System and method for rapid document conversion

• US 20030023637A1
• Filed: 08/23/2002
• Published: 01/30/2003
• Est. Priority Date: 03/01/2000
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Malikie Innovations Limited (Key Patent Innovations Limited)
• Original Assignee: Research In Motion Limited (Blackberry Limited)
• Inventors: Halahmi, Erez
• Granted Patent: US 8,122,344 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 715/523
• CPC Class Codes: G07F 15/00 Coin-freed apparatus with meter-controlled dispensing of liquid, gas or electricity

Abstract

A method and a system for converting a document in a streamed manner, for more rapid transmission and display of each part of the document as that part is converted. The system and method are preferred for operation in environments with limited bandwidth and/or display capacity, such as for wireless handheld devices, for example. Such devices cannot easily receive large amounts of data, and also typically have relatively small display screens. Thus, the user is able to quickly receive and display each part of the document after being converted, rather than waiting for the entire document to be converted and then transmitted before any part is displayed. The system and method are particularly useful for modular file formats, such as word processing document file formats, in which each module of a file can only be fully interpreted with regard to at least one other module.

Claims

1. A method for converting at least part of-a modular document into a converted file format for display to a user, the method comprising the steps of:

(a) analyzing at least a part of the modular document to locate a plurality of modules in at least a part of the modular document;

(b) separating said analyzed document into said plurality of modules;

(c) determining a relationship between at least a pair of modules; and

(d) converting at least said pair of modules according to said relationship to form the converted file format.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein at least said pair of modules are not arranged in a linear sequence in the modular document, such that at least a portion of at least one module is stored in step (d) for converting at least a second module.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein said relationship is such that said portion provides information for converting at least said second module.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein said information is at least one visual attribute of display data obtained from at least said second module.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein said display data is text, and said at least one visual attribute is a format of said text.

6. The method of claim 3, wherein said information is at least one audio attribute of display data obtained from at least said second module.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein at least said pair of modules are not arranged in a linear sequence in the modular document, such that step (d) further comprises the steps of:

(i) storing at least a first module before converting at least said first module;

(ii) analyzing at least a second module; and

(iii) converting at least said first module according to information obtained from at least said second module.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein an order for performing steps (i)-(iii) is determined according to an optimal order for efficient conversion.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the modular document is a word processing document, such that at least one module of the plurality of modules contains text and at least one module of the plurality of modules contains information for determining a format of said text.

10. The method of claim 1, further comprising the steps of:

(e) providing a display device; and

(f) displaying the converted file format on said display device.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein said display device is a display device, and said network is a wireless network.

12. The method of claim 11, wherein said display device is a cellular telephone, and said wireless network is a cellular telephone network.

13. The method of claim 10, wherein the converted file format is a mark-up language format.

14. The method of claim 13, wherein said mark-up language is WML (Wireless Mark-up Language), such that said display device is a WAP (wireless application protocol) enabled device.

15. The method of claim 10, wherein said display device is a low bandwidth communication device.

16. The method of claim 1, wherein steps (a)-(d) are performed in advance, before the user requests the document.

17. The method of claim 1, wherein step (d) comprises the step of converting the modular document to a first generic file format, the method further comprising the step of:

(e) converting the modular document from said first generic file format to a specific file format.

18. The method of claim 17, wherein said specific file format is determined according to at least one preference of the user.

19. The method of claim 17, further comprising the steps of:

(f) providing a display device;

(g) determining said specific file format according to at least one characteristic of said display device; and

(h) displaying the modular document in said specific file format on said display device.

20. The method of claim 1, wherein the converted file format data is output as soon as the conversion is performed, such that step (d) includes the step of transmitting the converted file format data in a streamed manner.

21. A system for converting a modular document to a converted file format for display to a user, the modular document featuring a plurality of modules having a relationship between at least a pair of modules, the system comprising:

(a) a document source for serving the modular document; and

(b) a conversion server for receiving the modular document and for converting at least part of the modular document into the converted file format according to the relationship between at least the pair of modules.

22. The system of claim 21, further comprising:

(c) a display device for displaying a converted part of the modular document to the user; and

(d) a network for connecting said display device to said conversion server.

23. A method for converting at least part of a document into a converted file format for display to a user, the document containing data in a non-sequential order, the method comprising the steps of:

(a) analyzing at least a part of the document to form an analyzed document;

(b) determining an order for the data in at least a part of the document; and

(c) converting at least said part of the document according to said order for the data to form the converted file format.