METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR VIEWING COLLABORATIVE DOCUMENTS

• US 20140032489A1
• Filed: 01/22/2009
• Published: 01/30/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 01/22/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Adobe Inc.
• Original Assignee: Adobe Systems Incorporated (Adobe Inc.)
• Inventors: Hebbar, Vivek, McAfee, Robert K.
• Granted Patent: US 9,384,295 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 707/608
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/93 Document management systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/986 Document structures and storage, e.g. HTML extensions
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/101 Collaborative creation, e.g. joint development of products or services

Abstract

A method and apparatus for viewing a collaborative document and a portable document at a device in a network. The collaborative document is hosted on a server and accessible through a network. The device hosts a corresponding portable document. The document processing application allows viewing of the portable document and the collaborative document on the device, wherein the user may select the desired view. In one embodiment, each view is displayed as a tabbed window, and switching views is enabled by selection of a tab. When the device is disconnected from the network, the user may view and process the portable document.

Claims

1. A method, comprising:

processing a portable document corresponding to a collaborative document, the collaborative document being resident on a server accessible through a distributed network, the portable document being editable when disconnected from the network;

displaying one of the collaborative document and the portable document; and

switching between views of the collaborative document and the portable document.

2. The method as in claim 1, wherein processing the portable document comprises editing the portable document when disconnected from the server.

3. The method as in claim 1, further comprising displaying a first document tab identifying an active view of a displayed document.

4. The method as in claim 3, further comprising displaying a second document tab identifying an inactive view of a document available for display.

5. The method as in claim 4, wherein switching between views further comprises:

selecting one of the first and second document tabs.

6. The method as in claim 4, wherein the document tab includes document identification information.

7. The method of claim 4, further comprising:

obtaining display parameters for the document from the server.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein displaying comprises:

displaying the contents of the user selected document; and

displaying a tab identifying the user selected document.

9. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

on disconnection of the device from the network displaying the portable document.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein a user application program at the device enables editing of the user selected document.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein the user application is a desktop application.

12. The method of claim 10, wherein the user application is a web browser.

13. The method of claim 1, wherein an amendment file identifies changes made to a collaborative document.

14. The method of claim 1, wherein switching between views comprises switching between views of the collaborative document and the portable document on user selection.

15. A computer system, comprising:

at least one processor coupled to a memory;

a plurality of modules, each module comprising instructions retained on at least one machine- readable storage medium, and that when executed by a machine perform identified operations, wherein the modules comprise;

a document processing engine, adapted to process a portable document corresponding to a collaborative document, the collaborative document being resident on a server accessible through a distributed network, the portable document being editable when disconnected from the network; and

a viewing engine, adapted to prepare, using the at least one processor, display information for displaying one of the collaborative document and the portable document, the viewing engine adapted to switch between views of the collaborative document and the portable document on user selection.

16. The computer system as in claim 15, further comprising:

an updating engine, adapted to detect updates to the collaborative document and apply the updates to the portable document.

17. The computer system as in claim 15, wherein the viewing engine is further adapted to provide information to display an identification tab for each document when displayed.

18. A computer-readable non-transitory storage medium comprising instructions, which when implemented by one or more machines, cause the one or more machines to perform the following operations:

processing a portable document corresponding to a collaborative document, the collaborative document being resident on a server accessible through a distributed network, the portable document being editable when disconnected from the network;

displaying one of the collaborative document and the portable document; and

switching between views of the collaborative document and the portable document.

19. The computer-readable medium as in claim 18, wherein switching between views of the collaborative document and the portable document on user selection.

20. The computer-readable medium as in claim 19, wherein switching between views comprises selecting one of the collaborative document and the portable document using a graphical user interface.

23. The data structure of claim 20, wherein the document identification portion indicates whether a displayed document is editable when disconnected from the network.

21-22. -22. (canceled)

24. A method, comprising:

using a computing system including one or more machines, to perform one or more of the following acts;

executing instructions on a specific apparatus so that digital electronic signals representing a portable document corresponding to a collaborative document being resident of a server accessible through a distributed network are processed, the portable document being editable when disconnected from the network;

executing instructions on a specific apparatus so that one of the collaborative document and the portable document are displayed on a display device;

executing instructions on a specific apparatus resulting in switching between views of the collaborative document and the portable document on the display device.