I

Claims (1)

[Claims] (1) In a man-machine interface that exchanges information interactively through output processing to a display device and input processing from a mouse, etc., the display screen data creation function and the input/output information processing function are implemented as a collection of multiple parts. Each part is a structure with a hierarchical structure and an activation function, and each part has a guidance display function, a guidance clear function, and a guidance character string, and the parts of the display screen displayed as a collection of parts are A guidance display method for a man-machine interface characterized in that when a mouse moves, guidance clearing of a part located in the past is started, guidance display of a currently located part is started, and its guidance character string is displayed.