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Application programming interfaces for scrolling

Application programming interfaces for scrolling description/claims

This disclosure relates to application programming interfaces that provide scrolling operations.

A portion of the disclosure of this patent document contains material which is subject to copyright protection. The copyright owner has no objection to facsimile reproduction by anyone of the patent document or the patent disclosure, as it appears in the Patent & Trademark Office patent file or records, but otherwise reserves all copyright rights whatsoever.

Applicant has submitted herewith Computer Program Listings which are included as Appendix A, attached.

An API is a source code interface that a computer system or program library provides in order to support requests for services from a software application. An API is specified in terms of a programming language that can be interpretative or compiled when an application is built, rather than an explicit low level description of how data is laid out in memory. The software that provides the functionality described by an API is said to be an implementation of the API.

Various devices such as electronic devices, computing systems, portable devices, and handheld devices have software applications. The API interfaces between the software applications and user interface software to provide a user of the device with certain features and operations. A user may desire certain operations such as scrolling, selecting, gesturing, and animating operations for a display of the device.

Scrolling is the act of sliding a directional (e.g., horizontal or vertical) presentation of content, such as text, drawings, or images, across a screen or display window. In a typical graphical user interface, scrolling is done with the help of a scrollbar or using keyboard shortcuts, often the arrow keys. Gesturing is a type of user input with two or more input points. Animating operations include changing content within a given time period.

The various types of devices may have a limited display size, user interface, software, API interface and/or processing capability which limits the ease of use of the devices. User interfaces of devices implement APIs in order to provide requested functionality and features. These user interfaces can have difficulty interpreting the various types of user inputs and providing the intended functionality associated with the user inputs.

At least certain embodiments of the present disclosure include one or more application programming interfaces in an environment with user interface software interacting with a software application. Various function calls or messages are transferred via the application programming interfaces between the user interface software and software applications. Example application programming interfaces transfer function calls to implement scrolling, gesturing, and animating operations for a device.

At least certain embodiments of the present disclosure include an environment with user interface software interacting with a software application. A method for operating through an application programming interface (API) in this environment includes transferring a scroll hysteresis call to determine whether a user input invokes a scroll. The method further includes setting a hysteresis value for determining whether a user input invokes a scroll.

At least certain embodiments of the present disclosure include an environment with user interface software interacting with a software application. A method for operating through an application programming interface (API) in this environment includes transferring a rubberband call. Rubberbanding a scrolled region within a display region occurs by a predetermined maximum displacement when the scrolled region exceeds a display edge. The method further includes transferring an edge rubberband call to set displacement values for at least one edge of the display (e.g., top and bottom edges, left and right edges).

At least certain embodiments of the present disclosure include gesture operations for a display of a device. The gesture operations include performing a scaling transform such as a zoom in or zoom out in response to a user input having two or more input points. The gesture operations also include performing a rotation transform to rotate an image or view in response to a user input having two or more input points.

At least certain embodiments of the present disclosure include a method for performing animations for a display of a device. The method includes starting at least one animation. The method further includes determining the progress of each animation. The method further includes completing each animation based on a single timer. The single timer can be based on a redraw interval of the display hardware.

Various devices which perform one or more of the foregoing methods and machine readable media which, when executed by a processing system, cause the processing system to perform these methods, are also described.

Other methods, devices and machine readable media are also described.

The disclosure is described by way of example with reference to the accompanying drawings, wherein:

• Provisional Patent
• Utility Patent

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