Patent Application

App. No. 11/852,806

Abstract

Claims (27)

1 . A method of ordering visual objects presented on a display comprising:

comparing visual objects to be placed in an overlapping condition;

determining from the comparison the order in which said visual objects are to be placed; and

re-ordering and placing the visual objects in said overlapping condition in accordance with said determination.

2 . The method of claim 1 wherein during said comparing, a metric of each visual object is compared to determine a relative size of each said visual object.

3 . The method of claim 2 wherein during said determining, visual objects are placed in order from smallest to largest with smaller visual objects being placed in front of larger visual objects.

4 . The method of claim 3 wherein said metric is the area of a rectangular region surrounding each visual object.

5 . The method of claim 1 wherein said comparing, determining and re-ordering are performed automatically when a visual object is brought into an overlapping condition with another visual object during visual object manipulation.

6 . The method of claim 5 wherein during said comparing, a metric of each visual object is compared to determine a relative size of each said visual object.

7 . The method of claim 6 wherein during said determining, visual objects are placed in order from smallest to largest with smaller visual objects being placed in front of larger visual objects.

8 . The method of claim 1 wherein said comparing, determining and re-ordering are performed automatically when a visual object is brought into an overlapping condition with another visual object during visual object manipulation and then released.

9 . The method of claim 8 wherein during said comparing, a metric of each visual object is compared to determine a relative size of each said visual object.

10 . The method of claim 9 wherein during said determining, visual objects are placed in order from smallest to largest with smaller visual objects being placed in front of larger visual objects.

11 . The method of claim 1 wherein said comparing, determining and re-ordering are performed in response to a user input command.

12 . The method of claim 11 wherein during said comparing, a metric of each visual object is compared to determine a relative size of each said visual object.

13 . The method of claim 12 wherein during said determining, visual objects are placed in order from smallest to largest with smaller visual objects being placed in front of larger visual objects.

14 . An overlapping object tool for ordering visual objects presented on a display comprising:

means for comparing visual objects to be placed in an overlapping condition;

means for determining the order in which said visual objects are to be placed based on said comparison; and

means for re-ordering and placing the visual objects in said overlapping condition in accordance with said determination.

15 . An overlapping object tool according to claim 14 wherein said comparing means compares a metric of each visual object to determine a relative size of each said visual object.

16 . An overlapping object tool according to claim 15 wherein said determining means places visual objects in order from smallest to largest with smaller visual objects being placed in front of larger visual objects.

17 . An overlapping object tool according to claim 16 wherein said metric is the area of a rectangular region surrounding each visual object.

18 . A computer readable medium including a computer program for ordering visual objects presented on a display, said computer program comprising:

computer program code for comparing visual objects to be placed in an overlapping condition;

computer program code for determining the order in which said visual objects are to be placed based on said comparison; and

computer program code for re-ordering and placing the visual objects in said overlapping condition in accordance with said determination.

Assignments (8)