Dynamically updating themes for an operating system shell
First Claim
1. A server computer system remotely accessible to multiple client computers each having an operating system with a local store of multimedia operating system element resources, a dynamic theme selector, a recurrent resource requesting service, and a shell, wherein the dynamic theme selector has a control for setting an active theme of the operating system which active theme has an associated source of multimedia operating system element resources, the recurrent resource requesting service automatically issuing requests on a recurrent basis to the source associated with the active theme and storing multimedia operating system element resources received from the source into the local store, the shell using the multimedia operating system element resources from the local store to create a dynamically updating user-perceptible environment through which a user of the respective client computer interacts with the operating system, the server computer system comprising:
- a data storage containing a collection of multimedia operating system element resources; and
a download request servicing module for responding to the requests from the recurrent resource requesting services of the client computers to transmit the collection of multimedia operating system element resources from the data storage to such requesting client computers;
whereby the collection of multi-media resources loaded into the data storage at the server computer system is used to remotely define the user-perceptible environment through which the user interacts with the operating system on those of the client computers set to an active theme that designates the server computer system as its associated source.
2 Assignments
0 Petitions
Accused Products
Abstract
A theme provides a group of multi-media resources for enhancing displays in a graphical user interface to an operating system of a computer according to a topic of the theme. The theme'"'"'s resources are periodically updated by retrieving updating resources from a remote computer at which the updating resources are stored by a theme provider, so as to provide continually updating enhancements to the graphical user interface display consistent with the theme'"'"'s topic. The theme'"'"'s resources can include hypertext templates which define the graphical user interface displays as hypertext pages, allowing the theme to provide a wide variety of enhancements to the displays including text, graphics, hyperlinks, and software components, among others. The theme also enhances a graphical user interface with a view port that plays live or locally cached information from the Internet in each of a plurality of categories, by adding a category for the theme so as to play information from the theme'"'"'s provider in the view port.
368 Citations
10 Claims
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1. A server computer system remotely accessible to multiple client computers each having an operating system with a local store of multimedia operating system element resources, a dynamic theme selector, a recurrent resource requesting service, and a shell, wherein the dynamic theme selector has a control for setting an active theme of the operating system which active theme has an associated source of multimedia operating system element resources, the recurrent resource requesting service automatically issuing requests on a recurrent basis to the source associated with the active theme and storing multimedia operating system element resources received from the source into the local store, the shell using the multimedia operating system element resources from the local store to create a dynamically updating user-perceptible environment through which a user of the respective client computer interacts with the operating system, the server computer system comprising:
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a data storage containing a collection of multimedia operating system element resources; and a download request servicing module for responding to the requests from the recurrent resource requesting services of the client computers to transmit the collection of multimedia operating system element resources from the data storage to such requesting client computers; whereby the collection of multi-media resources loaded into the data storage at the server computer system is used to remotely define the user-perceptible environment through which the user interacts with the operating system on those of the client computers set to an active theme that designates the server computer system as its associated source. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5)
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6. A computer readable data storage medium located on a server computer having information encoded thereon for dynamically altering a user-perceptible environment created by an operating system shell running on a client computer from multi-media resources locally stored at particular locations on the client computer when the client computer'"'"'s updating service recurrently updates the particular locations based on the information obtained from the updating service'"'"'s request to the server computer, the information comprising:
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a set of multi-media resources; and a resource descriptor file specifying locations within the client computer for storing respective of the multi-media resources; whereby changes to the set of multi-media resource and the resource descriptor file cause the user-perceptible environment to be dynamically altered as a result of the recurrent updates by the updating service.
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7. A computer readable data storage medium located on a remote server computer containing thereon a computer-executable program comprising:
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code for storing a group of multi-media resources on the remote server computer; code for enhancing displays in a user perceptible environment through which the user interacts with the operating system on a client computer with the stored resources on the remote server computer; and code for periodically servicing a request from the client to update the client computer with the stored resources on the remote server computer.
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8. A method in a server computer of dynamically altering user-perceptible environments for user interaction with an operating system created by an operating system shell running on client computers that remotely access the server computer over a network, the individual client computers having local storage for maintaining a collection of multimedia element resources used by the operating system shell in creating the user-perceptible environment and having an updating service for automatically recurrently requesting updates to the locally stored collection from the server computer, the method comprising:
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storing a group of multimedia element resources at the server computer; servicing the recurrent update requests of the client computers; during said recurrent update request servicing, transmitting the group of multimedia element resources to the client computers; and changing the multimedia element resources in the group stored at the server computer so as to cause the user-perceptible environments on the client computers to be altered when the updating service updates the locally stored collection of the client computers to conform with the changed group stored at the server computer. - View Dependent Claims (9, 10)
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Specification