Patent US 5,185,857

A method and apparatus for rapid search and co-display of graphics and tabular data for both local and distributed computer dsystems on a mobile station. The method rapidly selects and displays related graphical and text information via a Graphical User Interface (GUI) from both a Graphical Relational Database (GRDB) and large tabular database. An operator on a mobile station such as a plane or car enters a query where previously encoded and stored graphics elements are selected, via a control program on a host computer located on the mobile system, from a mass storage device and displayed with related text information on a local display. This method provides intelligent selection and display of graphics data based on an analysis by the system as to what graphics elements or images are required to satisfy the operator query, and how these elements are to be displayed in conjunction with related tabular (text) data.