Content-based depictions of computer icons

Abstract

A means and method for generating and displaying a contentbased depiction of a standard icon on the display of a computer is described. The depiction is generated upon the occurrence of predetermined events, such as the closure of the document or file associated with the icon, and is displayed in either a static or animated form in place of the standard icon in response to selection signals from a selection device. A single content-based depiction of an icon is generated by creating a representation of the object (file or document) to be depicted, and translating this representation into a scaled-down replica of the representation. This representation may be in the form of a bit-map, a full-scale image, etc. The replica is created by partitioning the representation into a number of equal segments, measuring the percentages of different colors (black and white, gray scale, or color) within each segment, and assigning a single color value to each display element or pixel of the replica based upon the color percentage measured from each corresponding segment of the representation. Animated depictions are created by forming a number of different replicas for each representation to be depicted and then displaying those replicas in a serial sequence to create an animated depiction of the representation. Like the icons these depictions replace when selected, the depictions would be movable to any position on the display through use of the mouse.