The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Apr. 01, 1997
Filed:
Jan. 17, 1996
Mark S Kressin, Niwot, CO (US);
Blaine H Berger, Longmont, CO (US);
Bret P Smith, Longmont, CO (US);
International Business Machines Corporation, Armonk, NY (US);
Abstract
This method improves the user-friendliness of command-line driven programs by having a correspondence set up between possible commands which may be entered on a command line and a series of Graphic User Interface 'buttons'. These buttons are graphical symbols that appear on the screen and are selectable via a mouse. A display screen is divided into work areas, one of which is associated with the screen which a user would have seen while using the application program without the invention and a second of which displays an array of 'buttons,' each of which are associated with commands. When the user selects the specific button with a mouse pointer moving the mouse, the related 'command' is identified. A message is then created, the message comprised of the same data that would have been created by the series of keystrokes to spell out that command. The command is passed to the application program, which receives it in the same manner that it would have received input from the keyboard. Accordingly, the application program recognizes the data as a command and executes the desired function.