Caching dynamic web pages

• US 6,185,608 B1
• Filed: 06/12/1998
• Issued: 02/06/2001
• Est. Priority Date: 06/12/1998
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Kuperman, Leon, Mau, Louis S., Hon, Lenny K., Mohelsky, Alexander
• Primary Examiner(s): Rinehart, Mark
• Assistant Examiner(s): Jaroenchonwanit, Bunjob
• Application Number:
  US09/096,305
• Time in Patent Office: 970 Days
• Field of Search: 709/203, 709/245, 709/229, 709/205, 709/246, 709/248, 709/213-216, 707/203, 707/10
• US Class Current: 709/216
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9574 of access to content, e.g. by caching

Abstract

Web pages for commercial applications, such as electronic retail, are built “on-the-fly” in Hypertext Markup Language (HTML) from product data stored in the merchant'"'"'s database. To reduce costs in time and computing resources and to improve customer access to data from the merchant'"'"'s web site, pages created in HTML are cached on the merchant server. On a customer request for a page, the merchant server checks the cache first for the page, and if it isn'"'"'t found there, generates a new page from the database. To maintain the validity of the content of the cached pages, the database tables include triggers that cause identifying information for any changes made on the stored data to be forwarded to a cache log. A synchronization daemon walks the cache log from time to time to locate pages that should be purged from the cache because their content is no longer synchronous with the data stored in the database. By setting preferences for identifiable customers in advance, data generated from the database can be selected for specific customer groups.

Claims

1. A document processing system for transmitting data for display on a client machine from a server, comprising:

data storage connected to the server, said data storage including a trigger mechanism to notify the server of a change to the stored data;

a converter program in the server for transforming data from the data storage into transmissible form for display on the client machine;

a cache on the server for storing one or more copies of the transformed data in transmissible form; and

means in the server for checking the cache for a copy of the transformed data in transmissible form before activating the converter program on receiving a request for data transmission from the client wherein said server further comprises a synchronized adapter to purge from the cache copies of the transformed data affected by the change to the stored data.

2. A document processing system, according to claim 1, wherein the transmissible form is Hypertext Markup Language.

3. A document processing system, according to claim 1, wherein the data storage is a database.

4. A document processing system, according to claim 3, wherein the database is a relational database.

5. A document processing system, according to claim 1 or 3, wherein the server further comprises:

log identifying copies of transformed data affected by the change to the stored data; and

a synchronizer adapted to walk the log to identify said copies of the transformed data affected by the change to the stored data and to purge said identified copies.

6. A document processing system, according to claim 1, wherein the converter program includes means for:

querying the client'"'"'s identity;

locating preferences corresponding to the client'"'"'s identity; and

selecting data from the data storage according to the located preferences.

7. A document processing system, according to claim 1, wherein the means in the server for checking the cache includes means for:

querying the client'"'"'s identity;

locating preferences corresponding to the client'"'"'s identity; and

selecting data from the data storage according to the located preferences.

8. A document processing system for transmitting data for display on a client machine from a server, comprising:

data storage connected to the server, wherein the data storage includes a trigger mechanism to notify the server of a change in the stored data;

means for selecting data from the data storage in response to receiving a request for data transmission from the client;

a converter program in the server for transforming the selected data from the data storage into transmissible form for display on the client machine;

a cache on the server for storing one or more copies of the transformed selected data in transmissible form; and

means in the server for checking the cache for the copy of the transformed selected data in transmissible form before activating the converter program on receiving a request for data transmission from the client wherein the server further comprises a synchronizer adapted to purge from the cache the copy of the transformed selected data if said selected data is affected by the change to the stored data.

9. A document processing system, according to claim 8, wherein the transmissible form is Hypertext Markup Language.

10. A document processing system, according to claim 8, wherein the data storage is a database.

11. A document processing system, according to claim 10, wherein the database is a relational database.

12. A document processing system, according to claim 8 or 10, wherein the server further comprises:

a log identifying the copy of the transformed selected data if said selected data is affected by the change to the stored data; and

a synchronizer adapted to walk the log and to purge the transformed selected data if said transformed selected data is identified in the log.

13. A document processing system, according to claim 8, wherein the converter program includes means for:

querying the client'"'"'s identity;

locating preferences corresponding to the client'"'"'s identity; and

selecting data from the data storage according to the located preferences.

14. A document processing system, according to claim 8, wherein the means in the server for checking the cache includes means for:

querying the client'"'"'s identity;

locating preferences corresponding to the client'"'"'s identity; and

selecting data from the data storage according to the located preferences.