METHOD AND SYSTEM FOR TRANSCODING WEB PAGES BY LIMITING SELECTION THROUGH DIRECTION

• US 20090157657A1
• Filed: 05/12/2008
• Published: 06/18/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 05/17/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Blackberry Limited
• Original Assignee: Blackberry Limited
• Inventors: Kim, Sang-Heun, Stinson, Charles Laurence
• Granted Patent: US 8,037,084 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9577 Optimising the visualization of content, e.g. distillation of HTML documents
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/06 Resources, workflows, human or project management; Enterprise or organisation planning; Enterprise or organisation modelling
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/10 Office automation; Time management

Abstract

Signature schema documents, pre-defined in a query language, provide one or more instructions for application by an engine to transcode web pages of respective web sites. The instructions identify a web page family for the web page and extract a subset of data from the web page using one or more signatures previously identified within web pages of the same web page family (e.g. in accordance with a shared template for each family) of the web site. The instructions may include one or more directional references relative to the signatures to locate and extract the subset of data within the web page. Signatures may comprise text strings within the code of the web page and the directional references indicate positions of respective data relative to the location of the text strings. Transcoding may facilitate use of e-commerce web sites by wireless mobile devices.

Claims

1. A method of transcoding a web page of a web site, the method comprising:

retrieving a signature schema for the web site, said signature schema comprising one or more instructions to identify a web page family for the web page and to extract a subset of data from the web page using one or more signatures previously identified within at least one web page of a same web page family of the web site;

obtaining the web page; and

applying the one or more instructions to the web page;

wherein at least some of the instructions include one or more directional references relative to the signatures to locate and extract some of the subset of data within the web page.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein the web page comprises code in a markup language;

wherein the one or more signatures comprise text strings within the code; and

wherein said one or more directional references indicate positions of some of the subset of data within the web page code relative to the text strings.

3. The method of claim 1 wherein the instructions to locate some of the subset of data comprise a directional reference to indicate that the position of the some of the subset of data relative to a particular signature comprises one of:

1) before the particular signature;

     2) after the particular signature;

or

     3) both before and after the particular signature.

4. The method of claim 3 wherein the instructions to locate some of the subset of data further comprise:

at least one of;

i) a start reference;

or ii) an end reference, said start reference and end reference respectively indicating a starting location and ending location for the some of the subset of data relative to the signature and in accordance with the direction indicated by the directional reference.

5. The method of claim 1 wherein the one or more instructions establish at least one of a beginning limit or an end limit within which to locate some of the subset of data.

6. The method of claim 1 wherein the subset of data comprises a plurality of elements for an object within the web page;

and wherein each element is located and extracted by respective instructions.

7. The method of claim 1 wherein the one or more instructions are interpreted by a transcoding engine component of a computing device configured for transcoding web pages to a target format.

8. The method of claim 7 wherein the web site comprises an e-commerce web site and some of the web pages are for conducting a transaction.

9. The method of claim 8 wherein the target format is suitable for use by a wireless mobile device thereby to conduct the transaction.

10. A computing device for transcoding a web page of a web site, the computing device comprising:

a processor and a memory coupled thereto, said memory storing instructions and data configuring the processor to provide a transcoding engine to;

retrieve a signature schema for the web site, said signature schema comprising one or more schema instructions to identify a web page family for the web page and to extract a subset of data from the web page using one or more signatures previously identified within at least one web page of a same web page family of the web site;

obtain the web page; and

apply the schema instructions to the web page;

wherein at least some of the schema instructions include one or more directional references relative to the signatures to locate and extract the subset of data within the web page.

11. The computing device of claim 10 wherein the one or more schema instructions transcode the subset of data to a target format.

12. The computing device of claim 10 wherein the web page comprises code in a markup language;

wherein the one or more signatures comprise text strings within the code; and

wherein said one or more directional references indicate positions of at least some of the data within the web page code relative to the text strings.

13. The computing device of claim 12 wherein the one or more schema instructions to locate said some of the subset of data comprise a directional reference to indicate that the position of the some of the subset of data relative to a particular signature comprises one of:

1) before a particular signature;

     2) after the particular signature;

or

     3) both before and after the particular signature.

14. The computing device of claim 13 wherein the one or more schema instructions to locate said some of the subset of data further comprise:

at least one of;

i) a start reference;

or ii) an end reference, said start reference and end reference respectively indicating a starting location and ending location for the some of the subset of data relative to the signature and in accordance with the direction indicated by the directional reference.

15. The computing device of claim 10 wherein the one or more schema instructions establish at least one of a beginning limit or an end limit within which to locate the subset of data.

16. The computing device of claim 10 wherein the subset of data comprises a plurality of elements for an object within the web page and wherein each element is located and extracted by respective schema instructions.

17. The computing device of claim 10 wherein the computing device comprises a gateway server and wherein the instructions and data further configure the processor to proxy a request for the web page from a client machine to obtain the web page;

and respond to the client machine with the subset of data in a target format thereby to provide a transcoded web page.

18. The computing device of claim 10 wherein the computing device comprises a client machine configured for communicating for web pages and wherein the instructions and data further configure the processor of the client machine to retrieve the schema signature and apply the one or more schema instructions to at least some of the web pages retrieved from the web site.

19. The computing device of claim 18 wherein client machine is further configured to communicate for some of the web pages via a gateway server to receive transcoded web pages.

20. The computing device of claim 19 wherein the client machine comprises a wireless mobile device.

21. The computing device of claim 20 wherein the web site comprises an e-commerce web site and at least some of the web pages are configured for conducting a transaction.

22. A computer program product storing computer readable instructions which when executed by a computer processor configure the processor to:

retrieve a signature schema for a web site, said signature schema comprising one or more schema instructions to identify a web page family for a web page of the web site and extract a subset of data from the web page using one or more signatures previously identified within web pages of the same web page family of the web site;

obtain the web page; and

apply the one or more schema instructions to the web page;

wherein at least some of the one or more schema instructions include one or more directional references relative to the signatures to locate and extract the subset of data within the web page.

23. A method of conducting an e-commerce transaction between a wireless mobile device and an e-commerce web site, said method comprising:

obtaining a signature schema comprising one or more schema instructions to locate, extract and transcode a subset of data from plain text of a web page of the web site, said schema instructions using one or more signatures previously identified within plain text of web pages of a same web page family of the e-commerce web site, thereby to transcode the web page;

receiving at least one web page from the e-commerce web site for conducting the transaction; and

transcoding at least some of the web pages received in accordance with the signature schema to conduct the transaction;

wherein at least some of the one or more schema instructions include one or more directional references relative to the one or more signatures to locate and extract the subset of data.

24. The method of claim 23 wherein the method is performed by the wireless mobile device, said device communicating with said e-commerce site directly at least for some of said web pages to conduct the transaction.

25. A system for transcoding web pages of a web site, the system comprising:

a web site serving said web pages;

at least one client machine configured to utilize transcoded web pages;

a gateway coupled between the web site and the at least one client machine via a telecommunication network, said gateway proxying respective requests for web pages from the at least one client machine and responding with transcoded web pages;

said gateway configured with a transcoding engine to;

retrieve a signature schema for the web site, said signature schema comprising one or more schema instructions to identify a web page family for the web page and extract a subset of data from the web page using one or more signatures previously identified within web pages of a same web page family of the web site;

obtain the web page; and

apply the signature schema to the web page;

wherein at least some of the one or more schema instructions include one or more directional references relative to the signatures to locate and extract the subset of data within the web page.