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:
Jun. 23, 2015
Filed:
Apr. 06, 2010
Anson M. Horton, Kirkland, WA (US);
Douglas J. Amaral, Redmond, WA (US);
Daniel R. Thorpe, Ben Lomond, CA (US);
Moneta K. Ho Kushner, Bellevue, WA (US);
Anson M. Horton, Kirkland, WA (US);
Douglas J. Amaral, Redmond, WA (US);
Daniel R. Thorpe, Ben Lomond, CA (US);
Moneta K. Ho Kushner, Bellevue, WA (US);
Microsoft Technology Licensing, LLC, Redmond, WA (US);
Abstract
An application assistance system is described herein that provides an on-demand canonical user interface that can quickly allow a user to learn the actions exposed by an application, such as a web site. The application assistance system is a pattern and method for guiding the user of a site/application through a set of possible actions on a page by providing a well-known invocation of hints. These hints show the actions/tasks that a user can take on a page by visually spotlighting a specific area of the page and providing a tooltip or pop-up dialog that describes the action/task the user is trying to complete while preserving the data the user has already entered. The system also provides a task pane that supports randomly accessing various steps of a task the system is explaining. Thus, the system makes it much easier for a user to learn to use an application.