Patent Publication Number: US-2009237389-A1

Title: Picture displaying method and apparatus of a personal information terminal

Description:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 
     1. Field of the Invention 
     The present invention relates to picture displaying method and apparatus of a personal information terminal such as PDA (Personal Digital Assistant), more particularly, to method and apparatus of displaying a picture if a personal information terminal is in power-off mode or in nonuse state when an external AC power is being supplied. 
     2. Description of the Related Art 
     A lately-developed PDA, which is being widely used, has a variety of functions such as private schedule management, calculator, electronic notepad, and MP3-formatted audio data player. 
     The small-sized PDA is easy to carry and it has a relatively wide LCD for its small size and a touch screen as an input device. A user carrying the PDA can check or confirm necessary information through the wide LCD easily and enter data or choose a desired function through the touch screen. 
     And, the PDA equips with a rechargeable battery which is conveniently charged through an additional AC charging cradle while the PDA is placed thereon. The rechargeable battery supplies an electric energy for the PDA while it is carried by a user. 
     The personal information terminal such as PDA, in general, conducts a power save operation to reduce power consumption. In conducting a power save operation, conditions such as time determining when to enter a power save mode are necessary.  FIG. 1  shows an illustrative menu screen for setting power save mode entering periods. The time  101  set in the ‘On Battery Power’ item specifies that the system should enter a power save mode if the personal information terminal is continuously unused during the time  101  under the condition that a rechargeable battery supplies an electric energy. The time  102  set in the ‘On External Power’ item indicates that the system should enter a power save mode if continuously unused during the time  102  under the condition that an external power is fed. 
     In a power save mode, elements consuming much electric energy, e.g., an LCD backlight is turned off. The operation-suspended elements are turned on again on an input. 
     And, even though a user touches an On/Off button to turn off the personal information terminal, the power supply from a battery or an external AC power for internal elements is not completely cut off. Instead, the operation mode is changed to operation-suspended state, namely, power save mode. Thus, the personal information terminal can still detect in a power-off state whether there is an input, e.g., data inputs or AC power supply. 
     As explained above, the personal information terminal changes its operation mode to power save mode if any input is not entered for a predetermined time even under the condition that an external AC power is supplied, and returns to normal operation mode, namely, power-on state the moment any input is detected. 
     However, the personal information terminal with such a function of power save operation can not be used for other purpose, e.g., a picture frame. 
     SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION 
     It is an object of the present invention to provide apparatus and method of using a personal information terminal as a picture frame by presenting a picture on a wide displaying unit of a personal information terminal after reading pre-stored video data constituting the picture when an external AC power is supplied. 
     A method of displaying a picture on a personal information terminal in accordance with the present invention is characterized in that it comprises the steps of: monitoring whether an external power is supplied or not; reading picture data from storage means if the personal information terminal is in power-off or nonuse state under the condition that an external power is supplied; and displaying the read picture data. 
     A picture displaying apparatus embedded in a personal information terminal in accordance with the present invention is characterized in that it comprises: a power supplier for receiving an electric energy from an external power source; a data storage storing picture data; a data displayer for reading and displaying the stored picture data; and a controller checking whether or not the external power source is supplied through the power supplier if a current operation state is power-off or nonuse state, and controlling the data displayer to read and display the stored picture data, based on the checked result. 
    
    
     
       BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS  
       The accompanying drawings, which are included to provide a further understanding of the present invention, illustrate the preferred embodiments of the invention, and together with the description, serve to explain the principles of the present invention, and wherein: 
         FIG. 1  shows an illustrative menu screen for setting power save mode entering periods; 
         FIG. 2  is a block diagram of a personal information terminal which a picture displaying apparatus of the present invention is embedded in; 
         FIG. 3  is a flow chart of an embodiment of a picture displaying method conducted by a personal information terminal in accordance with the present invention; 
         FIG. 4  shows an illustrative menu screen including a combo box for setting a picture display initiating period; and 
         FIG. 5  shows an illustrative structure of picture mode configuring information according to the present invention. 
     
    
    
     DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFFERRED EMBODIMENT 
     In order that the invention may be fully understood, a preferred embodiment thereof will now be described with reference to the accompanying drawings. 
       FIG. 2  is a block diagram of a personal information terminal which an apparatus conducting a picture displaying method in accordance with the present invention is embedded in. The personal information terminal  100  of  FIG. 2  comprises a displaying unit  1  displaying various menu items, information, and pictures; a memory  7  storing data including video data constituting at least one picture; a video processor  2  reading and processing the stored video data to convert it to display-suitable format; a video RAM  3  storing the converted data of display-suitable format; a touch screen  4  and a touch screen driver  5  detecting user&#39;s pointing on a displaying plane and selecting of the menu items displayed on the displaying unit  1 ; a controlling unit  6  including a CPU supervising all elements and conducting user&#39;s commands entered through the touch screen  4 , etc.; a rechargeable battery  8 ; a power connecting unit  10  equipping with DC power contacts connectable with DC power feeding taps of an additional AC charging cradle  200 ; a power supplying unit  9  supplying all or selected elements with an electric energy from the rechargeable battery  8  or from the DC power contacts of the power connecting unit  10 ; and a USB interface  11  conducting serial data communication with an external device such as a personal computer (PC). 
     When the personal information terminal  100  is placed onto the AC charging cradle  200 , which transforms an external AC power to a desired DC power, it is fed with an electric energy by the AC charging cradle  200  through the power connecting unit  10 . This DC power supplying state through the power connecting unit  10  is called ‘external power supplying mode’ in general. 
       FIG. 3  is a flow chart of an embodiment of a picture displaying method of a personal information terminal in accordance with the present invention. The procedure of  FIG. 3  conducted by the personal information terminal of  FIG. 2  is explained in detail below. 
     First, the controlling unit  6  checks whether system state is power-on or power-off mode (S 01 ) . If power-off state, the controlling unit  6  also checks whether or not an external power is being supplied (S 04 ). If not supplied, the controlling unit  6  makes the system enter operation-suspended mode (S 07 ) after conducting data backup for the data in the video memory  3  and in a system area of the memory  7  and values of all registers, and waits until any input is entered (S 08 ). 
     In the operation-suspended mode, if any input, e.g., press of Power On/Off button or any function button, or touch on the touch screen  4  is detected (S 09 ), the controlling unit  6  changes its operation mode to power-on (S 12 ) , and restores the memory  7  and all registers (S 13 ) with the data backed up in the step S 08 . Afterwards, the controlling unit  6  conducts a suitable work to process the detected input (S 14 ). 
     Even in the power-on state, the controlling unit  6  keeps checking whether there is any input (S 02 ). If no input state continues for a predetermined time (S 03 ), then, the controlling unit  6  checks whether an external power is being supplied (S 04 ). If not supplied, it makes the system enter operation-suspended mode as aforementioned (S 07 ). The predetermined time may be equal to the time set for turnover to power save mode or may be set through an additional menu screen shown in  FIG. 4  for specifying non-using time  401  to initiate picture display. 
     If an external power is being supplied (S 04 ) in power-off state (S 01 ) or at the time after the predetermined time elapses (S 03 ), the controlling unit  6  conducts data backup (S 05 ) and makes the system enter picture displaying mode (S 06 ). 
     In addition, when an external power starts to be supplied while checking whether there is any input in power-off state (S 09 , S 10 ), the controlling unit  6  also makes the system enter picture displaying mode (S 06 ) after changing the operation mode to power-on state (S 11 ) Entering picture displaying mode, the controlling unit  6  deactivates PM (Power Management) module, first (S 101 ). This is why no input during a time conditioning power save mode turnover causes the system to enter operation-suspended mode automatically if the PM module is in active. After deactivating the PM module, the controlling unit  6  analyzes picture mode configuring information stored in the memory  7  (S 102 ). All fields of the picture mode configuring information has been set or selected by a user. 
       FIG. 5  shows an illustrative structure of the picture mode configuring information. Each entry of the picture mode configuring information is composed of five fields of a flag  500  indicative of whether or not to display picture data of a corresponding entry; a software identifier  501  identifying a software to decode picture data of a corresponding entry; an address  502  pointing a location of corresponding picture data; a displaying manner  503  indicating how to display picture data; and display configuration  504  defining conditions for displaying picture data. 
     The picture data has been stored in the memory  7  after being receiving from outside through the USB interface  11  beforehand, otherwise, it starts to be downloaded from outside through the USB interface  11  on entrance of picture display mode and then is displayed onto the displaying unit  1 . For the latter way, the software identifier field is filled in with a decoding program ‘SeeInternet’ capable of accessing directly source data located in a network, and the address field is filled in with URL (Universal Resource Locator) information pointing uniquely store position in a global network. 
     The software ‘SeeInternet’ can be easily programmed using disclosed and well-known data decoding and network accessing technology. 
     In picture displaying mode, a plurality of pictures may be displayed. In case of plural pictures, the display manner field  503  specifies a method on how to display the plural pictures. Two exemplary displaying manners are ‘Multi’ and ‘Slide’ way. In the ‘Multi’ way, all pictures are displayed simultaneously in divided sub-windows of a full screen, and in the ‘Slide’ way, all pictures are sequentially displayed in a full screen at regular intervals. Besides the ‘Multi’ and ‘Slide’ way, there may be various different displaying ways. 
     In addition, hardware (H/W) setting information including screen condition for displaying pictures is written in the display configuration field  504 . For example, information indicative of whether to turn on or off a backlight of the displaying unit  1  is written in the field  504 . Moreover, information about how to set other H/W not used for displaying pictures may be written in the field  504 , too. 
     In the analyzing process of the picture mode configuring information, the controlling unit  6  checks what entries are set to be displayed based on their respective flags  500  which are selectively set in advance by a user. If a single entry is set to be displayed, the controlling unit  6  loads a software specified by the software identifier of the entry into the memory  7  and executes it while delivering the number of pictures to be displayed and each start and end address of the pictures to the identified software. Then, the executed software reads picture data from an area addressed by the received address and decodes it (S 103 ) .The decoded data is then stored in the video memory  3  of which data is presented onto the displaying unit  1  (S 104 ). At this time, the executed software writes the decoded picture data in the video memory  3  in accordance with the displaying way specified by the displaying manner field  503 . 
     In the meantime, the H/W of the displaying unit  1  has been already set to the state specified by the field  504  by the controlling unit  6 . 
     If plural entries of the picture mode configuring information are set to be displayed, the controlling unit  6  changes the displayed picture with a next picture whenever a predetermined time elapses. For picture change, the controlling unit  6  searches the picture mode configuring information for a next flag-set entry. If found, the controlling unit  6  conducts the same operations as explained above, thus, a suitable software specified by the software identifier  501  of the next entry decodes corresponding picture data (S 104 - 1 ) and presents a new picture on the displaying unit (S 104 ) in accordance with conditions defined by the fields  503  and  504  thereof. 
     The above picture displaying operations for all flag-set entries are conducted continuously and circularly. If an input is entered from a user (S 105 ) while displaying pictures like that, the controlling unit  6  releases the picture displaying mode to delete picture data in the video memory  3  (S 106 ), to activate the PM module again (S 107 ) , and to restore resources with the backed-up data (S 13 ) Afterwards, the controlling unit  6  conducts normal operation to process various inputs (S 14 ). 
     In the above-explained embodiment, the PM module is deactivated the moment the picture displaying mode begins. However, instead of deactivating the PM module, it may be possible to set system hardware excluding picture display related hardware to be subject to power management. Information for this partial power save setting is written in the display configuration field  504  of the picture mode configuration information as aforementioned. 
     In general, the PM module conducts power save operations for an LCD and a backlight of the displaying unit  1 , a CPU, and chipsets of peripheral devices such as the USB interface  11 , etc. However, the display configuration field  504  may specify that power save operation is conducted for an CPU and chipsets of peripheral devices and not for an LCD and backlight of the displaying unit  1  and the video processor  2 . 
     Through this partial power save, power consumption is somewhat reduced in the picture displaying mode, enabling faster battery recharge from an external power source, 
     The above-explained picture displaying method and apparatus of the present invention presents user&#39;s favorite picture or pictures on a displaying unit in nonuse state under the condition that an external power is supplied, whereby a user can feel sentimental emotion from a dry machine. 
     It will be apparent to those skilled in the art that various modifications and variations can be made in the present invention without departing from the spirit or scope of the invention. Thus, it is intended that the present invention cover the modifications and variations of this invention provided they come within the scope of the appended claims and their equivalents.