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:
Oct. 06, 1998
Filed:
Oct. 20, 1997
John K Calhoun, Felton, CA (US);
Apple Computer, Inc., Cupertino, CA (US);
Abstract
A computer performs designated operations on text that can be in any of a variety of different languages, rather than being restricted to a single language for which the computer was designed. A library stores operators and functions that can act upon character strings. Also stored within the library are sets of rules which identify the casing, ordering and matching of characters within different writing systems, or human languages. When a user of the computer designates a particular operation to be performed with respect to a text string, the writing system associated with the text string is identified. This identification can be made with reference to the typefont that is used to display the text string. Once the writing system for a string has been determined, appropriate tables and data structures that define and encode language rules for that writing system are accessed and applied to the operation on the string. For example, when comparing strings of text, the computer will be instructed whether to compare encodings on the basis of one byte at a time or multiple bytes together.