An information processing system includes a desk with a planar display unit which also accommodates physical objects to be manipulated by the operator. The physical objects are representative of physical objects normally used in office environments when handling paper files. A camera is provided which continuously monitors the desk display surface and is coupled to an electronic computer which can be controlled by the operator by moving the physical objects and the operator hands to simulate paper processing tasks, such as mailing, faxing, filing, opening files, editing and the like. An operator driven menu is provided on the desk display surface for facilitating operator classification and storage of physical object shapes of those physical objects which are to be used.

A desktop publishing software program configured to propagate object content-defining and format-defining object properties so that user-defined object properties automatically propagate to other objects in the document. Object property propagation allows the author of the document to edit a number of linked objects by editing just one of the objects. To enable object property propagation, the desktop publishing software program includes a propagation table for each predefined layout. Each document is constructed from a number of components, and multiple instances of the same component may occur in a document. Each object has a name including an identifier and an instance code. The desktop publishing software program supports the following object property propagation rules, which may be applied to content properties and format properties separately: (1) do not propagate to any other objects; (2) propagate to objects in the same component whose identifiers belong to the same content or format group; (3) propagate to objects in the same document whose identifiers belong to the same content or format group; (4) propagate to objects in other components of the same document with the same identifiers and instance codes; and (5) propagate to objects in the same document whose identifiers belong to the same content or format group and save the object property in a registry so that the object property propagates to other documents as well.

An information processing system and method using a file storage unit which stores electronic information and a display unit which displays the electronic information. A discrimination unit discriminates each of a plurality of physical objects indicated by a user. An attribute discrimination unit discriminates changeable attribute information of the physical objects. A link storage unit stores link information designating a correspondence between each of the physical objects and a respective corresponding portion of the electronic information stored in the storage unit. A file operation unit performs a plurality of operations, including: (a) changing an appearance of the electronic information on the display when the electronic information displayed is the corresponding portion of the electronic information which corresponds to at least one of the physical objects; (b) performing different or additional operations on the corresponding portion of the electronic information which corresponds to at least one of the physical objects when the corresponding portion of the electronic information is manipulated; and (c) changing attributes of the corresponding portion of the electronic information which corresponds to at least one of the physical objects when the changeable attribute information of at least one of the physical objects is changed.

A document preparation support system which enables a document preparer to easily prepare a good-looking document meeting his purpose and application while eliminating the need for having any editorial design knowledge and which also enables the document preparer to easily prepare a document having a good result satisfying his intention and application even when the document preparer has no knowledge about how to reflect his intention and application on the document. To this end, in the document preparation support system, inferring operation is carried out with use of such document data as document contents and attributes and such document design knowledge data as evaluation words and document design elements to decide the optimum document design. Further, inferring operation is carried out with use of such document data as document contents and attributes and improper point indication data indicative of improper points in a document being prepared to indicate the improper points in the document.

Texts of small fonts are made easier to read by displaying or printing background pixels in the spaces between characters within words with an adjusted grey level or color, which is a mix product of the grey level or color of the characters and that of the background.