Storage of sitemaps at server sites for holding information regarding content

• US 6,038,610 A
• Filed: 07/17/1996
• Issued: 03/14/2000
• Est. Priority Date: 07/17/1996
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Chew, Chee H., Ellison-Taylor, Ian M., Belfiore, Joseph D., Ramasubramanian, Sankaranarayanan, Berkun, Scott E.
• Primary Examiner(s): Treat, William M.
• Application Number:
  US08/683,663
• Time in Patent Office: 1,336 Days
• Field of Search: 395/200.01, 395/776, 709/300, 709/303, 709/203
• US Class Current: 719/310
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/30 of unstructured textual data document management systems G06F16/93
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/958 Organisation or management of web site content, e.g. publishing, maintaining pages or automatic linking
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/01 Protocols
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/1097 for distributed storage of data in networks, e.g. transport arrangements for network file system [NFS], storage area networks [SAN] or network attached storage [NAS]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 9/40 Network security protocols
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99943 Generating database or data structure, e.g. via user interface

Abstract

Sitemaps are utilized to hold content-related information about hypertext documents stored at a server site. The hypertext documents may be web pages for the World Wide Web portion of the Internet. Each sitemap file may hold a hierarchical index of the web pages that are accessible at the server site. Each sitemap may also hold search results that identify web pages that comply with the search criteria and/or ratings information regarding the content of the web pages at the server site. The sitemaps may also be utilized by web crawler programs to build an index of web pages available at the server site. The sitemap files may be located at a default location of the server site or, alternatively, may be located at a site designated by information held in a specified hypertext document at the server site.

Claims

1. In a distributed system having a server computer for providing hypertext documents and a client computer and that includes a storage that accesses at least one of the hypertext documents, a method comprising the steps of:

providing a block of data on the server computer that holds index information about the hypertext documents, wherein the block of data is held in a separate file that is distinct from the hypertext documents;

downloading the block of data from the server computer to the client computer without a request by a user;

extracting the index information from the block of data;

persistently storing a representation of the index information in the storage of the client computer; and

incorporating the index information in a namespace of the client computer.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein the hypertext documents are web pages.

3. The method of claim 1 wherein the index information specifies a hierarchical index.

4. The method of claim 1 wherein the server computer is an Internet server.

5. The method of claim 1 wherein the server computer is an intranet server.

6. The method of claim 1 wherein the namespace includes objects that are accessible at the client computer and wherein incorporating the index information in the namespace includes adding objects related to the index information for each hypertext document to the namespace.

7. The method of claim 1 wherein the file has a name that includes an extension that indicates that the file holds index information.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the block of data includes ratings information related to the content of the hypertext documents.

9. The method of claim 8, further comprising comparing at least a portion of the ratings information with a user profile to determine whether the user profile allows for accessing the content of the hypertext documents associated with the portion of the ratings information.

10. In a distributed system having a server computer for providing hypertext documents and a client computer for accessing at least one of the hypertext documents, the client computer including a namespace for storing objects representative of documents accessible at the client computer, a computer-readable storage medium, comprising:

a file that holds information regarding contents of the hypertext documents for downloading to the client computer without a request by a user so that the client computer may persistently store the information in the file at the client computer for future reference, wherein the file is distinct from the provided hypertext documents and wherein the file includes information sufficient to build objects to be included in the client computer namespace.

11. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 10 wherein the file holds an index to the hypertext documents on the server computer.

12. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 11 wherein the index is a hierarchical index that specifies the hierarchy of the hypertext documents.

13. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 10 wherein the file holds search results that identify certain of the hypertext documents that fulfill requirements of a query.

14. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 10 wherein the file holds ratings information about at least some of the hypertext documents.

15. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 10 wherein the server computer is an Internet server.

16. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 10 wherein the server computer is an intranet server.

17. In a client computer system that is connectable to a server computer that holds hypertext documents, a computer-readable storage medium holding:

a sitemap locator for locating a sitemap file at the server computer, said sitemap file holding information about contents of the hypertext documents of the server computer;

a downloading facility for asynchronously and transparently downloading said sitemap file without a request for said sitemap file by a user from the server computer after the sitemap file is located by the sitemap locator; and

a sitemap file processing facility for processing the downloaded sitemap to extract and persistently store the information in the sitemap file, wherein the sitemap is distinct from the hypertext documents held by the server computer, and wherein the information from the sitemap file is incorporated in a namespace of the client computer system.

18. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 17 wherein the sitemap holds an index of at least some of the hypertext documents at the server computer.

19. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 18 wherein the index is a hierarchical index.

20. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 17 wherein the sitemap holds ratings information regarding contents of at least some of the hypertext documents.

21. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 17 wherein the sitemap holds search results that identify selected ones of the hypertext documents that fulfill search criteria.

22. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 17 wherein the hypertext documents are web pages.

23. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 17 wherein the sitemap is held in a separate sitemap file.

24. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 17 wherein the sitemap locator locates multiple sitemaps, the downloading facility downloads the located sitemaps and the sitemap processing facility processes the sitemaps.

25. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 17, wherein the information about the contents of the hypertext documents includes object information that enables the creation of at least one site object for a corresponding hypertext document of the server computer.

26. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 25, wherein the at least one site object is incorporated in the namespace of the client computer system.

27. In a data processing system having at least one server computer holding hypertext documents and a client computer, a method comprising the steps of:

performing a query at the server to identify what hypertext documents at one or more of the servers have content that fulfills the search criteria;

storing the search results in a search results file at a selected one of the servers, wherein the search results file is distinct from the hypertext documents and contains information related to the content of hypertext documents that fulfill the search criteria;

downloading the search results file to the client without a request by a user; and

persistently storing the search results file at the client.

28. The method of claim 27 wherein the hypertext documents are web pages.

29. The method of claim 27 wherein the server is an Internet server.

30. The method of claim 27 wherein the server is an intranet server.

31. The method of claim 27 wherein the client has a namespace of objects and wherein the method further comprises the step of adding objects representing the hypertext documents identified in the search results to the namespace at the client.

32. The method of claim 31 wherein the client includes a display device, further comprising the step of displaying a visual representation of the objects that represent the hypertext documents that have been identified in the search results on the display device.

33. A computer-readable medium having computer-executable instructions for browsing, from a client computer, hypertext documents associated with a server computer, which, when executed, comprise:

retrieving from the server computer a sitemap containing information sufficient to create at least one site list object; and

creating the at least one site list object based on the information contained in the sitemap; and

incorporating the at least one site list object in a namespace associated with the client computer.

34. The computer-readable medium of claim 33, wherein creating the at least one site list object comprises:

reading the information contained in the sitemap to identify an object class associated with the at least one site list object;

retrieving the identified object class from a module stored on the client computer; and

creating an instance of the object class retrieved from the module.