1. An endoscope apparatus comprising:
a focus control section that performs a focus control process that controls a plurality of in-focus object plane positions by controlling an optical system, the plurality of in-focus object plane positions being set discretely;
a switch control section that switches the focus control process performed by the focus control section between an autofocus control process and a manual focus control process, the in-focus object plane position being automatically controlled when the focus control section performs the autofocus control process, and manually controlled when the focus control section performs the manual focus control process; and
an operation section that is operated by a user,
when the operation section has been operated by the user during a period in which the focus control section performs the autofocus control process,
the switch control section switching the focus control process performed by the focus control section from the autofocus control process to the manual focus control process, and
the focus control section moving the in-focus object plane position to an in-focus object plane position among the plurality of in-focus object plane positions that differs from the in-focus object plane position when the operation section has been operated by the user.
2. The endoscope apparatus as defined in claim 1,
the switch control section switching the focus control process performed by the focus control section from the autofocus control process to the manual focus control process based on a single operation that has been performed by the user on the operation section during a period in which the focus control section performs the autofocus control process, and
the focus control section moving the in-focus object plane position based on the single operation to an in-focus object plane position among the plurality of in-focus object plane positions that is adjacent to the in-focus object plane position when the single operation has been performed.
3. The endoscope apparatus as defined in claim 2,
when the operation section has been operated by the user after the switch control section has switched the focus control process performed by the focus control section from the autofocus control process to the manual focus control process, the focus control section moving the in-focus object plane position to an in-focus object plane position among the plurality of in-focus object plane positions that differs from the in-focus object plane position when the operation section has been operated, and also differs from the in-focus object plane position that is adjacent to the in-focus object plane position when the operation section has been operated.
4. The endoscope apparatus as defined in claim 1, further comprising:
a scene-change detection section that detects a scene change from image signals generated by the endoscope apparatus,
when the scene-change detection section has detected a scene change after the switch control section has switched the focus control process performed by the focus control section from the autofocus control process to the manual focus control process, the switch control section switching the focus control process performed by the focus control section from the manual focus control process to the autofocus control process.
5. The endoscope apparatus as defined in claim 1,
the operation section including a one-way switch, and
the focus control section moving the in-focus object plane position to an in-focus object plane position among the plurality of in-focus object plane positions that differs from the in-focus object plane position when the operation section has been operated, when the one-way switch has been operated once.
6. The endoscope apparatus as defined in claim 1,
the operation section including a two-way switch,
the two-way switch being a switch that is moved from a standard position to a first position, or moved from the standard position to a second position when operated once by the user, the first position being a position that differs from the standard position, and the second position being a position that differs from the standard position and the first position, and
the focus control section moving the in-focus object plane position to an in-focus object plane position among the plurality of in-focus object plane positions that differs from the in-focus object plane position when the operation section has been operated, when the two-way switch has been operated once.
7. The endoscope apparatus as defined in claim 4, further comprising:
an elapsed time measurement section that measures an elapsed time after the switch control section has switched the focus control process performed by the focus control section to the manual focus control process,
the switch control section switching the focus control process performed by the focus control section to the autofocus control process when the scene-change detection section has detected a scene change when the focus control section performs the manual focus control process, and the elapsed time measured by the elapsed time measurement section is larger than a given threshold value.
8. The endoscope apparatus as defined in claim 1,
the switch control section setting the focus control process performed by the focus control section to the autofocus control process when the endoscope apparatus starts operation.
9. The endoscope apparatus as defined in claim 1,
first to Nth (N is an integer equal to or larger than 2) in-focus object plane positions being set discretely as the plurality of in-focus object plane positions, and a distance from the optical system to an (i+1)-th (1\u2266i\u2266N\u22121) in-focus object plane position being longer than a distance from the optical system to an i-th in-focus object plane position,
the focus control section including a moving amount setting section that sets moving amount information that indicates an amount of change in the in-focus object plane position when the operation section has been operated by the user, and
the focus control section performing the autofocus control process by changing the in-focus object plane position from the i-th in-focus object plane position to an (i+k)-th (k is an integer other than 0) in-focus object plane position corresponding to an operation performed on the operation section when information that designates k has been set as the moving amount information.
10. The endoscope apparatus as defined in claim 9,
the moving amount setting section setting information that designates \u2212k as the moving amount information when i+k<1 or i+k>N is satisfied, and
the focus control section performing the autofocus control process by changing the in-focus object plane position from the i-th in-focus object plane position to an (i\u2212k)-th in-focus object plane position corresponding to the operation performed on the operation section.
11. The endoscope apparatus as defined in claim 10,
the moving amount setting section setting information that designates 1 or \u22121 as the moving amount information k.
12. The endoscope apparatus as defined in claim 10, the moving amount setting section setting the moving amount information k based on an external input.
13. The endoscope apparatus as defined in claim 9,
the focus control section changing the in-focus object plane position from the i-th in-focus object plane position to the (i+k)-th in-focus object plane position when the operation section has been operated by the user when the focus control section performs the autofocus control process, and the switch control section has switched the focus control process performed by the focus control section to the manual focus control process.
14. A method for controlling an endoscope apparatus that controls a plurality of in-focus object plane positions by controlling an optical system, the plurality of in-focus object plane positions being set discretely, the method comprising:
receiving an operation performed by a user;
switching a focus control process between an autofocus control process and a manual focus control process, and moving the in-focus object plane position based on the received operation performed by the user, the in-focus object plane position being automatically controlled when the autofocus control process is performed, and manually controlled when the manual focus control process is performed; and
when the operation performed by the user has been received during a period in which the autofocus control process is performed, switching the focus control process from the autofocus control process to the manual focus control process, and moving the in-focus object plane position to an in-focus object plane position among the plurality of in-focus object plane positions that differs from the in-focus object plane position when the operation performed by the user has been received.
The claims below are in addition to those above.
All refrences to claim(s) which appear below refer to the numbering after this setence.
1. A method of validating results of a host search engine, said method including the steps of:
scanning all data objects deliverable via a web interface; and
executing a matching engine to generate a report set containing content missed by said host search engine.
2. A method according to claim 1 wherein the step of scanning data objects includes creating an index of all the scanned data objects.
3. A method according to claim 1 or wherein the data objects may include any one or more of the following:
a. Words;
b. Pages;
c. Images;
d. Text;
e. Links;
f. Meta data;
g. Scripts;
h. Documents; or
i. Properties of documents
4. A method according to claim 2 wherein the contents of the index is ordered according to the uniqueness of the data object.
5. A method according to claim 4 wherein the uniqueness of the data object is determined by a density analysis of the data object.
6. A method according to claim 5 wherein the data object is words and the density analysis takes into account any one or more of the following:
a. Frequency of occurrence;
b. Relative importance of context; or
c. Proximity to other topics;
7. A method according to claim 1 wherein the matching engine submits data objects obtained from the scanning step to the host search engine.
8. A method according to claim 7 wherein the data objects submitted to the host search engine are restricted to unique data objects.
9. A method according to claim 1 wherein the report set includes information sufficient to identify the specific web site pages that contain missed data.
10. A method according to claim 1 wherein the matching engine is provided with keywords that are of particular importance to determine whether any content containing the important keyword is missed by the host search engine.
11. A system for validating results of a host search engine including:
a host search engine operable to execute searches of a web-site;
a scanning component that scans and locates all data objects available via a web interface to the web-site; and
a matching engine operable to receive the data objects located by the scanning component and submitting the data objects to the host search engine to determine those data objects obtained from the scanning component that cannot be located by the host search engine thereby representing data objects missed by the host search engine.
12. A system according to claim 11 wherein the scanning component includes an indexing component that indexes the located data objects.
13. A system according claim 11 or wherein the matching engine includes a reporting component that generates a report of the missed data objects.
14. A system according to claim 13 wherein the report includes a link to a web page identified in the report as containing missed data.
15. Computer instruction code embodied in a computer readable medium and operable to control the operation of a computer to validate the results of a host search engine, the computer instruction code effecting the steps of:
scanning all data objects deliverable via a web interface; and
executing a matching engine to generate a report set containing content missed by the host search engine.
16. Computer instruction code according to claim 15 operable to effect the additional step of indexing the data objects identified by the scanning step.
17. Computer instruction code according to claim 16 operable to effect the additional step of analysing the indexed data objects and passing only unique data objects to the matching engine for submission to the host search engine.
18. Computer instruction code according to claim 17 operable to effect the additional step of determining unique data objects by conducting an analysis of the data objects according to any one or more of the following:
a. Frequency of occurrence;
b. Relative importance of context; or
c. Proximity to other topics;
19-22. (canceled)