JPH0713821B2 - Editing device - Google Patents

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to an editing device for operating / editing various electronic data, which is widely used in industrial fields such as OA, research, development, education, publishing, and finance.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In the present situation where editing devices with simple operability such as word processors and spreadsheets are gaining millions of general users, the operation is simple and highly efficient in accordance with a natural flow of thought. Moreover, there is an increasing demand for an editing device that requires a small cost for learning the operation method. On the other hand, in the conventional editing apparatus, "designation of operation target" is commonly executed when executing various functions.
In most cases, the following operation steps are performed (reference: Japanese word processor “Ichitaro” (registered trademark) User's Manual, “Lotus”).
123 ”(registered trademark) User's Manual).

An example of an operation procedure for specifying a range in a conventional editing apparatus: 1) Repeatedly open a menu and select a moving function. 2) Repeat the cursor movement, specify the correct cursor position, and then select the start point. 3) Repeat the cursor movement, specify the correct cursor position, and then select the end point. 4) Repeat the cursor movement, specify the cursor position correctly, and select the movement destination.

[0004]

It is considered that the large amount of thoughts spent on the contents other than the document contents is one of the main causes of obstructing transparency. In particular, "Let's replace this paragraph with this one and see the difference in atmosphere."
When the user comes to think of it, it is necessary to repeat the above “moving” operation procedure exactly twice. What the user wanted is a function that replaces two paragraphs almost instantly and shows them, whereas the operation procedure in the conventional editing device requires too many operations and the cursor position is accurate. There is a problem that unreasonable attention is paid to positioning and the like.

[0005] Japanese Patent Application No. 1-251496 proposes a device configuration which is a premise for solving the above-mentioned problems in a text editing device. According to this
For the first time, it is possible to analyze an input sentence, retain its linguistic internal structure, and specify an edit target for each syntactic unit.

[0006] However, regarding the technical idea of what kind of procedure is specifically used to operate the object to be edited to reduce the number of operations and the attention, the Japanese Patent Application No. It is not mentioned in the specification of 251496. Further, even when various electronic data other than texts are targeted for editing, no technical idea about reducing the number of operations or enabling reductions is disclosed.

An object of the present invention is to provide an editing device that solves such a problem.

[0008]

According to the present invention, there is provided data holding means for holding electronic data to be operated / edited during editing, and input means for inputting electronic data and an instruction of an operation / editing function. In an editing device comprising a data held by the data holding means and a display means for displaying a content of an input to the input means to a user, which is inherent in electronic data to be edited accompanying the data holding means. The hierarchical structure holding means for holding the structural units of the upper and lower layers in correspondence with the data stored in the data holding means, and the data portion currently operated on in the data stored in the data holding means for the display means Cursor holding means for specifying / holding, and a hierarchy for storing the size of the specified range in the data location currently operated by the hierarchical structure holding means Cursor mode holding means for designating and holding the value of the structural unit of the upper and lower hierarchy determined in the created data, and the hierarchical structure holding based on the value held by the cursor mode holding means and the data location held by the cursor holding means Range specifying means for determining a specified range which is a current operation target in the means.

[0009]

According to the present invention, by combining and operating the above-mentioned means, it is possible to specify the position of the edit target in the editing apparatus for operating the electronic data having the upper and lower structural units.
It is possible to specify the editing target uniquely by a combination of the operation of inputting and switching the range specification of the editing target independently of the specification, and as a result, editing with a significantly smaller number of operations that conventional editing devices do not have. Can be realized.

[0010]

Embodiments of the present invention will now be described with reference to the drawings. FIG. 1 is a conceptual diagram showing the configuration of an editing apparatus which is an embodiment of the present invention. This editing apparatus has a data holding means 1 for holding electronic data to be operated / edited during editing, an input means 2 for inputting electronic data and an instruction of an operation / editing function, and a holding of the data holding means 1. The display means 3 for displaying the data to be input to the user and the input content to the input means 2, and the upper and lower hierarchical structural units included in the electronic data to be edited that accompanies the data holding means 1 are stored in the data holding means 1. A hierarchical structure holding means 4 for holding the data to be stored, a cursor holding means 5 for designating and holding the data portion currently operated on in the data stored in the data holding means 1 with respect to the display means 3,
Cursor mode holding means 6 for designating and holding the value of the structural unit of the upper and lower hierarchies which determines the size of the specified range in the data portion currently operated as the hierarchical structure data stored in the hierarchical structure holding means 4, and this cursor mode A range designating unit 7 is provided for deciding a designated range to be currently operated in the hierarchical structure holding unit 4 based on the value held by the holding unit and the data location held by the cursor holding unit 5.

Hereinafter, by using the means provided by this apparatus in combination, the "operation procedure for specifying the range in the conventional editing apparatus" described in "Prior Art",
It will be explained that it can be replaced with a new operation procedure that realizes an editing function with a smaller number of keystrokes.

The user inputs the data and some operation instruction to the editing device from the input means 2 while watching the data to be edited displayed on the display means 3. When a cursor position change instruction is given among the operation instructions, the instruction contents are the data line 21, the data holding means 1,
It is sent to the cursor holding means 5 via the data line 15.
The cursor holding means 5 calculates and holds a new cursor position in the edit target data stored in the data holding means 1 based on the sent data for changing the cursor position, and holds the new cursor position based on the new cursor position. Data line 5
The cursor display position on the display means 3 is redrawn via 3.

Now, in the current editing state, it is assumed that the cursor position is at the character "period", which is the black and white inverted character in the example of the editing screen of FIG. That is, the address of the character position of "period" is stored in the cursor holding means 5. The data holding means 1 stores all the character strings in the editing screen of FIG. 2 and the appearance address information from the beginning thereof. The hierarchical structure holding unit 4 holds the following hierarchical structure while matching the addresses with the respective parts of the stored contents of the data holding unit 1 via the data line 14 and corresponding to each other.

FIG. 5 shows a portion near the cursor position in the stored contents of the hierarchical structure holding means 4 corresponding to the edit screen of FIG. This stored content has a tree structure. That is, the unit "initialization" of the (word) including the unit "period" of the (character) in the lowermost layer at the cursor position is immediately above the character "period" (the parent position). Furthermore, there is a (word) unit "system initialization" in the parent position that includes the (word) unit "initialization", and a (bunsetsu) unit "system initialization" is included in the parent position. There is a (phrase) unit "Operation flow of system initialization when a document is input". Further, there is a unit of (section) that includes this (phrase) at the position of its parent, "Fig. 3 is a conceptual diagram,", and a (sentence) that contains this (section) at the position of its parent. Unit of "Also,
... is an example. Is there. Furthermore, at the position of its parent, the unit "(next) ... of (paragraph) including this (sentence) is shown. , And at the position of the parent, there is (whole sentence) including this (paragraph).

The range designating means 7 uses the data line 75 to store the data of the current cursor position held by the cursor holding means 5.
Through the data line 47 and sends it to the hierarchical structure holding means 4 to mark each hierarchical unit including the character at the cursor position as the cursor position equally. In this embodiment,
Since the hierarchical structure is a tree structure, the lowest layer (characters)
If the cursor position of is determined, the cursor position of a higher hierarchy unit is uniquely determined. These cursor positions are shown by using double brackets "" in FIG. 5 (corresponding to the double brackets described in the explanation of the previous paragraph).

The cursor mode holding means 6 stores a value designating any one of the upper and lower structural units of the sentence / paragraph / sentence / section / phrase / word shown in FIG. The range specifying means 7 reads this value via the data line 76 and sends it to the hierarchical structure holding means 4 via the data line 47.
Upon receipt of this value, the hierarchical structure holding means 4 selects the unit that matches the sent value from the units of each layer marked as the current cursor position and selects the data line 4.
It is sent to the range designation means 7 via 7. That is, for example, if the current cursor mode value is (clause),
“System initialization” is sent to the range specifying means 7 as data of the specified range. Upon receiving this data, the range designating means 7 sends the data of the designated range to the data holding means 1 via the data line 17, obtains the address to display the designated range, and displays the data on the display means 3 via the data line 13. Display the specified range on.

Simultaneously with the change of the display, the data holding means 1 matches the object of some data operation by the user with the displayed designated range. That is, the data in the specified range sent to the data holding means 1 becomes an operation target when some data operation instruction is sent from the user via the input means 2 and the data line 21.

The data line 53 and the data line 63 respectively display the address of the cursor position as a numerical value.
, Or the current value in the cursor mode is directly displayed on the display means 3 as "(clause)".

The range designating means 7 realizes the modification of the designated range by one of the following two operations: (1) Up and down of sentences, paragraphs, sentences, clauses, phrases, clauses and words in FIG. Information that the display button indicating the level is clicked using the input means 2 is received via the data line 21, the data holding means 1, and the data line 17, and the data line 7 is received.
The content of the cursor mode holding means 6 is rewritten with a new value via 6. (2) One or two of the specific control codes sent from the input means 2 is set to the value stored in the cursor mode holding means 6 as (text) ← → (paragraph) ← → (sentence) ← → (section) ← → (phrase)
Allocate to ← → (bunsetsu) ← → (word) and a function code that switches sequentially like a toggle switch. (In the case of two, it is used for switching to two types of adjacent layers of "+ (plus)" and "-(minus)".

In either of the cases (1) and (2), the range designating means 7 switches the display of the display means 3 based on the new value in the cursor mode holding means 6 according to the above-mentioned procedure, and the data is displayed. The data to be operated in the holding means 1 is made to match the designated range displayed.

FIG. 3 is a graph showing the effect of reducing the amount of operation by comparing the number of keystrokes required in widely used word processors and graphic editors with the number of keystrokes in this system. For example, with the number of keystrokes required to realize a group of editing functions of exchanging a paragraph of an appropriate size with another paragraph located at a distance from each other, by setting the cursor mode to the paragraph level and operating the paragraph mode, as shown in FIG. As shown in (5), the number of times of reduction of "Ichitaro (trademark)" is 5 times compared to 48 times, which is a reduction effect of one digit.

FIG. 4 is an example of a display screen of data which is the basis for creating the graph of FIG. There is a cursor on the upper left of the editing screen on the left side of the photo, which corresponds to the state where the above-mentioned "operation procedure for specifying range in conventional editing device" up to 2) has been executed in a conventional editing device such as "Ichitaro". To do. The number of keystrokes until reaching this state is indefinite because it depends on the previous cursor position, but here it is set to 5 as a numerical value that is judged to be valid on average as shown in the following calculation basis.

Basis for Calculating Number of Keystrokes in Conventional Device Number of keystrokes required to move the first paragraph to the third paragraph in “Ichitaro”: 1) Repeatedly open the menu and select the move function.

→ ESC keystroke, select move M, select move L in line units. = 3 keystrokes 2) Repeat the cursor movement to select the start point.

→ Strike the arrow key to move the cursor so that it looks like the picture above. = 5 keystrokes (estimated average value) 3) Repeat cursor movement to select the end point.

→ Strike the arrow key 9 times to move the cursor to the beginning of the paragraph two below. = 9 keystrokes 4) Repeat the cursor movement to select the movement destination.

→ Strike the arrow key seven times to move the cursor to the beginning of the paragraph two below. = 7 keystrokes ━━━━━━━━━ total 24 keystrokes When this procedure is executed, the number of one-way keystrokes for moving one paragraph to the target position is counted as 24 times. Since it is necessary to repeat the same operation again for replacing the paragraphs, the value of 48 keystrokes, which is twice the average, is adopted here, and the graph of FIG. 3 is created.

When the present invention is applied, five times means: 1) Click with a mouse somewhere in the paragraph on one side to be replaced. 1 keystroke 2) Change cursor mode to "paragraph" level. 1 keystroke 3) Click the other paragraph with the mouse. 1 keystroke 4) Select "Replace" from the menu icon "Replace / Move?" 1 keystroke 5) Select "YES" in the confirmation icon "OK? YES / NO". It is calculated based on a total of 5 keystrokes consisting of a single keystroke procedure.

In the above description of the embodiments, the method of analyzing and extracting the upper and lower hierarchical structures inherent in the electronic data to be edited has not been given. In the following, specific examples of different types of electronic data will be given to illustrate the upper and lower hierarchical structures in each, and show that the present invention is applicable to each electronic data.

(1) In the case of electronic data of a sentence consisting of a character string For example, the upper and lower hierarchical structures shown in FIG. 5 are extracted by the method described in Japanese Patent Application No. 1-251496. Is possible. For the definition of each layer, for example, the definition described in the latter half of FIG. 5 can be adopted.

(2) Electronic data of tree structure database (outline) Since the tree structure itself has natural upper and lower layers like the calendar data shown in FIG. 6, it is necessary to use an analyzing means. Instead, the present invention can be applied as it is.

(3) In the case of electronic data of figures FIG. 7 shows a drawing in which unit figures are displayed as squares and vertical and horizontal lines are connected between them. As the definition of the distance, for example, the concept of the distance increasing by +1 each time one connection is passed is introduced between the unit figures. in this way,
"Distance 0, 1, 2, 3, ..." By the definition of the distance quantized on the basis of the number of lines that mediate between element figures
Groups of elements or groups of element figures are defined by defining the groups of figures in Figure 1 or the groups of "distance 0 or less, 1 or less, 2 or less, 3 or less, ..." as being in the same cursor mode (Fig. 7). On these tool stands, the function of "designating a target figure with a cursor" and "switching the range of the designated group of figures in the vicinity thereof according to need" is provided respectively for the cursor holding means 5 and the cursor mode. The present invention can be applied by allocating to the holding means 6.

(4) Electronic Data in Table FIG. 8 shows an example of the definition of the concept of cursor and cursor mode in table editing. In both definition examples, "specific center row (or column) or start row (or column)" is defined as the current position, that is, the cursor position, and the cursor mode corresponding to the upper and lower layers is set to "row width (or column)". width)"
Or, tentatively, a hierarchy is defined among three types of “row” → “column” → “cross-shaped row and column”, and a cursor mode is defined by changing the mode between these.

(5) Electronic data of program source For example, in the case of a procedural language, a tree-shaped hierarchical structure of a function called from a main function and a function called from that function is introduced for the function, if
A statement nesting structure is introduced for a function as a tree-shaped hierarchical structure, and a structure definition is introduced for a function at the data structure definition part as a function. We introduce some combinations of these at the same time, and introduce a control that selects an appropriate hierarchy definition according to the part of interest when browsing the source code.

[0035]

According to the present invention, by combining and operating the above-mentioned means, an editing apparatus for manipulating electronic data having structural units of upper and lower hierarchies can specify the position of the object to be edited with one input. It is possible to uniquely specify the editing target by a combination of operations that switch the range specification of the editing target independently of the specification, and as a result, it is possible to realize editing with a significantly smaller number of operations that conventional editing devices do not have. It will be possible.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a diagram showing a configuration of an editing device.

FIG. 2 is a conceptual diagram of an edit screen showing a change of types of upper and lower layers and a designated unit.

FIG. 3 is a diagram showing a comparison of the number of keystrokes between the editing apparatus of the present invention and the conventional apparatus.

FIG. 4 is a diagram showing a display screen of data which is a basis for calculating the number of input keys.

FIG. 5 is a diagram showing a definition example of upper and lower hierarchical structures in text editing.

[Figure 6] Tree structure database operation (outline editing)
5 is a diagram showing an example of definition of an upper and lower hierarchical structure in FIG.

FIG. 7 is a diagram showing a definition example of upper and lower hierarchical structures in graphic editing.

FIG. 8 is a diagram showing a definition example of upper and lower hierarchical structures in table editing.

[Explanation of symbols]

 1 data holding means 2 input means 3 display means 4 hierarchical structure holding means 5 cursor holding means 6 cursor mode holding means 7 range specifying means

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. Data holding means for holding electronic data to be operated / edited during editing, and electronic data and operations / operations.
In an editing device comprising an input means for inputting an instruction of an editing function, and a display means for displaying to the user the data held by the data holding means and the contents of the input to the input means, Hierarchical structure holding means for holding structural units of upper and lower hierarchies inherent in the electronic data to be additionally edited corresponding to the data stored in the data holding means; Cursor holding means for designating / holding the data location currently being operated in the data, and size of the specified range at the data location currently being operated being determined in the hierarchical structure data stored in the hierarchical structure retaining means. Cursor mode holding means for designating and holding the value of the structural unit of the hierarchy, and the value held by the cursor mode holding means Editing apparatus characterized by comprising a range specifying means for determining a specified range which is currently the operation target in the hierarchical structure holding means on the basis of the data portion to hold the cursor holding means.