Enabling interactive integration of network-accessible applications in a content aggregation framework

• US 20060230062A1
• Filed: 04/12/2005
• Published: 10/12/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 04/12/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: AirBNB Incorporated
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Thirumalai, Srikanth, Roy-Chowdhury, Amber
• Granted Patent: US 7,774,332 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0613 Third-party assisted
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/02 based on web technology, e.g. hypertext transfer protocol [HTTP]

Abstract

Enabling network-accessible applications to be integrated into content aggregation frameworks (such as portals) and to become dynamically interactive through proxying components (such as proxying portlets), thereby providing run-time cooperation and data sharing.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method of enabling interactive integration of network-accessible applications in a content aggregation framework environment, comprising steps of:

receiving, by a component mediating access to a network-accessible application in a content aggregation framework environment, one or more data values from the network-accessible application, in addition to content received by the mediating component from the network-accessible application, wherein the receipt of the data values signals that the network-accessible application intends the data values to be shared with other components in the content aggregation framework environment and the received content is for aggregating into a content view along with content provided by one or more other components; and

publishing the received data values, by the mediating component, such that the published data values are automatically shared with any of the other components which have ability to consume those data values.

2. The method according to claim 1, wherein the any other components are those which have registered the ability to consume the data values.

3. The method according to claim 1, wherein a brokering mechanism receives the published data values and, in response, automatically shares those data values with the any other components.

4. The method according to claim 1, wherein the any other components register, upon their initialization in the content aggregation framework environment, the ability to consume the data values.

5. The method according to claim 1, wherein the received data values are received from the network-accessible application in a cookie of a message in which the content is received.

6. The method according to claim 1, wherein the received data values are received from the network-accessible application in one or more headers of a message in which the content is received.

7. The method according to claim 1, wherein each of the received data values is received from the network-accessible application in a cookie attached to a message in which the content is received.

8. The method according to claim 1, wherein the network-accessible application is not developed for deployment in the content aggregation framework environment.

9. The method according to claim 1, further comprising the step of filtering the received data values using a configured filter, prior to operation of the publishing step, and wherein the publishing step publishes only those ones of the received data values that pass the configured filter.

10. The method according to claim 1, wherein the mediating component is a proxying portlet and the other components are content-emitting portlets.

11. The method according to claim 1, wherein the mediating component is a proxying portlet for the network-accessible application, at least one of the other components is a proxying portlet for a different network-accessible application, and remaining ones of the other components are content-emitting portlets.

12. A computer-implemented method of sharing data values provided by network-accessible applications in a content aggregation framework environment, comprising steps of:

receiving, by a component mediating access to a network-accessible application in a content aggregation framework environment, one or more data values from the network-accessible application, in addition to content received by the mediating component from the network-accessible application, wherein the data values are to be shared with other components in the content aggregation framework environment; and

forwarding the received data values from the mediating component for sharing with the other components while providing the received content, by the mediating component, to an aggregator in the content aggregation framework environment, thereby enabling the forwarded data values to be automatically shared with selected ones of the other components and the provided content is to be aggregated with other content provided by the other components.

13. The method according to claim 12, wherein the mediating component is a proxying component and the other components are content-emitters.

14. The method according to claim 12, wherein the mediating component is a proxying component for the network-accessible application, at least one of the other components is a proxying component for a different network-accessible application, and remaining ones of the other components are non-proxying content-emitters.

15. The method according to claim 12, further comprising the step of transforming the received content by the mediating component, and wherein the transformed content is provided to the aggregator instead of the received content.

16. A method of enabling interactive integration of network-accessible applications in a content aggregation framework environment, comprising steps of:

registering, in the content aggregation framework environment on behalf of at least one of one or more components which provide content for aggregation in a content view renderable in the content aggregation framework environment, one or more actions and corresponding data types thereof, the actions registered on behalf of each component being those which are invocable on the component in response to run-time publishing of identified data types, and wherein at least one of the components is a mediating component that provides access to a network-accessible application;

detecting, at run-time, that one of the identified data types is published; and

responsive to the detection, performing the steps of;

selecting, from the registered actions, those for which the corresponding data type matches the detected published data type; and

automatically invoking the selected actions on the component on behalf of which each selected action was registered.

17. The method according to claim 16, wherein the detecting step further comprises the step of detecting a value published for the detected one and the invoking step further comprises passing, as a parameter to each of the invoked actions, the detected value.

18. A computer program product for enabling interactive integration of network-accessible applications in a content aggregation framework environment, the computer program product embodied on one or more computer-readable media and comprising computer-readable program code instructions adapted for carrying out steps of:

registering, by each of a plurality components which provide content for aggregation in a content view renderable in the content aggregation framework environment, one or more actions and corresponding data types thereof, the actions being those which are invocable on the component in response to run-time publishing of identified data types and wherein at least one of the components is a mediating component that provides access to a network-accessible application; and

maintaining a mapping, for each of the mediating components, between the registered actions for the mediating component and an invocation target corresponding to each of the registered actions, each of the invocation targets associated with the network-accessible application for which the mediating component provides access, such that the mediating component will automatically invoke the corresponding invocation target when any selected one of registered actions is invoked on the mediating component.

19. The computer program product according to claim 18, further comprising computer-readable program code instructions adapted for carrying out steps of:

detecting the run-time publishing of one of the identified data types; and

responsive to the detection, performing steps of;

selecting, from the registered actions, those for which the corresponding data type matches the detected published data type; and

automatically invoking each of the selected actions.

20. The computer program product according to claim 18, wherein the registering step is performed during initialization of the components.

21. The computer program product according to claim 18, further comprising computer-readable program code instructions adapted for carrying out steps of:

receiving, by at least one mediating component, an invocation of a selected one of its registered actions; and

responsive to the reception, performing the steps of;

consulting the mapping, by the mediating component, to determine the invocation target corresponding thereto; and

automatically invoking the determined invocation target.

22. The computer program product according to claim 18, wherein the network-accessible application is not developed for deployment in the content aggregation framework environment.

23. The computer program product according to claim 18, wherein each mediating component is a proxying portlet and remaining ones of the components are non-proxying content-emitting portlets.

24. The computer program product according to claim 18, wherein a first of the mediating components is a proxying portlet for a first network-accessible application, at least a second mediating component is a proxying portlet for a different network-accessible application, and remaining ones of the components are content-emitting portlets.

25. A system for enabling sharing of data values provided by network-accessible applications in a content aggregation framework environment, comprising:

means for receiving, in the content aggregation framework environment, publication of at least one data type, wherein the publication is received from a mediating component that provides access to a network-accessible component that contributes content for aggregation and rendering in a view of the content aggregation framework and wherein the at least one data type has been delivered to the mediating component along with content contributed thereby; and

means for automatically invoking an action on selected ones of one or more other components contributing content for the view, wherein the selected ones are those which have registered an ability to consume data of the received data type.

26. The system according to claim 25, wherein:

the means for receiving further comprises means for receiving, for each published data type, at least one value; and

the means for automatically invoking further comprises means for passing the at least one value to each of the selected ones on the invocation.