System and method for hierarchical layout specialization

• US 20050120288A1
• Filed: 02/21/2003
• Published: 06/02/2005
• Est. Priority Date: 03/28/2002
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Boehme, Thomas Friedhelm, Lieberman, Alexandra
• Granted Patent: US 7,353,452 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 715/246
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/954 Navigation, e.g. using categorised browsing

Abstract

The present invention discloses a system and method for delegated page specialization based on a page layer concept. A page consist of a set of layers. Except the first layer each layer represents a delta (container, frames) in its layout to its previous layer introduced on the corresponding level of administration. Administrators can modify the previous layers by defining new immutable and optional containers or frames on the page (delta). Only the deltas to the previous layers are stored with assignments to their parent layers. Immutable containers or frames of previous layers cannot be modified. The final page is automatically constructed as an union of deltas being stored in a so called tree-structure. The delegated page specialization is preferably accomplished via a GUI-component which supports the administrators.

Claims

1. A method for specializing in a delegated specialization system for any type of content, wherein said delegated specialization system provides a page created by a defined administration level which is defined by a page identification (ID), a defined layout comprising at least one container, wherein said container is assigned by an identification to a defined layer, and by an identification to an existing parent container, immutable parts of said defined layout, and access rights of the next level of administration, the method comprising the steps of:

specializing said defined layer by modifying its changeable parts resulting in a delta to said defined layer representing a new layer and assigning identification to said new layer, said identification including the identification of said defined layer,

storing said delta in a layer table,

defining parts of said delta to be unchangeable by the next administration level, and

granting access rights to said delta to the next administration level for specialization purposes.

2. The method performed by claim 1 including the further step:

repeating said steps by a next level of administration.

3. The method performed by claim 2, wherein said new layer comprises container(s) with or without frame(s) being assigned by an identification to parent container(s) of a previous layer.

4. The method according to claim 3, wherein said layers are being stored in a so-called tree-structure.

5. The method performed by said delegated specialization system according to claim 1, wherein said content may be presented in a form of a Web Page, a Portal Page, or a text document of a text processing system.

6. The method performed by said delegated specialization system according to claim 5, wherein said Portal Page is provided by a portal system, wherein said portal system comprises an authentication component for user authentication, an authorization component 40 for providing user access to authorized content, portlets for rendering content, an aggregation component 30 for aggregation of content provided by said portlets.

7. The method according to claim 1, wherein said delta is characterized by delete, add, or move one or more containers or frames with respect to said defined layer.

8. The method according to claim 6, wherein to a portlet ID is assigned to each frame.

9. The method performed by said delegated specialization system according to claim 1, wherein said defined administration level may be the first administration level and said defined layout page may be a basic layout (first layer).

10. The method performed by a delegated specialization system according to claim 5, wherein said Portal Page and said Home Page is additionally defined by page title and page description.

11. The method performed by a delegated specialization system according to claim 1, wherein said specializing step comprises the steps delete, add, and move of containers or frames.

12. The method performed by a delegated specialization system according to claim 1, wherein each newly added layer is added to an existing layer table which contains layer IDs, their parent layer Ids, and their assigned page ID.

13. The method performed by a delegated specialization system according to claim 7, wherein each newly added container is added in an existing container table which contains container Ids, their parent container Ids, and their assigned layer IDs.

14. The method performed by a delegated specialization system according to claim 7, wherein delete a container is added in an existing container table by indicating a terminator which is applied to the container to be deleted.

15. The method performed by a delegated specialization system according to claim 7, wherein move of a container is added in an existing container table by indicating the container to be replaced and the new parent.

16. A method for electronically displaying a page being created by a method according to claim 13, comprising the steps of:

receiving input from a user requesting a page,

determining layers belonging to said page by using said layer table,

determining and loading on a layer by layer basis all containers and frames belonging to said layers by using said container table,

assembling said containers and frames by starting with the first layer and connecting all containers and frames according to their parent relationship (tree-structure), and

visualizing said containers/frames by rendering said containers and frames according to their parent-relationship of said tree-structure.

17. The method according to claim 16, wherein said page is a Portal Page and said assembling step further includes the step to assign portlet IDs to each frame and said visualizing step further includes the step to render content to be provided by said portlets.

18. A portal comprising:

an authentication component for user authentication,

an authorization component for providing user access to authorized content,

portlets for rendering content,

an aggregation component for aggregation of content provided by said portlets,

characterized by a further delegated specializing system which is configured to execute the method according to claim 1.

19. A text processing system using a delegated specializing system which is configured to execute the method according to claim 1.

20. A text processing system according to claim 19, wherein said container may represent chapter and said frame may represent paragraphs.

21. A computer program product stored on a computer readable media, containing parts of program code to execute the method in accordance with claim 1.