Patent ID: 7451181

Claim:
An apparatus for controlling a shared screen for a plurality of shared applications, which can be shared in a network system of a plurality of connected communication terminals, with other communication terminals while running on different terminals among the terminals, the apparatus comprising: communication terminals comprising a window information acquiring unit acquiring window information of each of the applications to be shared while running on the different terminals, a shared window information managing unit managing the acquired window information of the applications to be shared and a window controlling unit controlling how windows are displayed on said communication terminals, wherein the shared window information managing unit manages a display layering order for displaying shared applications while running on the different terminals among the terminals, and said window controlling unit displays a window of shared space for displaying windows of shared applications collectively as sub-windows based on the display layering order, and detects an operation input to a window in the window of shared space and if the window is not an uppermost window in the window of shared space, updates the display layering order so that the window is displayed as an uppermost window in the window of shared space, and notifies other communication terminals of the updated display layering order to change the display layering order at the other communication terminals.