Web browser control for incorporating web browser functionality into application programs

• US 6,101,510 A
• Filed: 01/29/1997
• Issued: 08/08/2000
• Est. Priority Date: 01/29/1997
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Sheldon, Michael G., Stone, Jeremy D., Eckhardt, Kurt J.
• Primary Examiner(s): Trammell, James P.
• Assistant Examiner(s): YOUNG, JOHN L
• Application Number:
  US08/790,474
• Time in Patent Office: 1,287 Days
• Field of Search: 395/200.32, 395/200.48, 707/10, 707/513, 706/11, 345/357
• US Class Current: 715/234
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/954 Navigation, e.g. using categorised browsing
• 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]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 9/40 Network security protocols

Abstract

A web browser control allows application program developers to incorporate web browser functionality into application programs. The web browser control exposes web browsing functionality to application programs through an application program interface. This interface comprises member functions, events and properties. The member functions provide high level services such as Navigate to a URL, go forward or backward in a navigation stack, or refresh the display of an HTML page. The events are notification messages that the control sends to a host application to notify the application about actions that have taken place or are about to take place. The properties provide status information about an instance of a control. A host application can create several instances of the web browser control and communicate with them through the interface on each instance.

Claims

1. A method for invoking a web browser from within an application program executing on a computer, the method comprising:

in response to a request from an application program to create an instance of a web browser control, creating the instance of the web browser control;

in a server program of the web browser control, processing requests from the application program to invoke member functions on a programming interface of the web browser control for the instance of the web browser control;

when the application program invokes a navigate member function on the programming interface instructing the instance of the web browser control to navigate to a specified address on a computer network, executing the navigate member function in the server program to retrieve a first document at the address from the computer network, and saving the specified address in a navigation stack of the instance of the web browser control;

when the application program invokes a member function on the programming interface instructing the instance of the browser control to move to an entry in the navigation stack, executing the member function in the server program to request a second document associated with the entry in the navigation stack.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein the server program executing in the computer displays the first document in a window of the application program on a display screen of the computer associated with the instance of the web browser control in response to the navigate member function.

3. The method of claim 2 further including displacing the second document in the window in response to a go forward member function;

and

displaying a third document in the window in response to a go backward member function, where the go forward and go backward member functions move one entry forward and backward, respectively, in the navigation stack.

4. The method of claim 1 further including:

in response to requests to create more than one in stance of the browser control, creating separate instances of the browser control, each having a separate display frame on a display monitor and each simultaneously displaying different HTML documents retrieved from the computer network, wherein each separate instance of the browser control is responsive to function calls from the application program to each of the member functions.

5. The method of claim 1 further including:

from the server program executing on the computer, issuing a new window event to the application program to tell the application program to create a new window to display a document retrieved from the computer network.

6. The method of claim 1 further including:

from the server program executing on the computer, issuing a download begin event to the application program to tell the application program that the server program is beginning to download a document from the computer network for the instance of the browser control; and

from the server program, issuing a download complete event to the application program to tell the application program that the server program has completed downloading the document from the computer network.

7. The method of claim 1 further including:

from the server program executing on the computer, issuing a navigate begin event to the application program to tell the application program that the server program is about to navigate to a URL on the computer network on behalf of the instance of the browser control; and

from the server program, issuing a navigate complete event to the application program to tell the application program that the server program has completed navigating to the URL.

8. The method of claim 1 further including:

in response to a request to create a second instance of the web browser control from the application program, creating the second instance of the web browser control;

displaying a first HTML page in a display frame of the first instance of the browser control; and

displaying a second HTML page in a display frame of the second instance of the browser control;

when a user activates a targeted link in the first HTML page, displaying output of the targeted link in the display frame of the second instance of the browser control, wherein each separate instance of the browser control is responsive to function calls from the application program to each of the member functions.

9. The method of claim 8 wherein the step of displaying the output of the targeted link includes:

locating a target frame in the display screen for the targeted link by searching current frames to find a frame having a frame name of the target frame;

and displaying the output of the targeted link in the display frame of the second instance of the browser control such that the first instance communicates with the second instance of the browser control to display the output without using the application program to perform the targeted link.

10. The method of claim 1 further including:

from the server program executing on the computer, issuing a progress change event to the application program to indicate when progress of a download of a resource from the computer network changes.

11. The method of claim 1 wherein the server program is dynamically linked with the application program at run time and runs in a same process as the application program.

12. The method of claim 1 wherein the instance of the web browser control displays the first, and second documents in a user interface window created by the application program.

13. The method of claim 12 further including:

creating a second instance of the web browser control;

when the application program invokes the navigate method for the second instance of the browser control and specifies an address of a third document, retrieving the third document from the computer network;

adding the address of the third document on a navigation stack associated with the second instance of the browser control, and displaying the third document in a second user interface window created by the application program for the second instance of the browser control.

14. The method of claim 1 further including:

in the application program, creating separate windows in a display screen of the computer;

in the application program, creating instances of the web browser control, where each instance of the web browser control corresponds to one of the application program'"'"'s windows; and

simultaneously displaying separate HTML documents retrieved by the server in the windows.

15. The method of claim 1 wherein the first document is an HTML document and is encapsulated in the instance of the browser control such that the encapsulated document is accessible to the application program via the programming interface, and further including:

from the application program, adding code to the HTML document to modify the HTML document and displaying the modified document in a window of the application program.

16. A web browser control comprising:

a navigation stack for storing navigation history of the web browser control; and

a server program with application programming interface methods including;

a navigate member function for retrieving a HTML document at a specified address on a computer network, for rendering the HTML document, for storing the specified address on the navigation stack, and for displaying the document in a window on a display screen of a computer;

a go forward member function in communication with the navigation stack for navigating to a subsequent address relative to the current address in the navigation stack; and

a go backward member function in communication with the navigation stack for navigating to a previous address relative to the current address in the navigation stack.

17. The web browser control of claim 16 wherein the server program is operable to create instances of the web browser control, and wherein each instance of the web browser control is accessible to a host application program through the application programming interface methods of the server program.

18. The web browser control of claim 16 wherein the application programming interface includes a refresh member function for refreshing a current HTML document displayed on the display screen of the computer.

19. The web browser control of claim 16 wherein the application programming interface includes a stop member function for halting a navigation or download of a current HTML document.

20. The web browser control of claim 16 wherein the application programming interface includes a refresh member function for refreshing a current HTML document displayed on the display screen of the computer, and a stop member function for halting a navigation or download of an HTML document.

21. A computer-readable medium having computer-executable instructions for performing steps comprising:

in a web browser control program, processing requests from an application program to invoke member functions on an Interface of the web browser control for an instance of the web browser control;

when the application program invokes a navigate member function on the interface instructing the instance of the web browser control to navigate to a specified address on a computer network, retrieving a first document at the address from the computer network, and saving the specified address in a navigation stack of the instance of the web browser control;

when the application program invokes a member function on the interface instructing the instance of the browser control to move forward or backward to an entry in the navigation stack, retrieving a second document associated with the entry in the navigation stack.