Partial snapshots for creating generalized snapshots

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9992379-B2
Application number	US-201415115365-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Apr 10, 2014
Priority date	Apr 10, 2014
Publication date	Jun 5, 2018
Grant date	Jun 5, 2018

Abstract

Example embodiments relate to partial snapshots for creating generalized snapshots. An example method may include, in response to an event, accessing a user interface screen or view associated with an application. The screen or view includes multiple pixels arranged over an area. The method may include sampling the multiple pixels by capturing a portion of the total pixels included in the screen or view. The sampling may include maintaining a dispersion of the captured pixels over the area of the screen or view and preventing clustering of captured pixels within sub-areas of the area. The method may include transmitting the captured portion as a partial snapshot to a system to create a generalized snapshot from the partial snapshot and other partial snapshots.

First claim

The invention claimed is:

1. A method for creating a partial snapshot, the method comprising:
in response to an event, accessing, by a processor, a user interface screen or view associated with an application, wherein the screen or view includes multiple pixels arranged over an area, wherein a group of the multiple pixels are arranged to form human-readable text;
sampling, by the processor, the multiple pixels by capturing a portion of the multiple pixels included in the screen or view, wherein the sampling includes maintaining a dispersion of the captured pixels over the area of the screen or view to prevent capture of a sufficient number of the group of the multiple pixels to recreate the human-readable text from the sampled multiple pixels and preventing clustering of captured pixels within sub-areas of the area; and
transmitting, by the processor, the captured portion as a partial snapshot to a system, the system being to create a generalized snapshot from the partial snapshot and other partial snapshots received from other clients.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the sampling includes dividing the screen or view into multiple cells, and wherein the captured portion of the multiple pixels includes an equal number of pixels from each of the cells.

3. The method of claim 2 , wherein the multiple cells are arranged in a grid arrangement over the area of the screen or view.

4. The method of claim 2 , wherein, for each cell, the captured pixels are chosen at random locations within the cell.

5. The method of claim 2 , wherein, for each cell, the captured pixels are chosen at locations within the cell that correspond to relative locations of captured pixels in the other cells.

6. The method of claim 1 , wherein the sampling includes selecting scan lines across the screen or view, wherein each scan line is a horizontal or vertical line of pixels, and the spacing between the scan lines is selected randomly.

7. The method of claim 1 , further comprising assigning a classification to the partial screenshot according to one or more of the following:
a particular user interface screen;
a particular user interface screen view;
a particular clock time or timestamp; and
a particular user action related to an application user interface.

8. The method of claim 7 , wherein the transmission includes transmitting the classification to the system.

9. A computing device for creating a partial snapshot, the computing device comprising:
a processor;
a machine-readable storage medium on which is stored instructions that are to cause the processor to:
detect an event;
access, in response to the detected event, a user interface screen or view associated with an application, wherein the screen or view includes multiple pixels arranged over an area, wherein a group of the multiple pixels are arranged to form human-readable text; and
sample the multiple pixels by capturing a portion of the total pixels included in the screen or view, wherein the sampling includes maintaining a dispersion of the captured pixels over the area of the screen or view to capture the group of the multiple pixels at a sufficiently low resolution to prevent recreation of the human-readable text from the sampled multiple pixels and preventing clustering of captured pixels within sub-areas of the area; and
transmit the captured portion as a partial snapshot to a system, the system being to create a generalized snapshot from the partial snapshot and other partial snapshots received from other clients.

10. The computing device of claim 9 , wherein the event is one or more of the following:
a particular user action related to the user interface of the application; and
a particular clock time or timestamp.

11. The computing device of claim 9 , wherein to sample the multiple pixels, the instructions are further to cause the processor to divide the screen or view into multiple cells, and wherein the captured portion of the multiple pixels includes an equal number of pixels from each of the cells.

12. The computing device of claim 11 , wherein the multiple cells are arranged in a grid arrangement over the area of the screen or view.

13. A non-transitory machine-readable storage medium encoded with instructions for creating a partial snapshot, the instructions executable by a processor of a computing device to cause the computing device to:
access, in response to an event, a user interface screen or view associated with an application, wherein the screen or view includes multiple pixels arranged over an area;
sample the multiple pixels by capturing a portion of the total pixels included in the screen or view, wherein the sampling includes maintaining a dispersion of the captured pixels over the area of the screen or view and preventing clustering of captured pixels within sub-areas of the area, and wherein the sampling includes selecting scan lines across the screen or view, wherein each scan line is a horizontal or vertical line of pixels, and the spacing between the scan lines is selected randomly; and
transmit the captured portion as a partial snapshot to a system, the system being to create a generalized snapshot from the partial snapshot and other partial snapshots received from other clients.

14. The machine-readable storage medium of claim 13 , wherein the instructions are further executable by a processor of the computing device to cause the computing device to assign a classification to the partial screenshot according to one or more of the following:
a particular user interface screen,
a particular user interface screen view
a particular clock time or timestamp, and
a particular user action related to an application user interface;
wherein the transmission includes transmitting the classification to the system.

15. The computing device of claim 9 , wherein to sample the multiple pixels, the instructions are further to cause the processor to select scan lines across the screen or view, wherein each scan line is a horizontal or vertical line of pixels, and the spacing between the scan lines is selected randomly.

Assignees

• Hewlett Packard Entpr Dev Lp
• Entit Software Llc

Inventors

• Amichai Nitsan
• Shuvali Haim
• Gopshtein Michael

Classifications

• H04N25/441

  by reading contiguous pixels from selected rows or columns of the array, e.g. interlaced scanning · CPC title

• H04N1/448 Primary

  Rendering the image unintelligible, e.g. scrambling · CPC title

• G06F2201/86

  Event-based monitoring · CPC title

• H04N25/445

  by skipping some contiguous pixels within the read portion of the array · CPC title

• H04N25/443

  by reading pixels from selected two-dimensional [2D] regions of the array, e.g. for windowing or digital zooming · CPC title