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:
Jul. 06, 1999
Filed:
Jun. 06, 1995
Robert B Seidensticker, Jr, Woodinville, WA (US);
Microsoft Corporation, Redmond, WA (US);
Abstract
A relatively large set of image data (e.g. 640.times.480) is mapped onto a relative smaller physical display device (e.g. 320.times.240) by one of a variety of techniques, usually characterized by display of a subset of the data at full resolution (i.e. 1:1). In some embodiments, the entire physical display is dedicated to display of the subset of data at 1:1 resolution; data beyond this subset is not displayed. In other embodiments, only a portion of the physical display is dedicated to 1:1 resolution, with the remainder of the physical display being used to represent some fraction of the remaining data at a lower resolution. In one embodiment, the resolution decreases with distance from the 1:1 resolution area, resulting in a fisheye lens-like geometrical distortion. A variety of other alternatives are possible. Data displayed in these lower resolution portions of the display device are geometrically compressed or distorted, but provide useful context information for the user. Desirably, user-responsive control means are provided by which the user can move the 1:1 resolution window to show different portions of the data set.