Always on and updated operation for document logs

• US 7,970,738 B2
• Filed: 12/29/2005
• Issued: 06/28/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 12/29/2005
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Ricoh Company Limited
• Original Assignee: Ricoh Company Limited
• Inventors: Piersol, Kurt W., Wolff, Gregory J.
• Primary Examiner(s): Breene; John
• Assistant Examiner(s): Kerzhner; Aleksandr
• Application Number:
  US11/323,542
• Publication Number:
  US 20070156683A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,007 Days
• Field of Search: 707/3, 707/621, 707/999.003
• US Class Current: 707/621
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/93 Document management systems

Abstract

A method and an apparatus for handling updated or new entries for a document log are described. In one embodiment, the method comprises receiving a user input of a document identifier for a document and displaying information from metadata entries associated with the identifier.

Claims

1. A method comprising:

receiving, by a mobile device, a document identifier of a document by analyzing the document to obtain the document identifier from the content of the document;

submitting, by the mobile device, the document identifier to one or more servers communicably coupled to the mobile device;

receiving, by the mobile device, a set of metadata entries associated with the document identifier from the one or more servers, the metadata entries having information corresponding to the document including a set of comments associated with the document;

caching, by the mobile device, additional information related to the document that is created and stored on the mobile device while the mobile device does not have access to the one or more servers from which the information is received;

periodically polling, by the mobile device, the one or more servers to receive updated information for the set of metadata entries;

synchronizing, by the mobile device, the set of metadata entries, the additional information, and the updated information into a synchronized and updated set of metadata entries for the document to be viewed on the mobile device; and

uploading, by the mobile device, the synchronized and updated set of metadata entries to the one or more servers.

2. The method defined in claim 1 further comprising automatically retrieving the metadata entries from the one or more servers.

3. The method defined in claim 1 further comprising synchronizing the metadata entries received from the one or more servers.

4. The method defined in claim 1 wherein receiving the document identifier comprises scanning a machine readable code from a paper version of the one or more documents.

5. The method defined in claim 4 wherein the machine readable code comprises a barcode.

6. The method defined in claim 1 wherein receiving the document identifier comprises selecting the document identifier from a list of one or more document identifiers.

7. The method defined in claim 1 wherein periodically polling the one or more servers occurs only if user is a subscriber to receive a feed of the updated information for the set of metadata entries.

8. The method defined in claim 1 further comprising

uploading the additional information to be added to the set of metadata entries when subsequently having access to the network.

9. The method defined in claim 1 further comprising:

subscribing to receive a feed of information from the set of metadata entries; and

periodically receiving one or more updates to the set of metadata entries from the feed of information.

10. The method defined in claim 1 wherein the at least one metadata entry comprises a document log entry.

11. The method defined in claim 1 wherein each metadata entry is identified with an identifier based on its content.

12. The method defined in claim 11 wherein the identifier is a hash value.

13. The method defined in claim 11 wherein the identifier is a result of applying a hashing function to an electronic form of the content.

14. The method defined in claim 13 wherein the hashing function is the MD5 hashing algorithm.

15. The method defined in claim 1 wherein the set of metadata entries is stored separately from the one or more documents.

16. The method defined in claim 15 wherein the set of metadata entries is separate from content of the one or more documents and attached to the one or more documents electronically.

17. The method defined in claim 1 wherein the set of metadata entries is in XML format.

18. The method defined in claim 17 wherein each entry in the set of metadata entries is an XML segment.

19. The method defined in claim 1 wherein the set of metadata entries comprises a document log.

20. The method defined in claim 1 wherein the one or more documents comprises a plurality of bytes.

21. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

performing a hash on the one or more documents to determine the document identifier for each of the one or more documents; and

comparing each of the determined document identifiers for the one or more documents to a predetermined document identifier to determine which of the one or more documents corresponds to the predetermined document identifier.

22. An article of manufacture having one or more computer storage media encoded with instructions thereon which, when executed by a computer system, cause the system to perform a method comprising:

receiving, by a mobile device, a document identifier of a document by analyzing the document to obtain the document identifier from the content of the document;

submitting, by the mobile device, the document identifier to one or more servers communicably coupled to the mobile device;

receiving, by the mobile device, a set of metadata entries associated with the document identifier from the one or more servers, the metadata entries having information corresponding to the document including a set of comments associated with the document;

caching, by the mobile device, additional information related to the document that is created and stored on the mobile device while the mobile device does not have access to the one or more servers from which the information is received;

periodically polling, by the mobile device, the one or more servers to receive updated information for the set of metadata entries;

synchronizing, by the mobile device, the set of metadata entries, the additional information, and the updated information into a synchronized and updated set of metadata entries for the document to be viewed on the mobile device; and

uploading, by the mobile device, the synchronized and updated set of metadata entries to the one or more servers.