Describing documents and expressing document structure
First Claim
1. A method of describing the hierarchical structure of a document having content of a characteristic type of content, comprising:
- expressing, independently of the document content type, the hierarchical structure of the document as a tree structure of one or more nodes;
providing a semantic representation for interpreting the tree structure, wherein the semantic representation comprises parent-child relationships among the nodes; and
associating with a node a child-count attribute indicative of whether the node has associated child nodes that have not yet been expressed in the tree structure, and then storing the association between the node and the child-count attribute in a computer;
wherein associating is performed by one or more processors.
2 Assignments
0 Petitions
Accused Products
Abstract
Apparatus and methods of revealing the hierarchical structure of a document having content of a characteristic type of content are described. The hierarchical structure may be expressed, independently of document content type, as a tree structure of one or more nodes. A semantic representation for interpreting the tree structure may also be provided. Document description files are used to encapsulate structural and meta information associated with a document stored on a computer-readable medium. Document description files are external to native application files and have a set of required fields. Document description files point to the referenced document data using Uniform Resource Locators (URLs) and serve as virtual documents. In addition to the required fields, applications can choose to encode additional structural information in the document description files.
17 Citations
47 Claims
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1. A method of describing the hierarchical structure of a document having content of a characteristic type of content, comprising:
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expressing, independently of the document content type, the hierarchical structure of the document as a tree structure of one or more nodes; providing a semantic representation for interpreting the tree structure, wherein the semantic representation comprises parent-child relationships among the nodes; and associating with a node a child-count attribute indicative of whether the node has associated child nodes that have not yet been expressed in the tree structure, and then storing the association between the node and the child-count attribute in a computer; wherein associating is performed by one or more processors. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7)
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8. A method of extracting content from a document having content of a characteristic type of content, comprising:
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providing access to document content in response to a request for document content based upon an expression of the hierarchical structure of the document as a tree structure of one or more nodes, that is independent of document content type and has an interpretation controlled by a semantic representation, wherein the semantic representation comprises parent-child relationships among the nodes; and associating with a node a child-count attribute indicative of whether the node has associated child nodes that have not yet been expressed in the tree structure, and then storing the association between the node and the child-count attribute in a computer; wherein associating is performed by one or more processors. - View Dependent Claims (9, 10, 11)
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12. A method of describing the hierarchical structure of a document having content of a characteristic type of content, comprising:
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in response to a client request for information relating to the hierarchical structure of the document, expressing, independently of the document content type, the hierarchical structure of the document as a tree structure of one or more nodes; providing a first semantic representation for interpreting the tree structure, wherein the semantic representation comprises parent-child relationships among the nodes; and associating with a node a child-count attribute indicative of whether the node has associated child nodes that have not yet been expressed in the tree structure, and then storing the association between the node and the child-count attribute in a computer; wherein associating is performed by one or more processors. - View Dependent Claims (13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19)
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20. A document description file, stored on a computer-readable storage device, for describing the hierarchical structure of a document having content of a characteristic type of content, comprising:
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a tree structure of one or more nodes expressing, independently of the document content type, the hierarchical structure of the document; a semantic representation for interpreting the tree structure, wherein the semantic representation comprises parent-child relationships among the nodes; and a child-count attribute associated with a node, indicative of whether the node has associated child nodes that have not yet been expressed in the tree structure. - View Dependent Claims (21, 22, 23, 24, 25)
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26. A document description file, stored on a computer-readable storage device, for describing the hierarchical structure of a document having content of a characteristic type of content, comprising:
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a tree structure of one or more nodes expressing, independently of the document content type, the hierarchical structure of the document; a semantic representation for interpreting the tree structure;
wherein the semantic representation comprises parent-child relationships among the nodes;a child-count attribute associated with a node, indicative of whether the node has associated child nodes that have not yet been expressed in the tree structure; and information relating to document content within the hierarchical structure expressed by one or more tree nodes produced in response to a client request for document content associated with one or more tree nodes. - View Dependent Claims (27, 28)
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29. A document description file, stored on a computer-readable storage device, for describing the hierarchical structure of a document having content of a characteristic type of content, comprising;
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a tree structure of one or more nodes expressing, independently of the document content type, the hierarchical structure of the document, the tree structure being produced in response to a client request for information relating to the hierarchical structure of the document; a semantic representation for interpreting the tree structure, wherein the semantic representation comprises parent-child relationships among the nodes; and a child-count attribute associated with a node, indicative of whether the node has associated child nodes that have not yet been expressed in the tree structure. - View Dependent Claims (30, 31, 32, 33)
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34. A computer program product for describing the hierarchical structure of a document having content of a characteristic type, the program encoded on a computer-readable storage device and operable to cause data processing apparatus to perform operations comprising:
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expressing, independently of the document content type, the hierarchical structure of the document as a tree structure of one or more nodes; providing a semantic representation for interpreting the tree structure, wherein the semantic representation comprises parent-child relationships among the nodes; and associating with a node a child-count attribute indicative of whether the node has associated child nodes that have not yet been expressed in the tree structure, and then storing the association between the node and the child-count attribute in a computer. - View Dependent Claims (35, 36)
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37. A computer program product for extracting content from a document having content of a characteristic type of content, the program encoded on a computer-readable storage device and operable to cause data processing apparatus to perform operations comprising:
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providing access to document content in response to a request for document content based upon an expression of the hierarchical structure of the document as a tree structure of one or more nodes, that is independent of document content type and has an interpretation controlled by a semantic representation, wherein the semantic representation comprises parent-child relationships among the nodes; and associating with a node a child-count attribute indicative of whether the node has associated child nodes that have not yet been expressed in the tree structure, and then storing the association between the node and the child-count attribute in a computer.
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38. A computer program product for describing the hierarchical structure of a document having content of a characteristic type of content, the program encoded on a computer-readable storage device and operable to cause data processing apparatus to perform operations comprising:
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in response to a client request for information relating to the hierarchical structure of the document, expressing, independently of the document content type, the hierarchical structure of the document as a tree structure of one or more nodes; providing a first semantic representation for interpreting the tree structure, wherein the semantic representation comprises parent-child relationships among the nodes; and associating with a node a child-count attribute indicative of whether the node has associated child nodes that have not yet been expressed in the tree structure, and then storing the association between the node and the child-count attribute in a computer. - View Dependent Claims (39, 40)
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41. A system for describing the hierarchical structure of a document having a content of a characteristic type of content, the system comprising:
one or more processors programmed to perform operations comprising; expressing, independently of the document content type, the hierarchical structure of the document as a tree structure of one or more nodes; providing a semantic representation for interpreting the tree structure, wherein the semantic representation comprises parent-child relationships among the nodes; and associating with a node a child-count attribute indicative of whether the node has associated child nodes that have not yet been expressed in the tree structure, and then storing the association between the node and the child-count attribute in a computer. - View Dependent Claims (42, 43)
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44. A system for extracting content from a document having content of a characteristic type of content, the system comprising:
one or more processors programmed to perform operations comprising; providing access to document content in response to a request for document content based upon an expression of the hierarchical structure of the document as a tree structure of one or more nodes, that is independent of document content type and has an interpretation controlled by a semantic representation, wherein the semantic representation comprises parent-child relationships among the nodes; and associating with a node a child-count attribute indicative of whether the node has associated child nodes that have not yet been expressed in the tree structure, and then storing the association between the node and the child-count attribute in a computer.
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45. A system for describing the hierarchical structure of a document having content of a characteristic type of content, the system comprising:
one or more processors programmed to perform operations comprising; in response to a client request for information relating to the hierarchical structure of the document, expressing, independently of the document content type, the hierarchical structure of the document as a tree structure of one or more nodes; providing a first semantic representation for interpreting the tree structure, wherein the semantic representation comprises parent-child relationships among the nodes; and associating with a node a child-count attribute indicative of whether the node has associated child nodes that have not yet been expressed in the tree structure, and then storing the association between the node and the child-count attribute in a computer. - View Dependent Claims (46, 47)
Specification