Patent ID: 6853980

Claim:
A method performed by computing machinery for enabling a user to select a font comprising: storing information about each of a set of fonts, including a value of each of a plurality of attributes for each such font, which attributes, and the values of such attributes, define a multi-dimensional font space in which each of said fonts has a position; providing a font-selection user interface that enables a user to select a font from said font space; responding to a user selection of a font through the font selection interface by making the selected font the currently selected font, including using the stored attribute values of the currently selected font to define a currently selected point in said multi-dimensional font space; and then performing the following sequence one or more times: providing a spatial-specification user interface that enables the user to select a spatial specification relative to said currently selected point from among a plurality of such spatial specifications, each of which user-selectable spatial specifications defines a sub-portion of said font space defined by position relative to the currently selected point, with different spatial specifications defining sub-portions of said font space with different displacements in different dimensions of said space relative to the currently selected point; responding to a user selection of a spatial specification through said spatial-specification interface by making the selected spatial specification the current spatial specification; searching to find which one or more fonts, if any, are in the sub-portion of the font space defined by the currently selected spatial specification; displaying one or more character-font shapes of the one or more fonts found by the search to be in the current spatial specification's sub-portion of the font space; and—making one of the said displayed fonts in the current specification's sub-portion of the font space the new currently selected font relative to which a new spatial specification can be selected by said spatial-specification interface, including using the stored attribute values of the new currently selected font to define a new currently selected point in said multi-dimensional font space.