Embedded web server

• US 5,973,696 A
• Filed: 08/08/1997
• Issued: 10/26/1999
• Est. Priority Date: 08/08/1996
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Conexant Systems Incorporated (Synaptics Incorporated)
• Original Assignee: Agranat Systems, Inc. (Synaptics Incorporated)
• Inventors: Lawrence, Scott D., Giusti, Kenneth A., Agranat, Ian D.
• Primary Examiner(s): Bayerl, Raymond J.
• Assistant Examiner(s): Thai, Cuong T.
• Application Number:
  US08/907,770
• Time in Patent Office: 809 Days
• Field of Search: 345/357, 345/339, 707/513, 707/514, 707/515, 707/501, 707/901, 395/500, 395/339, 395/200.31, 395/200.33, 709/201, 709/203
• US Class Current: 715/760
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 2219/31186 TCP-IP internet protocol
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 2219/34038 Web, http, ftp, internet, intranet server
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/986 Document structures and storage, e.g. HTML extensions
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/34 Graphical or visual programming
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/38 for implementing user interfaces
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/02 based on web technology, e.g. hypertext transfer protocol [HTTP]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/329 in the application layer [OSI layer 7]

Abstract

An embedded graphical user interface employs a World-Wide-Web communications and display paradigm. The development environment includes an HTML compiler which recognizes and processes a number of unique extensions to HTML. The HTML compiler produces an output which is in the source code language of an application to which the graphical user interface applies. A corresponding run-time environment includes a server which serves the compiled HTML documents to a browser.

Claims

1. A method for providing a graphical user interface having dynamic elements, comprising the steps of:

defining elements of the graphical user interface in at least one text document written in a mark-up language;

including in the document a string identified by prototype tags;

serving the text document to a prototyping client which interprets the mark-up language but does not recognize and does not display the prototype tags, but does display the string; and

compiling the text document into a content source, omitting the prototype tags and the string identified thereby.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising the step of:

including at a location in the document a code tag containing a segment of application source code, wherein the prototyping client does not recognize and does not display the code tag; and

the step of further comprising including the segment of application source code in the content source.

3. The method of claim 2, further comprising the steps of:

decompiling the content source into a replica of the text document;

serving the replica to a user client; and

when the location is encountered in the replica, serving to the user client a character stream derived from a result generated by executing the segment of application source code.

4. The method of claim 3, further comprising the steps of:

including in the document at least one more code tag containing a segment of application source code; and

including in the document at least one more string identified by code tags.

5. A method for providing a graphical user interface having dynamic elements, comprising the steps of:

defining elements of the graphical user interface in at least one text document written in a mark-up language;

including at a location in the document a code tag containing a segment of application source code;

including in the document a string identified by prototype tags;

compiling the text document into a content source;

decompiling the content source into a replica of the text document;

serving the replica of the text document to a client which interprets the mark-up language; and

when the location is encountered in the replica, serving to the client a character stream generated by executing the segment of application source code.

6. The method of claim 5, further comprising the steps of:

including in the document at least one more code tag containing a segment of application source code; and

including in the document at least one more string identified by code tags.

7. A software product recorded on a medium, the software product comprising a mark-up language compiler which can compile a mark-up language document into a data structure in a native application programming language, the compiler recognizing one or more code tags which designate included text as a segment of application source code to be saved in a file for compilation by a compiler of the native application programming language.

8. A method for providing a graphical user interface having displayed forms for entry of data, wherein the text document is viewed using a prototype client during development and is viewed using a user client during use, comprising the steps of:

defining elements of the graphical user interface in at least one text document written in a mark-up language;

naming in the document a data item requested of a user and used by an application written in a native application programming language and executed on a server;

compiling the text document into a content source including a data structure definition in the native application programming language for the named data item;

naming the data item within a tag understood in the mark-up language for viewing by both the prototype client and the user client; and

including in the content source a definition of a function to provide a default value for the data item when the content source is served and a definition of a function to perform an application specific operation at the server when the data item is returned by the user client.

9. In a computer-based apparatus for developing a graphical user interface for an application, the apparatus including an editor which can manipulate a document written in a mark-up language and a viewer which can display a document written in the mark-up language, the apparatus further comprising:

a mark-up language compiler which recognizes a code tag containing a source code fragment in a native application source code language, the code tag not otherwise part of the mark-up language, the compiler producing as an output a representation in the native application source code language of the document, including a copy of the source code fragment.

10. The apparatus of claim 9, wherein the mark-up language compiler further recognizes begin and end prototype tags not otherwise part of the mark-up language, the output representation omitting the begin and end prototype tags and all content appearing therebetween in the document.