Patent ID: 7058905

Claim:
In a computer system, a method of presenting information associated with a hierarchy comprising the steps of: creating a first display area, said first display area displaying a first node of said hierarchy, the hierarchy being of a file system; creating a second display area, said second display area presenting a plurality of child nodes of said first node; performing the following when one of said plurality of child nodes in said second display area is selected: updating said first display area to include said one of said plurality of child nodes; and updating said second display area to display a plurality of nodes in place of said plurality of child nodes, said plurality of nodes being the child nodes of said selected child node, and wherein said step of updating said second display area further includes the steps of: determining whether said child node is a leaf node of said hierarchy; and removing said second display area, if said child node is a leaf node; wherein the step of performing further includes resizing said first display area to eliminate any unused display space and allowing the second display area to expand into the space not used by the fist display space.