Modifying native document comments in a preview

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10198406-B2
Application number	US-201615389331-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Dec 22, 2016
Priority date	Oct 24, 2014
Publication date	Feb 5, 2019
Grant date	Feb 5, 2019

Abstract

A document preview system provides previews of a native document to client devices. The previews include comments associated with native objects in the native document. The document preview system identifies bounding areas in the preview associated with the native objects, which may be identified by the rendering markers applied to the native document prior to rendering. Using the bounding areas, the document preview system identifies comments for the native document and determines the location to display the comment using native objects associated with the comment. When a new comment is received from a user for a preview of a native document, the document preview system determines native objects for the new comment that match a user's selection for placing the new comment. The new comment is inserted with the native objects in the native document.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A computer-implemented method comprising:
generating, by a document system and for a native document, a set of rendering markers, each rendering marker associated with a different native object in the native document;
after generating the set of rendering markers, receiving, by the document system, a request to generate a preview of the native document, the preview representing the native document in a file format other than the file format of the native document; and
generating, by the document system, the preview of the native document, wherein generating the preview includes generating a bounding area for each of the rendering markers in the set of rendering markers, the bounding area mapping a location in the preview to the native object in the native document.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the request to generate the preview is received from a client device, and wherein the preview is generated responsive to receiving the request.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein the preview is generated prior to receipt of the request to generate the preview of the native document.

4. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
synchronizing the native document with one or more client devices; and
inserting the set of rendering markers into a copy of the native document;
wherein the set of rendering markers are identified and the preview is generated from the copy of the native document.

5. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
synchronizing the native document with one or more client devices; and
removing the set of rendering markers from the native document prior to synchronization.

6. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
identifying a comment in the native document;
determining at least one native object associated with the comment in the native document; and
determining a bounding area for the comment by combining the bounding areas for the rendering markers of the at least one native object associated with the comment.

7. The method of claim 1 , further comprising:
receiving a request to add a comment to the preview indicating a selected portion of the preview for the comment;
identifying a set of native objects corresponding to the selected portion of the preview by matching the selected portion to bounding areas associated with the identified set of native objects; and
inserting the comment in the native document at the identified set of native objects.

8. The method of claim 1 , wherein generating the set of rendering markers comprises:
generating a mapping table that maps an identity of each native object in the native document to a bounding area associated with the native object, the bounding area defining a pixel range within the native document associated with the native object.

9. The method of claim 1 , wherein the native objects are selected from a group consisting of characters, words, and sentences.

10. The method of claim 1 , wherein the bounding area for a native object accounts for formatting effects of the preview in the other file format during generation of the preview.

11. The method of claim 10 , wherein the formatting effects include format and page changes in the preview relative to the native document.

12. The method of claim 1 , wherein generating the preview further comprises generating metadata of the preview, the metadata including an identification of the bounding areas for each rendering marker in the native document.

13. A computer-implemented method comprising:
generating, by a document system and for a native document, a set of rendering markers, each rendering marker associated with a different native object in the native document;
after generating the set of rendering markers, receiving, by the document system, a request to add a comment to a preview indicating a selected portion of the preview for the comment; and
inserting, by the document system, the comment in the native document based on the set of rendering markers.

14. The method of claim 13 , wherein:
each rendering marker is associated with a bounding area in the preview mapping a location in the preview to a native object in the native document; and
identifying the set of rendering markers corresponding to the selected portion of the preview comprises:
identifying a set of bounding areas intersecting at least a portion of the selected portion of the preview and
determining the set of rendering markers corresponding to the identified set of bounding areas.

15. The method of claim 13 , wherein inserting the comment in the native document comprises:
identifying a set of native objects corresponding to the set of rendering markers; and
inserting the comment in association with the identified set of native objects.

16. A system comprising:
a processor configured to execute instructions;
a non-transitory computer-readable medium containing instructions that when executed by the processor cause the processor to perform steps of:
generating, by a document system and for a native document, a set of rendering markers, each rendering marker associated with a different native object in the native document;
after generating the set of rendering markers, receiving, by the document system, a request to generate a preview of the native document, the preview representing the native document in a file format other than the file format of the native document; and
generating, by the document system, the preview of the native document, wherein generating the preview includes generating a bounding area for each of the rendering markers in the set of rendering markers, the bounding area mapping a location in the preview to the native object in the native document.

17. The system of claim 16 , wherein the request to generate the preview is received from a client device, and wherein the preview is generated responsive to receiving the request.

18. The system of claim 16 , wherein the preview is generated prior to receipt of the request to generate the preview of the native document.

19. The system of claim 16 , wherein the instructions further cause the processor to perform steps of:
synchronizing the native document with one or more client devices; and
inserting the set of rendering markers into a copy of the native document;
wherein the set of rendering markers are identified and the preview is generated from the copy of the native document.

20. The system of claim 16 , wherein the instructions further cause the processor to perform steps of:
synchronizing the native document with one or more client devices; and
removing the set of rendering markers from the native document prior to synchronization.

21. The system of claim 16 , wherein the instructions further cause the processor to perform steps of:
identifying a comment in the native document;
determining at least one native object associated with the comment in the native document; and
determining a bounding area for the comment by combining the bounding areas for the rendering markers of the at least one native object associated with the comment.

22. The system of claim 16 , wherein the instructions further cause the processor to perform steps of:
receiving a request to add a comment to the preview indicating a selected portion of the preview for the comment;
identifying a set of native objects corresponding to the selected portion of the preview by matching the selected portion to bounding areas associated with the identified set of native objects; and

Assignees

• Dropbox Inc

Inventors

• Pan Matteus
• Greze Jean-Denis
• Horn Daniel
• Hu Bo
• Chan Richard W
• Yang Andy
• Rha Philip
• Somani Adhiraj

Classifications

• G06F40/169

  Annotation, e.g. comment data or footnotes · CPC title

• G06F40/103

  Formatting, i.e. changing of presentation of documents (automatic justification G06F40/189; automatic line break hyphenation G06F40/191) · CPC title

• G06F40/106 Primary

  Display of layout of documents; Previewing · CPC title

• G06F17/212 Primary

  Physics · mapped topic

• G06F17/241

  Physics · mapped topic