Displaying Content on a Mobile Device

• US 20090070413A1
• Filed: 06/13/2008
• Published: 03/12/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 06/13/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Apple Inc.
• Original Assignee: Apple Inc.
• Inventors: Miller, Andrew, Rothman-Shore, Jeremy W., Mohammed, Irfan, Cuccinelli, Joseph, Priyadarshan, Eswar, Vadrevu, Jayasurya, Chittari, Ravikiran
• Granted Patent: US 8,762,556 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 709/203
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/00 Information retrieval; Database structures therefor; File system structures therefor
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9577 Optimising the visualization of content, e.g. distillation of HTML documents
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/00 Input arrangements for transferring data to be processed into a form capable of being handled by the computer; Output arrangements for transferring data from processing unit to output unit, e.g. interface arrangements
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/106 Display of layout of documents; Previewing
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/143 Markup, e.g. Standard Generalized Markup Language [SGML] or Document Type Definition [DTD]
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/221 Parsing markup language streams streaming G06F40/149

Abstract

A method for facilitating the rendering of a web page on a mobile device includes providing an enhanced DOM tree for the web page that includes web page components and their display coordinates. A rule set is applied to the DOM tree, thereby selecting components for display on the mobile device. A mobile-device-specific version of the source code is generated based on the selected components.

Claims

1. A method for creating an enhanced document object model tree for a web page, the method comprising:

(a) parsing source code of the web page to identify components of the web page;

(b) rendering the web page to determine display coordinates of the identified components;

(c) annotating the source code of the web page by associating the display coordinates with the respective components, thus creating an enhanced document object model tree for the web page; and

(d) storing the enhanced document object model tree on a physical storage medium.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein the source code of the web page comprises HTML.

3. The method of claim 1 wherein the source code of the web page comprises XML.

4. The method of claim 1 wherein the display coordinates comprise horizontal and vertical distances of the components from an origin located on the web page.

5. A method for generating a mobile-device-specific version of a web page, the method comprising:

(a) providing an enhanced document object model tree for the web page, the enhanced document object model tree comprising (i) web page components identified by parsing source code of the web page and (ii) display coordinates of the web page components;

(b) applying a rule set to the enhanced document object model tree, the rule set defining which components are to be included when rendering the web page on the mobile device; and

(c) generating a mobile-device-specific version of the source code based on the selected components.

6. The method of claim 5, further comprising providing the mobile-device-specific version of the source code to a mobile device for rendering thereon.

7. The method of claim 5 wherein the rule set is specific to the web page.

8. The method of claim 5 wherein the rule set is specific to a domain at which the web page is hosted.

9. The method of claim 5 wherein the rule set is specific to a model of the mobile device.

10. The method of claim 5 wherein the rule set comprises one or more scope attributes associated therewith, and further comprising selecting the rule set from a collection of rule sets based on scope attributes of the web page.

11. The method of claim 5 wherein step (b) further comprises categorizing the structural components.

12. The method of claim 11 wherein the categories comprise one or more of text components, advertisements, navigational components, multimedia components and images.

13. The method of claim 11 wherein the determination of the components to be included when rendering the web page on the mobile device further comprises automatically selecting categories of components to be included.

14. The method of claim 11 wherein the determination of the components to be included when rendering the web page on the mobile device further comprises manually selecting categories of components to be included.

16. The system of claim 13 further comprising a web server application which, upon request of the web page by the mobile device, transmits the mobile-device-specific version of the source code to the mobile device for display.

15. A system for facilitating the display of a web page on a mobile device, the system comprising:

(a) a web page parser application configured to generate an enhanced document object model tree for the web page, the enhanced document object model tree comprising (i) web page components identified by parsing source code of the web page and (ii) display coordinates of said components;

(b) a component selection module configured to;

(x) apply a rule set to the enhanced document object model tree, the rule set defining which components are to be selected for inclusion when rendering the web page on the mobile device, and (y) generate a mobile-device-specific version of the source code based on the selected components; and

(c) a physical storage device for storing the mobile-device-specific version of the source code for subsequent transmission a mobile device.

17. An article of manufacture having computer-readable program portions embodied thereon for creating a mobile-device-specific version of a web page, the article comprising computer-readable instructions for:

(a) generating an enhanced document object model tree for the web page, the enhanced document object model tree comprising;

(i) web page components identified by parsing source code of the web page, and (ii) display coordinates of said components;

(b) applying a rule set to the enhanced document object model tree, the rule set defining which components are to be included when rendering the web page on the mobile device; and

(c) generating a mobile-device-specific version of the source code based on the selected components.

18. The article of manufacture of claim 17, wherein the computer-readable program portions embodied thereon further comprise instructions for providing the mobile-device-specific version of the source code to a mobile device for rendering thereon.