Remote-access fuel dispenser using a data type aware mark-up language
First Claim
1. A fuel dispenser comprising:
- a communications interface adapted to transfer information between a remote system and said fuel dispenser;
a communications processor associated with said communications interface and adapted to provide;
a) a protocol service operating such that said information transferred between said fuel dispenser and said remote system is transferred in accordance with a defined protocol;
b) a data type aware SGML service operating such that select operating data transferred from said remote system to said fuel dispenser in a data type aware SGML format is converted to a native format; and
c) a storage service operating such that said select operating data is stored in an associated memory in said native format; and
a controller adapted to control one or more operations of said fuel dispenser based on said select operating data stored in said associated memory.
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Accused Products
Abstract
A fuel dispenser includes data type aware SGML processing capabilities allowing it to efficiently process received data having a variety of data types. Such received data typically includes fuel dispenser configuration information. Further benefits related to data type aware SGML processing within the fuel dispenser include the ability to transfer information in a data type aware SGML format from the fuel dispenser, such as diagnostics data, to a remote system. Data type aware SGML data definitions facilitate conversion of the data type aware SGML-formatted diagnostics data into a machine format usable by the remote system. Preferably, the fuel dispenser includes an HTTP server for communicating with remote client'"'"'s systems that employ data type aware SGML-capable, web browsers. Data type aware SGML-based style sheets may be transferred from the fuel dispenser to the remote system for assisting with the visual display of received fuel dispenser data in HTML format. Optionally, the fuel dispenser may include a Java applet designed to impart data type aware SGML-based transfer and processing capabilities to remote client web browsers lacking native data type aware SGML support. As an alternative, the fuel dispenser may itself apply resident data type aware style sheet information to stored fuel dispenser data after converting it to data type aware SGML format to produce formatted HTML-based web pages, and then transfer the web pages to the remote system for display.
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Citations
21 Claims
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1. A fuel dispenser comprising:
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a communications interface adapted to transfer information between a remote system and said fuel dispenser;
a communications processor associated with said communications interface and adapted to provide;
a) a protocol service operating such that said information transferred between said fuel dispenser and said remote system is transferred in accordance with a defined protocol;
b) a data type aware SGML service operating such that select operating data transferred from said remote system to said fuel dispenser in a data type aware SGML format is converted to a native format; and
c) a storage service operating such that said select operating data is stored in an associated memory in said native format; and
a controller adapted to control one or more operations of said fuel dispenser based on said select operating data stored in said associated memory. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10)
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11. A fuel dispenser comprising:
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a communications interface adapted to transfer information between said fuel dispenser and a remote system;
a communications processor associated with said communications interface and adapted to provide;
a) a protocol service operating such that information transferred between said communications processor and said remote system via said communications interface is transferred in accordance with a defined protocol;
b) a conversion service operating such that data items included in information received from said remote system are converted from a transfer format to a native format based on interpreting embedded data tags included in said information received from said remote system; and
c) a storage service such that said data items are stored in a memory associated with said fuel dispenser after conversion to said native format; and
a controller for controlling one or more operations of said fuel dispenser based on said stored data items. - View Dependent Claims (12, 13)
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14. A method of supporting remote interaction in a fuel dispenser, said method comprising:
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establishing a communications link between said fuel dispenser and a remote system based on a common protocol;
receiving a data type aware SGML data request from said remote system via said communications link;
identifying one or more fuel dispenser operating values corresponding to said data request;
converting said one or more fuel dispenser operating values from a native format to produce data type aware SGML-formatted fuel dispenser operating values; and
transferring said data type aware SGML-formatted fuel dispenser operating values to said remote system via said communications link. - View Dependent Claims (15, 16, 17, 18)
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19. A method of supporting remote parameter editing in a fuel dispenser, said method comprising:
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receiving a data request from a remote system;
converting stored information associated with said data request from a native format into a data type aware SGML format, thereby forming converted information;
transferring said converted information to said remote system;
receiving edited information from said remote system, said edited information received in a data type aware SGML format;
parsing said data type aware SGML format edited information to extract one or more updated parameters; and
storing said one or more updated parameters in a memory associated with said the fuel dispenser. - View Dependent Claims (20, 21)
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Specification