METHOD FOR COMBINING INPUT DATA WITH RUN-TIME PARAMETERS INTO XML OUTPUT USING XSL/XSLT

• US 20070157078A1
• Filed: 12/29/2006
• Published: 07/05/2007
• Est. Priority Date: 12/30/2005
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: Discovery Productions, Inc.
• Original Assignee: Discovery Productions, Inc.
• Inventors: Anderson, Robert
• Application Number:
  US11/618,359
• Publication Number:
  US 20070157078A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 715/207
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/143 Markup, e.g. Standard Generalized Markup Language [SGML] or Document Type Definition [DTD]
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/154 Tree transformation for tree-structured or markup documents, e.g. XSLT, XSL-FO or stylesheets

Abstract

A system and method is disclosed for adding dynamic information to XML source data without substantial, or preferably any, modification of the underlying source code and without requiring the writing of any XSLT extension functions. The addition of dynamic information enables a user to customize XML source data for display based on parameters known only at run-time. The present invention receives various run-time and system parameters, uses the parameters to construct queries, and executes the queries against internal and/or external data sources. Datasets that are generated based on query execution are converted to XML document fragments and an XSL Transform converts the XML document fragments into a desired markup language file for presentation within a browser application.

Claims

1. A computer implemented method for adding dynamic data to a markup language file comprising:

receiving a request, wherein said request includes a package identifier;

invoking a package corresponding to said package identifier, wherein said package at least one of;

explicitly and implicitly retrieves runtime data;

creating a dataset based on said runtime data; and

,

invoking a transform to process said dataset, wherein said processing constructs a document.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein said document is at least one of:

eXtensible Markup Language (XML), HyperText Markup Language (HTML), XmlPackage, JavaScript, ASCII text, and delimited text

3. The method of claim 1, wherein said runtime data comprises data known over the duration of at least one of:

a session and a program execution.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein said package is an eXtensible Markup Language (XML) package.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein said dataset is an eXtensible Markup Language (XML) file.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein said transform is an Extensible Stylesheet Language (XSL) Transform.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein said request is instantiated by a call from at least one of:

a markup language, a scripting language, and program code.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein said document is an eXtensible Markup Language (XML) document fragment.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein said transform invokes a second package.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein said package comprises a data section and a transformation section.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein said data section defines how data is retrieved and said transformation section defines additional package calls.

12. The method of claim 1, wherein said request includes a parameter comprising at least one of:

a runtime parameter, a system parameter, and a form parameter.

13. The method of claim 1, wherein said package includes at least one of:

a Structured Query Language (SQL) query, web query, eXtensible Stylesheet Language (XSL) Transform, search engine setting, post processing query, set cookie instruction, and reference to a second package.

14. The method of claim 1, wherein said package includes a query element and an eXtensible Stylesheet Language (XSL) Transform element.

15. The method of claim 1, wherein said package includes a Uniform Resource Locator (URL) for retrieving data from a web site.

16. The method of claim 1, wherein said package includes a reference to an extension object comprising high level programming code.

17. The method of claim 1, wherein said markup language file is at least one of:

HyperText Markup Language (HTML), eXtensible Markup Language (XML), and eXtensible Stylesheet Language (XSL).

18. A machine-readable medium having stored thereon a plurality of instructions, the plurality of instructions when executed by a processor, cause the processor to perform a method comprising the steps of:

receiving a request, wherein said request includes a package identifier;

invoking a package corresponding to said package identifier, wherein said package at least one of;

explicitly and implicitly retrieves runtime data;

creating a dataset based on said runtime data; and

,

invoking a transform to process said dataset, wherein said processing constructs a document.