Patent ID: 7487444

Claim:
A method for viewing an electronic document on a display, the method comprising: accessing an electronic document to be presented on a display, the electronic document including a header, a body, and a colophon, wherein the body includes multiple columns of electronic content; identifying a first column of electronic content included in the electronic document; identifying a second column of electronic content included in the electronic document; detecting a horizontal alignment, in the electronic document, between the first column of electronic content and the second column of electronic content; identifying a width of the first column of electronic content and a width of the second column of electronic content; identifying a width of a portion of the display in which at least one of the multiple columns is to be presented; comparing the width of the first column of electronic content to the width of the portion of the display; comparing the width of the second column of electronic content to the width of the portion of the display; determining, based on results of the comparisons, that the width of at least one of the first column of electronic content and the second column of electronic content exceeds the width of the portion of the display; formatting, based on the determination, the first column of electronic content and the second column of electronic content for presentation in the portion of the display such that the width of each of the first column of electronic content and the second column of electronic content is equal to or less than the width of the portion of the display; accessing data reflecting the detected horizontal alignment between the first column and the second column in the electronic document; and reformatting the electronic document for presentation in the portion of the display by aligning, in the reformatted document, the formatted first column of electronic content and the formatted second column of electronic content based on the detected horizontal alignment between the first column and the second column in the electronic document such that the horizontal alignment between the formatted first column and the formatted second column in the reformatted electronic document corresponds to the horizontal alignment between the first column and the second column in the electronic document.