Private regions within a shared workspace

Claims

What is claimed:

1. A method comprising:

presenting a shared workspace at each of first and second workstations, the shared workspace being perceptible as including a region, the region being perceptible as having a position within the shared workspace; the region having a first level of privacy applicable to the first workstation and a second level of privacy applicable to the second workstation;

the step of presenting the shared workspace comprising:

presenting first and second display objects within the shared workspace, the first display object indicating a position of the region within the workspace, the region being presented at the first workstation with the first level of privacy and at the second workstation with the second level of privacy;

receiving a signal from the first workstation requesting that the first display object be positioned on the second display object; and

in response to the signal, presenting the shared workspace with the first display object superimposed on the second display object such that at least part of the second display object is in the region, the part of the second display object that is in the region being presented at the first workstation with the first level of privacy and at the second workstation with the second level of privacy.

2. The method of claim 1 in which the step of presenting the shared workspace further comprises:

after the substep of presenting the shared workspace with the first display object superimposed on the second display object in response to the first above-mentioned signal, receiving a second signal from one of the first and second workstations requesting movement of the second display object to a new position within the shared workspace; and in response to the second signal, presenting the shared workspace with the first display object superimposed on the second display object at the new position such that at least part of the second display object remains in the region.

3. A method of presenting a navigable shared workspace at each of first and second workstations, the method comprising:

receiving, at the first workstation, a first signal indicating a first part of the shared workspace to be presented at the first workstation;

receiving, at the second workstation, a second signal indicating a second part of the shared workspace to be presented at the second workstation; the first part and the second part each including a region within the shared workspace; and

in response to the first and second signals, presenting the first part of the shared workspace at the first workstation and presenting the second part of the shared workspace at the second workstation; the first part of the shared workspace presented at the first workstation having a first set of display features in the region and the second part of the shared workspace presented at the second workstation having a second set of display features in the region, the first set of display features being different than the second set of display features;

the step of receiving the first signal comprising receiving a signal selecting a selectable transition unit in a third part of the shared workspace presented at the first workstation, the step of presenting the first and second parts of the shared workspace comprising ceasing to present the third part of the shared workspace at the first workstation and beginning to present the first part of the shared workspace at the first workstation.

4. A method comprising:

presenting a shared workspace at first and second workstations; the shared workspace including a pointer; the shared workspace further including a private region with a boundary, the private region having a level of privacy applicable to the first workstation, the level of privacy indicating whether the first workstation has sufficient access to the private region to move the pointer into the private region;

the step of presenting the shared workspace comprising:

presenting the shared workspace with the pointer outside the boundary of the private region and, if the level of privacy indicates that the first workstation has sufficient access to move the pointer into the private region, presenting a key display object within the shared workspace at the first workstation;

receiving a signal from the first workstation requesting movement of the pointer into the private region; and

responding to the signal based on the level of privacy of the private region; the substep of responding to the signal comprising presenting the pointer in the private region if the signal also requests that the key display object move into the private region but continuing to present the pointer outside the private region's boundary if the signal does not also request that the key display object move into the private region.

5. A method comprising:

presenting a shared workspace at first and second workstations; the shared workspace including a pointer; the shared workspace further including a private region that contains a selectable display unit, the private region having a level of privacy applicable to the first workstation, the level of privacy indicating whether the first workstation has sufficient access to the private region to select the selectable display unit;

the step of presenting the shared workspace comprising:

presenting the shared workspace with the pointer and the private region containing the selectable display unit;

receiving a signal from the first workstation requesting positioning of the pointer on the selectable display unit and selection of the selectable display unit; and

responding to the signal based on the level of privacy of the private region; the substep of responding to the signal comprising selecting the selectable display unit if the level of privacy indicates that the first workstation has sufficient access to select the selectable display unit and not selecting the selectable display unit if the level of privacy indicates that the first workstation does not have sufficient access.

6. A method comprising:

presenting a shared workspace at each of first and second workstations;

the step of presenting the shared workspace comprising:

presenting the shared workspace including first and second display objects within the shared workspace, the first display object indicating a position of a region within the workspace;

receiving a signal from the first workstation requesting that the first display object be positioned on the second display object such that the second display object is entirely within the region; and

in response to the signal, presenting the shared workspace with the first display object superimposed on the second display object such that the second display object is entirely in the region.

7. A method comprising:

presenting a shared workspace at each of first and second workstations;

the step of presenting the shared workspace comprising:

presenting the shared workspace with first and second display objects within the shared workspace, the first display object indicating a position of a region within the workspace;

receiving a signal from the first workstation requesting that the first display object be positioned on the second display object such that only a part of the second display object is in the region; and

is response to the signal, presenting the shared workspace with the first display object superimposed on the second display object within the shared workspace such that only the part of the second display object is in the region.

8. A method comprising:

presenting a shared workspace at each of first and second workstations;

the step of presenting the shared workspace comprising:

presenting first, second, and third display objects within the shared workspace, the first and third display objects respectively indicating opposite corners of a rectangular region within the workspace;

receiving a first signal from the first workstation requesting that the first display object be positioned on the second display object;

in response to the first signal, presenting the shared workspace with the first display object superimposed on the second display object such that at least part of the second display object is in the region;

receiving a second signal from the first workstation requesting that the third display object be positioned on the second display object; and

in response to the second signal, presenting the shared workspace with the third display object superimposed on the second display object such that at least part of the second display object remains in the region.

9. A method of operating a system including a first workstation with a first display means, and a second workstation with a second display means; the system further including means for presenting a shared workspace on the first and second display means, presentation of the shared workspace producing the perception that a first workspace shown on the first display means is the same as a second workspace shown on the second display means; the shared workspace further being perceptible as including a region; the method comprising the steps of:

presenting the first workspace at the first display means, the first workspace including the region, the region being perceptible as having a position within the shared workspace and having a boundary that is within the shared workspace, the first workspace including a first set of display features within the boundary of the region; and

presenting the second workspace at the second display means, the second workspace including the region, the region being perceptible as having a position within the shared workspace and having a boundary that is within the shared workspace, the second workspace including a second set of display features within the boundary of the region, the second set of display features appearing the same as the first set of display features;

receiving a first signal from the first workstation indicating a change in level of privacy of the region; and

in response to the first signal, modifying one of the first and second sets of display features to appear differently than the other so that the region has a first level of privacy in the first workspace and a second level of privacy in the second workspace, the first and second levels of privacy being different.

10. The method of claim 9 in which the step of presenting the first workspace at the first display means comprises a substep of presenting contents of the region, the first set of display features including the presented contents of the region; the step of presenting the second workspace at the second display means comprising a substep of presenting display features that do not indicate the contents of the region, the second set of display features being the display features that do not indicate the contents of the region.

11. The method of claim 4 in which the contents of the region include at least one physical display object, the substep of presenting contents of the region comprising a substep of presenting the physical display object.

12. The method of claim 9 further comprising, after the step of modifying one of the first and second sets of display features, steps of:

receiving a second signal from the first workstation requesting a change in the position of the region; and

presenting the region at a changed position in response to the request.

13. The method of claim 9 in which the first above-mentioned region is further perceptible as including a second region, the second region being perceptible as having a position within the shared workspace and having a boundary that is within the boundary of the first region; the first set of display features including a third set of display features within the boundary of the second region; the second set of display features including a fourth set of display features within the boundary of the second region;

the step of modifying one of the first and second sets of display features further comprising a substep of respectively modifying one of the third and fourth sets of display features, so that the second region has the first level of privacy in the first workspace and the second level of privacy in the second workspace.

14. A method of operating a system including a first workstation with a first display means, and a second workstation with a second display means; the system further including means for presenting a shared workspace on the first and second display means, presentation of the shared workspace producing the perception that a first workspace shown on the first display means is the same as a second workspace shown on the second display means, the shared workspace further being perceptible as including a region; the method comprising the steps of:

presenting the first workspace at the first display means, the first workspace including the region, the region being perceptible as having a position within the shared workspace and having a boundary that is within the shared workspace;

presenting the second workspace at the second display means, the second workspace including the region, the region being perceptible as having a position within the shared workspace and having a boundary that is within the shared workspace;

receiving a first signal from the first workstation requesting that the region within the shared workspace be made private;

in response to the first signal, storing privacy data indicating that the level of privacy of the region at the first workstation is different than the level of privacy at the second workstation;

after the step of storing privacy data, receiving a second signal from the first workstation requesting an operation involving the region; and

responding to the second signal based on the privacy data.

15. The method of claim 14 in which the privacy data indicates whether the first workstation has sufficient access to the region to perform the operation requested by the second signal; the step of responding to the second signal comprising a substep of performing the operation requested by the second signal if the privacy data indicates that the first workstation has sufficient access to the region to perform the operation requested by the second signal.

16. The method of claim 14 in which the first and second workspaces include respective first and second display objects within the region; the privacy data including data indicating that the first display object has a first level of privacy in the first workspace and the second display object has a second level of privacy in the second workspace.

17. The method of claim 15 in which the step of responding to the second signal further comprises a substep of denying the request if the privacy data indicates that the first workstation does not have sufficient access to the region to perform the operation requested by the second signal.

18. The method of claim 17 in which the substep of denying the request comprises a substep of performing a recovery operation other than the operation requested by the second signal.

19. A method of operating a system including a first workstation with a first display means, and a second workstation with a second display means; the system further including means for presenting a shared workspace on the first and second display means, presentation of the shared workspace producing the perception that a first workspace shown on the first display means is the same as a second workspace shown on the second display means, the shared workspace further being perceptible as including a region; the method comprising the steps of:

presenting the first workspace at the first display means, the first workspace including the region, the region being perceptible as having a position within the shared workspace and having a boundary that is within the shared workspace, the first workspace further including a display object within the region, the display object including a selectable unit that a user can select to request that the region be made private;

presenting the second workspace at the second display means, the second workspace including the region, the region being perceptible as having a position within the shared workspace and having a boundary that is within the shared workspace;

receiving a signal from the first workstation indicating user selection of the selectable unit;

in response to the signal, storing privacy data indicating that the region has a first level of privacy in the first workspace and a second level of privacy in the second workspace, the first and second levels of privacy being different.

20. The method of claim 19 in which the first above-mentioned region is further perceptible as including a second region within the first region; the privacy data further indicating that the second region has the first level of privacy in the first workspace and the second level of privacy in the second workspace; the method further comprising:

after the step of storing privacy data, receiving a second signal from the first workstation requesting an operation involving the second region; and

responding to the second signal based on the privacy data.

21. A method of operating a system including a first workstation with a first display means, and a second workstation with a second display means; the system further including means for presenting a shared workspace on the first and second display means; presentation of the shared workspace producing the perception that a first workspace shown on the first display means is the same as a second workspace shown on the second display means, the shared workspace further including a pointer, the shared workspace further being perceptible as including a region; the method comprising the steps of:

presenting the first workspace at the first display means, the first workspace including the region, the region being perceptible as having a position within the shared workspace and having a boundary that is within the shared workspace, the pointer being outside the region and visible in the first workspace;

presenting the second workspace at the second display means, the second workspace including the region, the region being perceptible as having a position within the shared workspace and having a boundary that is within the shared workspace, the pointer being outside the region;

receiving a first signal from the first workstation requesting that the region within the shared workspace be made private;

in response to the first signal, storing privacy data indicating the region has a first level of privacy in the first workspace and a second level of privacy in the second workspace, the first and second levels of privacy being different, so that the first workstation has sufficient access to move the pointer into the region, and the second workstation does not have sufficient access to move the pointer into the region;

receiving a second signal from the first workstation requesting movement of the pointer into the region; and

responding to the second signal based on the stored data indicating the level of privacy of the region.

22. The method of claim 21 in which the step of responding to the second signal comprises presenting the pointer in the region so that it is visible in the first workspace and not visible in the second workspace.

23. A method of operating a system including a first workstation with a first display means, and a second workstation with a second display means; the system further including means for presenting a navigable shared workspace on the first and second display means; presentation of the shared workspace producing the perception that a first workspace shown on the first display means is the same as a second workspace shown on the second display means, the shared workspace further being perceptible as including a region; the shared workspace further including a selectable transition unit for requesting transition to the region; the method comprising the steps of:

presenting the first workspace at the first display means, the first workspace including the selectable transition unit;

presenting the second workspace at the second display means, the second workspace including the region, the region being perceptible as having a position within the shared workspace and having a boundary that is within the shared workspace;

storing privacy data indicating that the region has a level of privacy so that the first workstation has sufficient access to make a transition to the region;

receiving a first signal from the first workstation indicating user selection of the selectable transition unit to request transition to the region;

responding to the first signal based on the privacy data by making a transition to the region so that the first workspace includes the region, the region being perceptible as having a position within the shared workspace and having a boundary that is within the shared workspace.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

The present invention relates to graphical user interface techniques for multiple users. More specifically, the invention relates to privacy within a shared workspace.

A number of techniques have been proposed for enabling multiple users to work together through a data processing system.

Stefik, M., Bobrow, D. G., Foster, G., Lanning, S., and Tatar, D., "WYSIWIS Revised: Early Experiences with Multiuser Interfaces," ACM Transactions on Office Information Systems, Vol. 5, No. 2 (April 1987), pp. 147-167, described multiuser interfaces that provide users with simultaneous, shared access to a database. Pages 149 and 158 described how such an interface may include both public or multiuser windows and private or single-user windows. The section beginning on page 152 deals with various relaxations of strict WYSIWIS ("what you see is what I see"--each user sees the same thing). Some WYSIWIS relaxations introduce privacy into public windows. Page 161 describes how certain display regions can be used primarily for the placement of private windows and how a density map can be used to show where private windows tend to be located without revealing their contents. Foster, G., Collaborative Systems and Multi-user Interfaces, Ph.D. Thesis, University of California, Computer Science Division, Report No. CSD/UCB 86/326, 1986, pp. 33-68, 87-90, and 121-132, discusses multi-user interfaces. Pages 36, in discussing time and space tradeoffs, mentions that an approach to the screen space problem is to allow private views of shared data. Pages 44-47 discuss WYSIWIS relaxations that permit private views of public objects, as well as private objects. FIG. 3.9 illustrates individual views of a shared model. Pages 87-89 describe busy signals to help avoid conflict between participants. As shown in FIG. 4.9, a busy item is greyed out in all views when being edited, moved, or grouped, warning other participants of the work in progress. Pages 121-132 discuss database management techniques to avoid conflict.

Trigg, R. H., Suchman, L. A., and Halasz, F. G., "Supporting Callaboration in NotesCards," Proceedings of the Conference on Computer-Supported Cooperative Work, Austin, Tex., Dec. 3-5 1986, pp. 153-162, described collaboration in a hypertext-based idea structuring system identified by the trademark NoteCards, a trademark of Xerox Corporation. Pages 155 describes basic features of the system, in which multiple cards can be simultaneously displayed on a screen, each card in a separate window. Pages 158-159 described simultaneous sharing of a notefile containing a number of cards, contrasting it with draft-passing and pointing out that real-time communication requires special mechanisms. In Distributed NoteCards, any number of users can simultaneously read and display a given card, but permission to modify the card is restricted to one user at a time. Garrett, L. N. Smith, K. E., and Meyrrowitz, N., "Intermedia: Issues, Strategies, and Tactics in the Design of a Hypermedia Document System," Proceedings of the Conference on Computer-Supported Cooperative Work, Austin, Tex., Dec. 3-5, 1986, pp. 163-174, describe Intermedia, a framework and collection of tools that allows authors to link together the contents of documents over a workstation network. Pages 171-173 describe a multi-user environment in which multiple authors would have simultaneous access to documents. Section 5.1 discusses accesses control to allow individuals working together to have full access to their shared data, while preventing those without permission from viewing or modifying such data. Read access allows the user to examine the content of a document and follow links; annotate access further allows the user to add links and modify the added links, but not to alter the content of the document; write access further allows the user to modify the content of the document. Similar access rights could apply to a web of documents. If contention management permits multiple writers, complex chalk-passing and synchronization protocols are required.

Sarin, S. and Greif, I., "Computer-Based Real-Time Conferencing Systems," Computer, October 1985, pp. 33-45, discuss a number of features or real-time conferencing systems. Page 33 draws a distinction between a shared space of each screen in which each participant sees the same information and private spaces on the screens that allow a participants to view relevant private data or compose and review information before submitting it to the shared space. FIG. 1, as described at page 35, illustrates shared and private spaces. Pages 37-39 discuss a number of design issues, including shared versus individual views, access control, and concurrency control. Under shared versus individual views, Sarin and Grief note that conference participants may want to view different parts of a large shared space, such as different documents or drawings, or different sections of a large document. Under concurrency control, they note that problems can be avoided by allowing only one participant at a time to update the shared space, which can be generalized by having participants set reservations on different parts of the shared space.

Fisher, S. S., McGrreevy, M., Humphries, J., and Robinett, W., "Virtual Environment Display System," presented at ACM Workshop on Interactive 3D Graphics, Chapel Hill, N.C., October 1986, describe a head-mounted, wide-angle, stereoscopic display system controlled by operation position, voice and gesture. This system provides a virtual environment, illustrated in FIG. 3, and FIG. 6 shows a virtual environment workstation. FIG. 9 illustrates how a three-dimensional graphic database of an articulated hand that, in the display environment, is spatially correspondent with the viewer's real hand and is directly controlled by an instrument glove device. This allows the operator to pick up and manipulate virtual objects that appear in the surrounding virtual environment. Similarly, as illustrated in FIG. 12, the operator can manipulate virtual objects to position, size, and activate multiple windows of information and simulated control panels. Page 9 mentions that one major research issue is definition of interface configurations for shared workspace environments in collaborative systems management.

Bolt, R. A., The Human Interface, Lifetime Learning Publications, Belmont, Calif., 1984, pp. 8-34, describes Dataland, a spatial data-management system for use in the Media Room, shown in FIGS. 2-1. FIGS. 2-5 shows how a large screen in the Media Room functions as a magnifying glass onto Dataland, an image of which appears on a smaller worldview monitor. Pages 21-25 describe CCA's system that can provide a set of information spaces with transistion points called ports between the spaces, as illustrated in FIGS. 2-16. One of the design issues discussed at pages 26-28 is the sharing of a Dataland with others users.

Herot, C. F., "Spatial Management of Data," ACM Transactions on Database Systems, Vol. 5, No. 4, December 1980, pp. 493-514, describes CCA's system in more detail. Page 494 discusses the simultaneous presentation of a world view, as in FIG. 3, and a detailed view of the data surface, as in FIGS. 4-7. Pages 506 describes a method of accessing videodisk data in which the user can zoom in on a particular icon to see an associated frame of videodisk data or a sequence of videodisk images.

Henderson, D. A., Jr., and Card, S. K., "Rooms: The Use of Multiple Virtual Workspaces to Reduce Space Contention in a Window-Based Graphical User Interface," ACM Transactions on Graphics, Vol. 5, No. 3, July 1986, pp. 211-243, describe various solutions to the problem of small computer display screens at pages 212-216. Page 215 discusses several system that provide a large virtual workspace in which the screen is treated as a movable viewport onto the workspace. Page 216 discuses the problem of navigation, or finding the way to information without getting lost, pointing out that systems with large virtual workspaces base much of their navigation on translating and zooming and may provide both global and local views. Pages 216-217 discuss the problem of simultaneous access to separated information, and mention that the same piece of information may be logically associated with more than one part of the workspace. Pages 221-237 discuss the design of a system called Rooms, a trademark of Xerox Corporation. Pages 237-241 discuss specific design issues, including the use of accelerators such as overviews and pop-up means for task switching in a large virtual workspace.

The Maze Wars video game is played by more than one player, with each player seeing two views of a maze. One view is a view of the maze from above, within which each player can see the walls of the entire maze as well as a special display feature representing that player's current position within the maze. The other view is a horizontal view from that player's current position, in which the player can see the surrounding walls and can also see a display feature representing another player's current position, but only if the other player's current position is not obscured by a maze wall.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

The present invention provide private region techniques that are especially useful within a shared workspace. Furthermore, techniques according to the invention are applicable in a navigable shared workspace in which each user can select a part of the workspace for viewing. For example, a private region according to the invention can be provided in a large shared virtual workspace within which each user can view a relatively small part of the workspace.

One aspect of the invention is based on the recognition of a basic problem in presenting a shared workspace at a number of workstation. Because each user can view any part of the workspace, no part of the workspace can be absolutely private, in the sense that it is completely hidden from other users. A user could have an additional, private workspace that is not part of the shared workspace, but if the user wishes to share the contents of the private workspace with other users, a cumbersome operation is typically necessary to transfer the contents into the shared workspace. Also, the user may be required to switch back and forth between working in the shared workspace and a private workspace in order to work in both workspaces. In short, conventional shared workspace techniques do not integrated privacy mechanisms into a shared workspace, but only allow a private workspace in parallel with a shared workspace.

This problem can be solved by treating a region within the shared workspace as private. In other words, even though any usedr can view any part of the shared workspace, a region within the shared workspace is different for different users, being private to some subset of the users. A user can request that such a region be made private. Such a request can be accelerated by presenting a previously created region with a selectable display unit that the user can select to request the region be made private. For example, a region can be defined by a boundary or frame that includes a button or similar display unit that the user can select to request privacy.

A closely related aspect of the invention is based on the recognition of a special problem in implementing privacy within a shared workspace in an object-oriented display system. In such a system, the content shared workspace can include a number of distinct display objects, such as icons, windows, physical objects, and so forth. A user may want to work privately on any one of these objects, but it would be difficult for the user interface designer and bewildering for the novice user if every type of object had a different privacy mechanism. Privacy mechanisms could be automatically inherited by new objects, based on the privacy mechanisms of objects on which they are based, but these inherited privacy mechanisms may not be appropriate or desirable and may encumber the interface to an object.

This problem can be solved with regions that can be made private and that can contain display objects. To make an object temporarily private, the user need only make a region private that contains that object or move the object into a private region, so that it is unnecessary for the object itself to have an independent privacy mechanism. Conversely, to share an object previously made private in this manner, the user need only make public the region that contains the object or move the object out of the region. This solution requires only that the designer provide a privacy mechanism for regions, and that a user learn how to use the privacy mechanism applicable to regions. It is unnecessary to provide special access protection for each new type of object that is created, and new objects will not be encumbered with inherited privacy mechanisms. Furthermore, this privacy mechanism can be applied to any set of objects that can be contained by a region, so that the entire set can be made public or private by making the region public or private.

This solution can be extended to produce a stronger form of privacy that is equivalent to a private display object or a private part of a display object.

This can be done, for example, in a user interface in which the user can modify the position, including the size and shape, of a region, and in which a region can be positioned in fixed relation to another display object, such as by putting region corner markers on top of the other object. To make an object private, the user can position the corners of a private region at the perimeter of the object. To make a part of an object private, the user can position the corners of a private region so that the region includes only the private part.

Another related aspect of the invention is based on the recognition of a special problem in implementing private regions in a system that presents a navigable virtual shared workspace. Such a system allows each user to select a part of the shared workspace for viewing, and various selection techniques could be used to permit a user to navigate within the workspace. But each user may have unique navigation requirements or preferences that differ from those of other users.

This problem can be solved by providing selectable display objects for accelerating navigation within a virtual workspace, conveniently referred to as teleporters. For example, teleporters can be paired so that when a user selects one of a pair of teleporters, the part of the shared workspace around the other of the pair of teleporters is presented on that user's display. Like other display objects, teleporters can be made private using private regions, so that each user can set up a private set of teleporters for navigating within the shared workspace. Even if one of a pair of teleporters is in a public part of the shared workspace, if the other is in a private region, a user without sufficient access to that private region is unable to use the teleporter in the public area to obtain access. These selectable display objects thus allow private navigation in a navigable shared virtual workspace.

Additional aspects of the invention are based on the recognition that different levels of privacy within a shared workspace are desirable in different situations. One level of privacy would limit visual access to a private region to one user. Another level of privacy would permit visual access by more than one user but limit access to modify the private region or its contents to one user. Yet another level of privacy would permit visual access by all users, but would limit access to modify the private region or its contents to a subset of users. A privacy mechanism that does not permit different levels of privacy will have limited usefulness.

This problem can be solved by allowing a user to select an appropriate level of privacy for a private region of a shared workspace. The level of privacy can be defined in part by indicating whether visual access is limited and, if so, to whom it is limited. Then, if visual access is not limited or is limited to a group that includes users at more than one workstation, the level of privacy can be further defined by indicating which users have access to modify the private region or its contents. Here again, a selectable display unit can be provided to accelerate selection of a level of privacy. For example, a display object marking a corner of the region can include one button to select private visual access and another button to select private access to modify.

This problem can further be solved by providing appropriate features to enforce the selected level of privacy. The private region can be presented differently at different workstations, with i