A tree view or tree navigator is used to display hierarchical data organized in the form of a tree. In a tree structure there are parent and child nodes. The child nodes may further have descendants to n levels.

There are many methods to make the navigation easy. Some of these are expanding and collapsing branches, splitting the tree, displaying a parent node in a separate tree, zooming branches, scrolling in various directions etc. It is still a difficult exercise to handle large trees efficiently. The effort still continues to manage large number of nodes with faster speed, greater control, user friendliness and aesthetics.

This article illustrates five inventions on tree navigators selected from US patent database. Each of them tries to solve various problems relating to the tree navigator in different ways. Each invention is also analyzed from a TRIZ perspective.

The dialog boxes are useful in case of displaying warnings, errors, confirmations etc. in special situations. A typical dialog box is displayed in a small window with some text message along with a few options for the user to select. However, there are certain difficulties associated in programming and implementing a conventional dialog box, such as, severe programming effort, rigidity of the hard coded message, obscuring screen space and so on. There is a need to overcome these difficulties of the dialog box to make them more efficient and useful.

The modality of the dialog boxes also creates some limitations. While modal dialog boxes needs to be closed explicitly by the user, modeless dialog boxes can grow in number and become difficult to control. Thus, an ideal dialog box should be deprived of all the above-mentioned drawbacks. The dialog box should not obscure the screen. The user should be able open multiple dialog boxes but without obscuring the screen.

This article analyses 5 interesting inventions on dialog boxes selected from US Patent database. Each invention tries to overcome some limitations of a conventional dialog box and provides some positive features. Each solution is also analyzed from a TRIZ perspective.

The conventional GUI is more mechanical and does not recognize or communicate emotions. The modern GUIs are trying to infer the likely emotional state and personality of the user and communicate through a corresponding emotional state.

Emotions are expressed in graphical icons, sounds, pictures and other means. The emotions are found to be useful in especially in communication software, interactive learning systems, robotics and other adaptive environments. Various mechanisms have been developed to express emotions through graphical user interfaces. This article illustrates some interesting inventions selected from US patent database.