Automatically orientating a map according to the map's natural viewing orientation

• Main Author: Blumenberg, Christopher
• Format: Patent
• Language: English
• Published: 19.06.2018
• Subjects: ADVERTISING; APPLIANCES FOR TEACHING, OR COMMUNICATING WITH, THE BLIND,DEAF OR MUTE; CALCULATING; COMPUTING; COUNTING; CRYPTOGRAPHY; DIAGRAMS; DISPLAY; EDUCATION; EDUCATIONAL OR DEMONSTRATION APPLIANCES; ELECTRIC DIGITAL DATA PROCESSING; GLOBES; GYROSCOPIC INSTRUMENTS; MEASURING; MEASURING DISTANCES, LEVELS OR BEARINGS; NAVIGATION; PHOTOGRAMMETRY OR VIDEOGRAMMETRY; PHYSICS; PLANETARIA; SEALS; SURVEYING; TESTING

Some embodiments provide a device that automatically orients and displays a map of a region according to the natural viewing orientation of the map. In some embodiments, the device examines data associated with the map to determine whether it can identify a natural viewing orientation of the map that differs from the geographic orientation of the map. When the device is able to identify such a natural viewing orientation, it displays the map according to this natural viewing orientation instead of the geographic orientation of the map. On the other hand, when the device is not able to identify a natural viewing orientation that differs from the geographic orientation, the device displays the map according to its geographic orientation. In some embodiments, the geographic orientation of the map is north-up orientation (where north is up (e.g., top center of the page), south is down, west is left, and east is right). In other embodiments, the geographic orientation of the map can be another orientation that is set by one of the geographic directions, such as south-up map orientation, where south is up, north is down, east is left and west is right.