Method and system for using vectors of data structures for extracting information from web pages of remotely monitored devices

• US 7,500,003 B2
• Filed: 12/26/2002
• Issued: 03/03/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 12/26/2002
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Ricoh Company Limited
• Original Assignee: Ricoh Company Limited
• Inventors: Motoyama, Tetsuro, Fong, Avery
• Primary Examiner(s): BATES, KEVIN T
• Application Number:
  US10/328,026
• Publication Number:
  US 20040128365A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,259 Days
• Field of Search: 709/227, 709/217, 709/223, 709/224, 707/101, 707/102
• US Class Current: 709/227
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/3347 using vector based model
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99942 Manipulating data structure, e.g. compression, compaction, compilation
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99943 Generating database or data structure, e.g. via user interface

Abstract

In a communication system having one or more monitored devices communicatively coupled to a monitoring system, a method of obtaining status information of a monitored device is described. The method includes creating a communication session using HTTP protocol with the monitored device, ii) accessing a web page of the monitored device in order, to obtain information displayed on the web page, iii) parsing the displayed information using a first and second data structure vectors in order to obtain the status information of the monitored device, and iv) closing the communication session upon parsing all the information displayed on the web page or upon obtaining desired status information.

Claims

1. In a communication system having one or more monitored devices communicatively coupled to a monitoring system, a method of obtaining status information of a monitored device, comprising:

creating a communication session using an HTTP protocol with the monitored device;

accessing a web page of the monitored device in order to obtain information in the web page;

parsing a line of the information using first and second data structure vectors in an attempt to obtain the status information of the monitored device, the first and second data structure vectors having a same number of elements;

removing corresponding elements from the first and second data structure vectors when the status information is obtained in the parsing step; and

closing the communication session upon parsing all the lines in the web page or upon obtaining all desired status information.

2. The method as in claim 1, further comprising:

iterating the creating, accessing, parsing, removing, and closing steps for multiple web pages of the monitored device.

3. The method as in claim 1, wherein:

the parsing step is performed, using first and second data structure vectors to locate and obtain information from the web page of the monitored device, for one line of information at a time.

4. The method as in claim 1, further comprising:

identifying a key from information in the web page; and

identifying a value corresponding to the key.

5. The method as in claim 4, wherein the step of identifying the value is performed using a plurality of fields of an element of said first and second data structure vectors.

6. The method as in claim 5, wherein:

the plurality of fields of the element of said first data structure vector include nPosition, sDelimiter, and nInLinePosition fields; and

the plurality of fields of the element of said second data structure vector include nCounter and bValueObtained fields.

7. The method as in claim 4, wherein:

the step of identifying the key is performed using data from a first field of said first data structure vector; and

the step of identifying the corresponding value is performed by using data from a plurality of fields of an element of said first and second data structure vectors.

8. The method as in claim 1, further comprising:

providing a one-to-one correspondence between elements of said first and second data structure vectors.

9. The method as in claim 8, further comprising:

adding information corresponding to a key and a value to a map having information about the monitored device, if the value corresponding to the key is obtained from a parsed line of information from the web page.

10. A method of obtaining information from a web page of a monitored device, comprising:

reading information in the web page;

parsing the read information;

determining a key and corresponding value information, using each element of first and second data structure vectors, for each line of information in the web page, the first and second data structure vectors having a same number of elements; and

removing an element from each of said first and second data structure vectors if a key and a corresponding value information are found for the element.

11. The method as in claim 10, further comprising:

iterating the parsing, determining, and removing steps for each line of information in the web page until all values of information defined by the elements of the first and second data structure are obtained.

12. The method as in claim 11, further comprising:

determining key and value information for all elements of said first and second data structure vectors.

13. The method as in claim 11, further comprising:

providing a one-to-one correspondence between said first and second data structure vectors.

14. The method as in claim 13, further comprising:

adding information corresponding to the key and a corresponding value to a map having information about the monitored device if the corresponding value is obtained from the parsed information.

15. In a communication system having one or more monitored devices communicatively coupled to a monitoring system, a monitoring computer including a processor configured to obtain status information of a monitored device, the monitoring computer comprising:

means for creating a communication session using an HTTP protocol with the monitored device;

means for accessing a web page of the monitored device in order to obtain information in the web page;

means for parsing a line of the information using first and second data structure vectors to attempt to obtain the status information of the monitored device, the first and second data structure vectors having a same number of elements;

means for removing corresponding elements from the first and second data structure vectors when the status information is obtained by the means for parsing; and

means for closing the communication session upon parsing all the lines in the web page or upon obtaining all desired status information.

16. A monitoring computer having a processor configured to obtain information from a web page of a monitored device, the monitoring computer comprising:

means for reading information in a web page of the monitored device;

means for parsing the read information;

means for determining a key and corresponding value information, using each element of first and second data structure vectors, for each line of information in the web page, the first and second data structure vectors having a same number of elements; and

means for removing an element from each of said first and second data structure vectors if a key and a corresponding value information are found for the element.

17. A computer program product having a computer readable medium for obtaining information from a monitored device, comprising:

instructions for reading information in a web page of the monitored device;

instructions for parsing the read information;

instructions for determining a key and corresponding value information, using each element of first and second data structure vectors, for each line of information in the web page, the first and second data structure vectors having a same number of elements; and

instructions for removing an element from each of said first and second data structure vectors if a key and a corresponding value information are found for the element.

18. A method of obtaining status information of a device, comprising:

creating a communication session using an HTTP protocol with the device;

accessing a web page of the device in order to obtain information in a web page of the device;

parsing a line of information obtained from the web page using first and second data structure vectors, the first and second data structure vectors having a same number of elements;

removing corresponding elements from the first and second data structures when the status information is obtained in the parsing step; and

closing the communication session upon parsing all the lines in the web page or upon obtaining all desired status information.