E-business mobility platform

• US 20020035617A1
• Filed: 08/03/2001
• Published: 03/21/2002
• Est. Priority Date: 08/04/2000
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Mobileaware Technologies Limited
• Original Assignee: Mobileaware Technologies Limited
• Inventors: Carr, James M., Lynch, Mark, Kinane, Brian, Fennelly, Thomas, Howe, Eamonn, McGaley, Paul, Hanrahan, Rotan
• Granted Patent: US 7,287,093 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 709/219
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/252 between a Database Management System and a front-end application
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/258 Data format conversion from or to a database
• 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 67/568 Storing data temporarily at an intermediate stage, e.g. caching
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/329 in the application layer [OSI layer 7]

Abstract

A platform (1) allows end users to engage in a session with servers such as content providers, corporate systems, commercial services or ASPs. A session object is associated with each session, attributes of which include the channel—thereby allowing changing of a channel during a session. Request/event objects are associated with the session object as requests/notifications arise, and these objects are shared with other modules. Hosted services may be physically resident on the platform or may be accessed transparently via interfaces. A device/channel neutral mark-up language extended from a presentation mark-up language is used as a single common form from which the delivered content is derived. The content from a service is generated by an executable process, normally (but not exclusively) in the extended mark-up language. The derivation of deliverable content is performed via a dynamic and configurable sequence of providers that manipulate the original content in stages.

Claims

1. An e-business mobility platform comprising a request handler interface (20) for interfacing with user devices (10), a content interface (22) for interfacing with content servers (11), means in the content interface (22) for retrieving content requested by a user device and for routing the content to the request handler interface for onward routing to the requesting user device (10) characterised in that,

the platform further comprises a transformation engine (23) comprising means for dynamically transforming the content to a suitable format for the user device by processing intention and task tags in the content.

2. An e-business mobility platform as claimed in claim 1, wherein the intention tags include tags for linking related blocks of content, and the transformation engine comprises means for maintaining said relationships in the content delivered to a user device.

3. An e-business mobility platform as claimed in claim 1, wherein the task tags include tags for indicating information that is optional or alternative for a user device having different interfacing capabilities than other devices.

4. An e-business mobility platform as claimed in claim 1, wherein the transformation engine comprises means (24) for converting the retrieved content to a document object model (DOM), and means (25) for transforming the DOM to a device format.

5. An e-business mobility platform as claimed in claim 4, wherein the DOM is transformed by parsing tags indicating blocks of content and associating blocks with nodes of the DOM.

6. An e-business mobility platform as claimed in claim 4 wherein the transformation engine comprises means for combining content by combining DOMs generated from different incoming content streams.

7. An e-business mobility platform as claimed in claim 4, wherein the transformation engine (23) comprises means (26) for applying user preferences to the device-format content.

8. An e-business mobility platform as claimed in claim 7, wherein said preferences are applied by dynamically retrieving preference data from a user database and modifying the content accordingly.

9. An e-business mobility platform as claimed in claim 1, wherein the transformation engine (23) comprises means for dynamically activating providers in series for a session, said providers being for performing a transformation-related function.

10. An e-business mobility platform as claimed in claim 9, wherein at least one provider comprises means for caching reusable intermediate data captured from a stream of content being transformed, and at least one other provider comprises means for using cached data.

11. An e-business mobility platform as claimed in claim 10, wherein a provider comprises means for caching user preference data.

12. An e-business mobility platform as claimed in claim 1, wherein the platform comprises a database system (47) and all functions of the platform comprises means for accessing said database system via accessors (45) each dedicated to a data type.

13. An e-business mobility platform as claimed in claim 12, wherein the data types include user, group, and device data types.

14. An e-business mobility platform as claimed in claim 1, wherein the platform comprises a messaging system comprising means for controlling communication within the platform by passing objects representing events between functions.

15. An e-business mobility platform as claimed in claim 1, wherein the user device interface (20) comprises means for causing a session manager (51) to generate a session object upon receipt of a user device request, and said session object comprises means for controlling full execution of the session until delivery of the requested content even if the user device changes.

16. An e-business mobility platform as claimed in claim 15, wherein the session manager (51) comprises means for maintaining a list of sessions for each user and for caching the associated content.

17. An e-business mobility platform as claimed in claim 15, wherein the device interface (20) comprises a device detection function (52) for detecting device attributes, and the session manager (51) comprises means for using said attributes to create a session object.

18. An e-business mobility platform as claimed in claim 17, wherein the device detection function (52) comprises means for accessing a hierarchical device database to retrieve device attributes.

20. A computer program product comprising software code for completing a platform as claimed in any preceding claim when executing on a digital computer.

19. An e-business mobility platform comprising a request handler interface (20) for interfacing with user devices (10), a content interface (22) for interfacing with content servers (11), means in the content interface (22) for retrieving content requested by a user device and for routing the content to the request handler interface for onward routing to the requesting user device (10) characterised in that,

the platform further comprises a transformation engine (23) comprising means for dynamically transforming the content to a suitable format for the user device by processing intention and task tags in the content,

the intention tags include tags for linking related blocks of content, and the transformation engine comprises means for maintaining said relationships in the content delivered to a user device,

the task tags include tags for indicating information that is optional or alternative for a user device having different interfacing capabilities than other devices, and

the user device interface (20) comprises means for causing a session manager (51) to generate a session object upon receipt of a user device request, and said session object comprises means for controlling full execution of the session until delivery of the requested content even if the user device changes.