Creating and editing documents

摘要

A computer-implemented method of creating and editing a document containing one or more terms. A knowledge base containing a set of terms with one or more predefined properties including part-of properties relating terms to each other is provided. The one or more predefined properties associated with a user-selected term are identified. Constraints are imposed on user manipulation of the document with respect to the user-selected term in accordance with the one or more identified predefined properties associated with the user-selected term. In a particular implementation, a method of creating and editing a financial document containing one or more financial terms is described. The tasks of creating and editing documents are simplified by the separation of the presentation of information contained in a document from underlying representation of calculations and interrelationships. A user may readily manipulate the content and appearance of domain-specific (e.g., financial) analyses, without having repeatedly to define and verify calculations. A user may define and customize standard reports with a simple palette of powerful editing tools that implement and maintain the semantics of the items in a document. This frees the user from having to handle the underlying references directly, allowing the user to focus instead upon concepts and contexts contained within the document.