SERVICE PLAN WEB CRAWLER
First Claim
1. A web crawler stored on computer readable media for causing a processor of a computer to crawl a website having a webpage displaying a product, said web crawler comprising:
- a. an interface input for receiving a URL of a homepage of the website, said homepage containing links;
b. a linking system containing a link follower for retrieving and following the links on the homepage which leads to an additional webpage in the website;
c. a webpage collector for collecting the homepage and a current webpage associated with at least one of the links retrieved from the linking system;
wherein the collector categorizes the webpage as a category webpage, a quasi category webpage, or SKU webpage;
d. an analyzer for collecting at least one of the following;
a name of the product, a category and subcategory of the product, pricing information on the product, pricing information relating to a service plan of the product, breadcrumbs, and images of the product;
e. a validator for examining product information and the product'"'"'s associated service plan; and
f. an interface output for generating an output containing results generated by the web crawler.
4 Assignments
0 Petitions
Accused Products
Abstract
A web crawler for downloading and analyzing the contents of a merchant'"'"'s website. The web crawler may analyze the products advertised and determine whether a service plan is properly associated. The crawler may also analyze the placement of the service plans on the website, and store the information in a database. A dynamic mapper is also provided which can determine what service plan should be associated with a particular product. The dynamic mapper may also suggest what type of control to use for a particular customer. A webserver containing software for updating a webpage is also disclosed. A process for updating a webpage is also disclosed.
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Citations
35 Claims
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1. A web crawler stored on computer readable media for causing a processor of a computer to crawl a website having a webpage displaying a product, said web crawler comprising:
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a. an interface input for receiving a URL of a homepage of the website, said homepage containing links; b. a linking system containing a link follower for retrieving and following the links on the homepage which leads to an additional webpage in the website; c. a webpage collector for collecting the homepage and a current webpage associated with at least one of the links retrieved from the linking system;
wherein the collector categorizes the webpage as a category webpage, a quasi category webpage, or SKU webpage;d. an analyzer for collecting at least one of the following;
a name of the product, a category and subcategory of the product, pricing information on the product, pricing information relating to a service plan of the product, breadcrumbs, and images of the product;e. a validator for examining product information and the product'"'"'s associated service plan; and f. an interface output for generating an output containing results generated by the web crawler. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20)
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21. A web crawler stored on computer readable media for causing a processor of a computer to crawl a website having a webpage displaying a product, said web crawler causing the computer to perform the steps of:
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a. receiving a URL of a homepage of the website, said homepage containing links; b. downloading the homepage; c. retrieving and following the links on the homepage; d. determining whether a particular link from the homepage should be followed, by using a regular expression to determine whether at least a part of a link'"'"'s URL matches at least part of a particular phrase; e. retrieving a current webpage associated with at least one of the retrieved links; f. collecting at least one of the following;
a name of the product, a category and subcategory of the product, pricing information on the product, pricing information relating to a service plan of the product, breadcrumbs, and images of the product;g. providing a validator for examining a product and its associated service plan; and h. outputting results from the validator to a display. - View Dependent Claims (22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35)
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Specification