System and method for providing contents on a network

• US 20020010756A1
• Filed: 07/24/2001
• Published: 01/24/2002
• Est. Priority Date: 07/24/2000
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: NHN Corporation
• Original Assignee: NHN Corporation
• Inventors: Oku, Kazuho
• Granted Patent: US 7,320,024 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 709/217
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/123 Shopping for digital content
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/0815 providing single-sign-on or federations
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/083 using passwords cryptographic mechanisms or cryptographic arrangements for entity authentication using a predetermined code H04L9/3226
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/565 Conversion or adaptation of application format or content adding application control or application functional data H04L67/561
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/5651 Reducing the amount or size of exchanged application data
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/329 in the application layer [OSI layer 7]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 9/40 Network security protocols

Abstract

Disclosed is a contents-providing system for receiving contents from a web server and providing the contents to a portable terminal connected via a network that comprises: a user information database for storing user ID information; an authentication server for performing authentication based upon the user ID information by using the user information database when the user ID information and a URL of a web server are input by the portable terminal, and outputting the URL after performing the authentication; and a data server for requesting that the web server corresponding to the URL provided by the authentication server provides the contents, processing the contents provided by the web server into a predetermined format, and transmitting the processed contents to the portable terminal.

Claims

1. In a system for receiving contents from a web server and providing the contents to a portable terminal connected via a network, a contents-providing system comprising:

a user information database for storing user identification (ID) information;

an authentication server for performing authentication based upon the user ID information by using the user information database when the user ID information and a uniform resource locator (URL) of a web server are input by the portable terminal, and outputting the URL after performing the authentication; and

a data server for requesting that the web server corresponding to the URL provided by the authentication server provides the contents, processing the contents provided by the web server into a predetermined format, and transmitting the processed contents to the portable terminal.

3. The system of claim 1 or 2, wherein the user information database stores user information corresponding to the user ID information, the authentication server extracts user information corresponding to the user ID information from the user information database and outputs the same with the URLs when performing authentication based on the user ID information, and the system further comprises a billing server for settling fees for the contents provided by the web servers having the URLs provided by the portable terminal based on the user information provided by the authentication server.

4. The system of claim 3, wherein the billing server settles the respective fees of the web servers respectively corresponding to the channel URLs when the URLs provided by the portable terminal are channel URLs, the data server transmits the settlement results to the respective web servers corresponding to the channel URLs when the settlement results of the billing server are provided, and the respective web servers determine the settlement results and when the settlement of the fees is performed and provide the corresponding contents to the data server.

8. The system of claim 3, wherein the system further comprises an advertisement server for providing advertisement contents, and wherein the authentication server provides the user information extracted from the user information database to the data server, the advertisement server extracts the advertisement contents according to the user information provided by the data server and provides the advertisement contents to the data server, and the data server processes the advertisement contents provided by the advertisement server and the contents provided by the web server and transmits them to the portable terminal.

11. The system of claim 1, 2 or 7, wherein the data server processes the contents according to a display specification of the portable terminal and transmits them.

12. The system of claim 1, 2 or 7, wherein the data server comprises:

an image compressor for receiving the contents from the web server, and reducing image sizes or a number of colors according to the specification of the portable terminal; and

a proxy unit for monitoring data transmitted by the portable terminal or the web server, and when the contents transmitted by the web server include image information, calling the image compressor.

13. The system of claim 1, 2 or 7, wherein the data server further comprises a filter for filtering information that is inappropriate or is not needed for the portable terminal among the contents provided by the web server.

14. The system of claim 1, 2 or 7, wherein the data server further comprises a channel generator for binding a plurality of contents of a predetermined field provided by the web server into a single channel.

2. In a system for receiving contents from a plurality of web servers and providing the contents to a portable terminal connected via a network, a contents-providing system comprising:

a user information database for storing user identification (ID) information;

an authentication server for performing authentication based upon the user ID information by using the user information database when the user ID information and uniform resource locators (URLs) of web servers are input by the portable terminal, and outputting the URLs after performing the authentication; and

a data server for requesting that the web servers corresponding to respective channel URLs provide the contents when the URLs provided by the authentication server are channel URLs that are of a set of URLs of the web servers that provide contents of a predetermined field, processing the contents provided by the web servers into a predetermined format, and transmitting the processed contents to the portable terminal.

10. The system of claim 2, 8 or 9, wherein the data server binds the contents into a single channel and transmits the same to the portable terminal.

5. The system of claim I or 2, wherein when the data server requests the contents, the web server provides the contents to the data server in the case a user who accesses via the portable terminal is a service user who can receive the contents.

6. The system of claim 5, wherein the data server provides the user ID information provided by the authentication server to a plurality of web servers respectively corresponding to the channel URLs, and the respective web servers request a password input for authenticating the service user when the data server requests the contents, and they perform authentication via the user'"'"'s password and the user ID information input via the portable terminal.

7. In a system for receiving contents from web servers and providing the contents to a portable terminal connected via a network, a contents-providing system comprising:

a user information database for storing user identification (ID) information; and

a data server for performing authentication based upon user ID information by using the user information database when the user ID information and uniform resource locators (URLs) of web servers are input by the portable terminal, requesting that the web servers corresponding to the URLs provide the contents when performing the authentication, processing the contents provided by the web servers into a predetermined format, and transmitting the processed contents to the portable terminal.

9. The system of claim 7, wherein the system further comprises an advertisement server for providing advertisement contents, and wherein the advertisement server extracts the advertisement contents according to the user information provided by the data server and provides the advertisement contents to the data server, and the data server processes the advertisement contents provided by the advertisement server and the contents provided by the web server and transmits them to the portable terminal.

15. In a server for receiving contents via a network and providing the contents to a portable terminal connected to the network, a server for requesting that a web server corresponding to a uniform resource locator (URL) of the web server input by the portable terminal provides the contents according to authentication results brought about by user identification (ID) information input by the portable terminal, processing the contents provided by the web server into a predetermined format, and transmitting the processed contents to the portable terminal.

16. In a server for receiving contents via a network and providing the contents to a portable terminal connected to the network, a server for performing authentication according to user identification (ID) information input by the portable terminal, and when performing the authentication, requesting that a web server corresponding to a uniform resource locator (URL) of the web server input by the portable terminal provides the contents, processing the contents provided by the web server into a predetermined format, and transmitting the processed contents to the portable terminal.

17. In a server for receiving contents via a network and providing the contents to a portable terminal connected to the network, a server for performing authentication based on user identification (ID) information when the user ID information and a uniform resource locator (URL) of a desired web server are input by the portable terminal, and after the authentication, outputting the URL to server functions of requesting that the web server corresponding to the URL of the web server provides the contents, processing the contents provided by the web server into a predetermined format, and transmitting the processed contents to the portable terminal.

18. In a server for receiving contents via a network and providing the contents to a portable terminal connected to the network, a server for providing the contents to the portable terminal by providing settlement processes to server functions including settling the fee for the contents provided by a web server having a uniform resource locator (URL) provided by the portable terminal by using user information, requesting that the web server corresponding to the URL of the web server provides the contents input by the portable terminal, processing the contents provided by the web server into a predetermined format, and transmitting the processed contents to the portable terminal.

19. In a program on a computer for implementing a server for receiving contents via a network and providing the contents to a portable terminal connected via the network, a program on the computer for implementing functions of requesting that a desired web server corresponding to a uniform resource locator (URL) of the web server input by the portable terminal provides the contents according to authentication results brought about by user identification (ID) information input by the portable terminal, processing the contents provided by the web server into a predetermined format, and transmitting the processed contents to the portable terminal.

20. In a program on a computer for implementing a server for receiving contents via a network and providing the contents to a portable terminal connected via the network, a program on the computer for implementing functions of performing authentication based upon user identification (ID) information input by the portable terminal, and when performing the authentication, requesting that a desired web server corresponding to a uniform resource locator (URL) of the web server input by the portable terminal provides the contents, processing the contents provided by the web server into a predetermined format, and transmitting the processed contents to the portable terminal.

21. In a program on a computer for implementing a server for receiving contents via a network and providing the contents to a portable terminal connected via the network, a program on the computer for implementing functions of performing authentication based upon user identification (ID) information when the user ID information and a uniform resource locator (URL) of a desired web server are input by the portable terminal, and after performing the authentication, outputting the URL to server functions of requesting the web server corresponding to the URL of the web server to provide the contents, processing the contents provided by the web server into a predetermined format, and transmitting the processed contents to the portable terminal.

22. In a program on a computer for implementing a server for receiving contents via a network and providing the contents to a portable terminal connected via the network, a program on the computer for implementing functions of settling the fee for the contents provided by a web server having a uniform resource locator (URL) provided by the portable terminal by using user information, and providing the contents to the portable terminal by providing the settlement results to server functions including requesting that the web server corresponding to the URL of the web server provides the contents input by the portable terminal, processing the contents provided by the web server into a predetermined format, and transmitting the processed contents to the portable terminal.

23. In a contents-providing method of a system for receiving contents from a plurality of web servers and providing the contents to a portable terminal connected via a network, a contents-providing method comprising:

(a) extracting user information corresponding to user identification (ID) information and authenticating the user when the user ID information and a uniform resource locator (URL) of a web server for providing the contents are input by the portable terminal;

(b) determining whether the URL is a channel URL that is of a set of URLs of a plurality of web servers that provide contents of a predetermined field;

(c) requesting that the respective web servers corresponding to the respective channel URLs provide the contents;

(d) reducing image sizes of the contents or reducing a number of colors so as to convert them according to a specification of the portable terminal when the contents are provided by the respective web servers according to the request; and

(e) transmitting the converted contents to the portable terminal via the network.

24. The method of claim 23, wherein the method further comprises respectively settling the fees for the contents provided by the web servers corresponding to the respective channel URLs based upon the user information.

25. The method of claim 23, wherein when the contents are requested in (c), the settlement results are provided to the web servers corresponding to the respective channel URLs.

26. The method of claim 23, wherein the method further comprises:

requesting a password from the portable terminal when a password input request for authenticating service users who can receive desired contents from a web server is generated according to the contents request; and

providing the password to the web server and authenticating the service user when the password is provided to the portable terminal.

27. The method of claim 26, wherein when it is determined that the corresponding user is a service user according to the password provided by the portable terminal in the step of providing the contents, the web server provides the contents to the user.