Dynamic web page behaviors

• US 7,594,166 B1
• Filed: 05/20/1999
• Issued: 09/22/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 05/20/1999
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Ramakrishna, Anand, Zotov, Alexander J., Gardner, Richard J., Chavez, Roderick, Fortini, Christian, Massy, David H.
• Primary Examiner(s): Ries; Laurie
• Assistant Examiner(s): Nguyen; MaiKhanh
• Application Number:
  US09/316,897
• Time in Patent Office: 3,778 Days
• Field of Search: 707/501.1, 707/525, 345/760, 345/744, 715/580.1, 715/514, 715/526, 715/501.1, 715/512, 715/513, 715/200, 715/205, 715/226, 715/234, 715/238, 715/253, 715/255, 715/273, 715/760, 709/201, 709/203, 709/217, 709/202, 709/218, 709/219, 717/100, 717106-108, 717/114, 717/115, 717/116, 717/110, 717/111, 717/120, 705200-202, 705/205, 705/209, 705/226, 705/234, 705/236, 705/238, 705/243, 705/253, 705/255, 705/256, 705/273, 705/749, 705/760, 705/793
• US Class Current: 715/234
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/958 Organisation or management of web site content, e.g. publishing, maintaining pages or automatic linking

Abstract

A method and system for rendering dynamic web page images on a display is disclosed. Code is encapsulated in an external behavior component for affecting the behavior of elements inserted into an HTML document. A simple reference is attached to the element in the document to associate the element with the external behavior component. When the document is provided to a renderer and the renderer parses the element in the document, the renderer accesses the external component to modify a behavior of the page image. Multiple documents can reuse external behavior components, and an element can be associated with multiple external behavior components. The associations between elements and external behavior components may be maintained in cascading style sheets, inline with the elements, and in various formats.

Claims

1. A computer-readable medium having computer-executable instructions for performing a method of rendering a web page image, the method comprising:

receiving an HTML document having an element thereon, the HTML document including information associating the element with an external component that is encapsulated and external to the HTML document such that multiple instances of the external component are used with a plurality of different HTML documents including the HTML document having the element thereon and wherein the information associating the element with the external component is maintained in a cascading style sheet;

rendering a page image corresponding to at least part of the HTML document, the page image including a representation of the element and the page image being rendered by a renderer configured to;

modify the page image by accessing one or more extensible markup language (XML) namespaces specified by the external component to initiate drawing of information on the page image based at least in part on code included in the one or more XML namespaces;

make a plurality of calls to the one or more XML namespaces to initiate the drawing of the information on the page image; and

draw the information on the page image responsive to one or more of the plurality of calls to the one or more XML namespaces;

instantiating the external component to reveal one or more of the XML namespaces specified by the external component, the one or more of the XML namespaces being external to the HTML document and specifying one or more behaviors to be applied to the element; and

accessing the one or more XML namespaces to retrieve a new behavior to be applied to the representation of the element rendered on the page image, the new behavior being configured to enhance a default behavior for the element.

2. The computer-readable medium of claim 1 further comprising, receiving an event, and wherein instantiating the external component is in response to receiving the event.

3. The computer-readable medium of claim 1 further comprising, modifying an appearance of the representation of the element in response to accessing the one or more of the XML namespaces.

4. The computer-readable medium of claim 1 further comprising, changing a location of the representation of the element in response to accessing the one or more of the XML namespaces.

5. The computer-readable medium of claim 1 further comprising, drawing information on the page image in response to accessing the one or more of the XML namespaces.

6. The computer-readable medium of claim 1 wherein the external component comprises an object, and wherein accessing the external component includes instantiating an instance of the object.

7. The computer-readable medium of claim 1 further comprising, receiving a new HTML document having another element thereon, the new HTML document including information associating the another element with the external component, rendering a new page image corresponding to at least part of the HTML document, the new page image including a representation of the another element, and accessing the one or more of the XML namespaces for determining a behavior of the representation of the another element rendered on the new page image.

8. The computer-readable medium of claim 7 wherein the external component comprises a component object model (COM) object, and wherein instantiating the external component for determining a behavior of the representation of the another element includes instantiating another instance of the object.

9. The computer-readable medium of claim 1 wherein the information associating the element with the external component is maintained in a custom tag.

10. The computer-readable medium of claim 1 wherein the information associating the element with the external component is maintained in a class.

11. The computer-readable medium of claim 1 wherein the information associating the element with the external component is maintained in the document inline with the element.

12. The computer-readable medium of claim 1 wherein the HTML document includes another element having a representation thereof rendered in the page image, the HTML document includes other information associating the another element with the external component, and further comprising, accessing the external component for determining a behavior of the representation of the another element.

13. The computer-readable medium of claim 1 wherein the HTML document includes information associating the element with a second external component, and further comprising, accessing the second external component for determining a second behavior of the representation of the element.

14. The computer-readable medium of claim 13 further comprising, resolving a conflict between the behavior determined by the one or more XML namespaces and the second behavior determined by the second external component based on the order in which the behaviors were applied to the element with each subsequent behavior taking precedence over a previous behavior.

15. The computer-readable medium of claim 1 further comprising, downloading the external component.

16. A computer-implemented method of providing dynamic effects to an HTML document, comprising,

encapsulating code in an external component that affects a behavior of one or more elements contained in the HTML document while being external to the HTML document, including elements of different HTML documents, wherein code for determining a behavior of the one more elements contained in the HTML document is not included in the HTML document and is defined by one or more extensible markup language (XML) namespaces associated with the external component;

inserting an element into the HTML document;

attaching a reference in the HTML document to associate the element with an instance of the external component, such that another instance of the element is referenced by a different HTML document, and wherein the reference associating the element with the external component is maintained in a cascading style sheet and comprises a reference to the one or more XML namespaces; and

providing the HTML document to a renderer, wherein the renderer is capable of instantiating the external component, the renderer being configured to;

modify a page image by accessing the one or more XML namespaces associated with the external component to initiate drawing of information on the page image based at least in part on code included in the one or more XML namespaces;

make a plurality of calls to the one or more XML namespaces to initiate the drawing of the information on the page image;

draw the information on the page image responsive to one or more of the plurality of calls to the one or more XML namespaces;

instantiate the external component to reveal one or more of the XML namespaces associated with the external component the one or more of the XML namespaces being external to the HTML document and specifying one or more behaviors to be applied to the element; and

access the one or more XML namespaces to retrieve a new behavior to be applied to a representation of the element rendered on the page image the new behavior being configured to enhance a default behavior for the element.

17. The method of claim 16 further comprising, providing the external component to the renderer.

18. The method of claim 16 further comprising, rendering the page image from the HTML document, accessing the one or more XML namespaces, and modifying the representation of the element based on the code in the one or more XML namespaces.

19. The method of claim 18 wherein the external component is a component object model (COM) object, and wherein accessing the one or more XML namespaces includes calling an interface of the COM object.

20. The method of claim 18 wherein modifying the representation of the element includes changing the appearance thereof.

21. The method of claim 18 wherein modifying the representation of the element includes changing the location thereof.

22. The method of claim 16 further comprising, rendering the page image from the HTML document, accessing the one or more XML namespaces, and drawing information in the page image based on the code in the one or more XML namespaces.

23. The method of claim 22 wherein rendering the page image from the HTML document is interleaved with drawing information in the page image.

24. The method of claim 16 further comprising receiving an event indicative of user interaction with the page image.

25. The method of claim 16 wherein the reference associating the element with the external component is maintained in a custom tag.

26. The method of claim 16 wherein the reference associating the element with the external component is maintained in a class identifier.

27. The method of claim 16 wherein the reference associating the element with the external component is maintained inline with the element in the HTML document.

28. A computer system including at least one processor for rendering page images on a display, comprising:

an external component encapsulating code for modifying a behavior of one or more elements, the external component operable to be instantiated multiple times and operable to modify elements in a plurality of different HTML documents while being external to the HTML documents and wherein information associating the one or more elements with the external component is maintained in a cascading style sheet, wherein code for determining a behavior of the one or more elements is included in one or more extensible markup language (XML) namespaces that are defined externally to the HTML documents and that are associated with the external component; and

at least one processing unit comprising a renderer connected to the display for rendering the page images, the renderer being configured to;

modify one or more of the page images by accessing one or more of the XML namespaces associated with the external component to initiate drawing of information on the one or more of the page images based at least in part on code included in the one or more XML namespaces;

make a plurality of calls to the one or more XML namespaces to initiate the drawing of the information on the one or more of the page images; and

draw the information on the one or more of the page image responsive to one or more of the plurality of calls to the one or more XML namespaces;

the renderer being further configured to;

instantiate the external component to reveal one or more of the XML namespaces associated with the external component the one or more of the XML namespaces being external to the HTML document and specifying one or more behaviors to be applied to the one or more elements; and

access the one or more XML namespaces to retrieve a new behavior to be applied to the representation of the one or more elements rendered on the page image, the new behavior being configured to enhance a default behavior for the one or more elements.

29. The system of claim 28 further comprising a mechanism for receiving an event.

30. The system of claim 28 wherein the renderer is configured to display a representation of the one or more elements and modify a behavior of the element by accessing the one or more XML namespaces.

31. The system of claim 30 wherein the behavior is modified by changing a displayed property of the representation of the one or more elements.

32. The system of claim 30 wherein the behavior is modified by changing a displayed location of the representation of the one or more elements.

33. The system of claim 28 wherein the renderer is configured to call the external component a plurality of times to draw information on the one or more of the page images, and the renderer is configured to draw information on the one or more of the page images between at least some of calls to the external component.

34. The system of claim 28 wherein the external component comprises an object, and wherein the renderer is configured to instantiate an instance of the object.

35. The system of claim 28 wherein the external component comprises an object, and wherein the renderer is configured to communicate with the object through an interface.

36. The system of claim 28 wherein the renderer is configured to receive a new HTML document having another element thereon that references the external component.

37. The system of claim 28 wherein the cascading style sheet is embedded in the HTML document.

38. The system of claim 28 wherein the cascading style sheet is linked to the HTML document.

39. The system of claim 28 including a custom tag for associating the one or more elements with the external component.

40. The system of claim 28 wherein the information associating the one or more elements with the external component is maintained in the HTML document inline with the one or more elements.

41. The system of claim 28 wherein the HTML document includes another element and information associating the another element with the external component, and wherein the renderer is configured to access the one or more XML namespaces for determining a behavior of a representation of the another element.

42. The system of claim 28 wherein the HTML document includes information associating the one or more elements with a second external component.

43. The system of claim 28 wherein the renderer is configured to access the external component to control a format of data input by a user.