Techniques for local personalization of content

• US 8,490,198 B2
• Filed: 05/18/2007
• Issued: 07/16/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 05/18/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Apple Inc.
• Original Assignee: Apple Inc.
• Inventors: Burch, Lloyd Leon, Morris, Cameron Craig
• Primary Examiner(s): Nalvern, Andrew L
• Assistant Examiner(s): Mehrmanesh, Amir
• Application Number:
  US11/750,791
• Publication Number:
  US 20080289013A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,251 Days
• Field of Search: 726 2- 6, 726 26- 30, 713/155, 713/168, 713/170, 709201-203
• US Class Current: 726/26
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9577 Optimising the visualization of content, e.g. distillation of HTML documents
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 21/6209 to a single file or object, e.g. in a secure envelope, encrypted and accessed using a key, or with access control rules appended to the object itself
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2221/2149 Restricted operating environment

Abstract

Techniques for the local personalization of content are presented. A content personalization service is dynamically pushed from a server environment to a client processing environment associated with a principal on demand. The content personalization service interjects itself between content that the principal attempts to view and access within the client processing environment and modifies and personalizes that content on behalf of the principal before the principal can view or access the content.

Claims

1. A machine readable non-transitory storage medium storing executable instructions which when executed by a data processing system cause the system to perform a method, comprising:

authenticating, by a central server, a principal who is requesting access to a content personalization service;

acquiring, by the central server, the content personalization service, wherein the content personalization service is configured for a given set of settings for a local processing environment of the principal wherein the content personalization service configuration is selected based on said given set of settings;

dynamically instantiating, by the central server, the content personalization service, wherein the content personalization service instance is configured to process in the local processing environment;

dynamically generating, by the central server, an executable of the content personalization service; and

dynamically delivering, by the central server, the executable of the content personalization service over a network connection to the local processing environment;

wherein the content personalization service is dynamically installed and processed in the local processing environment, wherein the content personalization service modifies and personalizes content delivered to the principal over the network connection by interjecting itself between the content presented to the principal and the content received over the network connection.

2. The medium of claim 1, wherein authenticating further includes requesting a third-party trusted identity service to assist in authenticating the principal.

3. The medium of claim 1, wherein acquiring further includes accessing a repository using identity associated with the principal to acquire a configuration of the content personalization service tailored to the principal, the configuration previously supplied by the principal.

4. The medium of claim 1, wherein dynamically delivering further includes providing the content personalization service as an extensible style sheet transformation (XSLT) application or JAVA script application to a World-Wide Web (WWW) browser of the principal, wherein the XSLT or JAVA script application processes against the content that the principal attempts to access within the WWW browser and personalizes a presentation of the content before the content is presented to the principal within the WWW browser for viewing and access.

5. The medium of claim 1, wherein dynamically delivering further includes providing the content personalization service as a World-Wide Web (WWW) browser plug-in that self-loads and self-installs within a WWW browser of the principal, and wherein the WWW browser plug-in processes against the content that the principal attempts to access within the WWW browser and personalizes the content by modifying the content before the content is presented to the principal within the WWW browser for viewing and access.

6. The medium of claim 1, the method further comprising:

dynamically acquiring the settings associated with the local processing environment; and

configuring the content personalization service in response to the settings before dynamically delivering the content personalization service to the local processing environment of the principal.

7. The medium of claim 1, the method further comprising, redirecting the principal to indirectly make the request for access to the content personalization service when the principal is detected as initially logging into the network connection.

8. The medium of claim 1, wherein the content personalization service is previously supplied by the principal to the central server as an implementation or definition.

9. A machine readable non-transitory storage medium storing executable instructions which when executed by a data processing system cause the system to perform a method, comprising:

requesting access to a content personalization service by a principal from a remote service residing on a central server;

supplying credentials to authenticate the principal associated with the content personalization service;

receiving the content personalization service as an executable from the remote service after the credentials successfully authenticate the principal, wherein the content personalization service is dynamically instantiated and generated by the central server, wherein the content personalization service instance is configured to process in the local processing environment, and the content personalization service is configured for a given set of settings for a local processing environment of the principal, wherein the content personalization service configuration is selected based on said given set of settings;

dynamically installing the content personalization service within the local processing environment of the principal; and

dynamically possessing the content personalization service in the local processing environment of the principal;

wherein the content personalization service modifies and personalizes content delivered to the principal over the network connection by interjecting itself between the content presented to the principal and the content received over the network connection.

10. The medium of claim 9, the method further comprising, processing the method as a local service within the local processing environment that is activated when the principal attempts to initially log into the network.

11. The medium of claim 9, the method further comprising, processing the method in response to the principal activating a uniform resource locator (URL) or identifier (URI) link within a World-Wide Web (WWW) browser or supplying an Internet Protocol (IP) address to an address bar within the WWW browser.

12. The medium of claim 9, the method further comprising, processing the content personalization service to do one or more of the following within a World-Wide Web (WWW) browser of the principal:

automatically populating selective fields of a WWW form with personal data of the principal;

removing portions of the content before presenting within the WWW browser;

adding additional content before presenting within the WWW browser; and

customizing a display presentation before presenting the content within the WWW browser.

13. The medium of claim 9, wherein supplying further includes interacting with the principal to acquire the credentials.

14. The medium of claim 9, wherein supplying further includes automatically acquiring at least some portion of the credentials from the local processing environment on behalf of the principal.

15. The medium of claim 9, the method further comprising one or more of the following:

supplying the settings associated with the local processing environment to the remote service before receiving the content personalization service from the remote service; and

configuring the content personalization service after receipt of the content personalization service in response to the settings of the local processing environment.

16. The medium of claim 9, wherein the content personalization service is previously supplied by the principal to the central server as an implementation or definition.

17. A system, comprising:

a content personalization service implemented for a client machine and processed in a client processing environment associated with the client machine of a principal; and

a personalization delivery service implemented and processed on a server machine or a different machine accessible to the server machine, wherein the server machine or the different machine can connect to the client machine remotely over a network connection, and wherein the personalization delivery service dynamically delivers the content personalization service to the client machine when the principal is successfully authenticated by the server machine;

wherein the content personalization service is configured for a given set of settings for the client processing environment, wherein the content personalization service is selected based on said given set of settings, and wherein the content personalization service is dynamically instantiated and dynamically generated as an executable by the server machine prior to being dynamically delivered by the personalization delivery service, as an executable, to the client machine, wherein the content personalization service instance is configured to process in the client processing environment, and the content personalization service is dynamically installed and processed in the client processing environment, and the content personalization service modifies and personalizes content delivered to the principal over the network connection by interjecting itself between the content presented to the principal and the content received over the network connection.

18. The system of claim 17, wherein the content personalization service is to be processed as a World-Wide Web (WWW) browser plug-in that processes within a WWW browser of the client machine.

19. The system of claim 17, wherein a configuration of the content personalization service is initially received from or defined by the principal and before the principal requests the content personalization service from the personalization delivery service.

20. The system of claim 17, wherein the personalization delivery service is to dynamically update and modify the content personalization service in response to dynamic policy evaluation or dynamically received instruction and is to push the update to the client machine.

21. The system of claim 17, wherein the personalization delivery service is to dynamically push the content personalization service to the client machine when the principal logs into the network connection or when the principal logs into the personalization delivery service.

22. The system of claim 17, wherein the principal previously supplied the content personalization service as an implementation or definition to the personalization delivery service in a different transaction with the personalization delivery service.

23. A system, comprising:

content personalization service repository implemented in a machine-accessible medium and accessible to a server machine within a server processing environment, wherein the content personalization service repository includes at least one content personalization service; and

a personalization deliver service implemented and processed on a server machine or a different machine accessible within the server processing environment, wherein the personalization delivery service manages the at least one content personalization service located in the content personalization service repository;

wherein the personalization delivery service can dynamically push the at least one content personalization service as an executable to at least one client processing environment associated with at least one principal, over a network connection, by selecting the at least one content personalization service based on the at least one principal and particular settings for the at least one client processing environment of the at least one principal, after the at least one principal is successfully authenticated by the server machine, and

wherein the at least one content personalization service is configured for a given set of settings for the at least one client processing environment of at least one client machine, wherein the at least one content personalization service is selected based on said given set of settings, and wherein the at least one content personalization service is dynamically instantiated and dynamically generated as an executable by the server machine prior to being dynamically delivered by the personalization delivery service, as an executable, to the at least one client machine, wherein the at least one content personalization service instance is configured to process in the at least one client processing environment, and the at least one content personalization service is dynamically installed and processed in the at least one client processing environment, and the at least one content personalization service modifies and personalizes content delivered to the at least one principal over the network connection by interjecting itself between the content presented to the at least one principal and the content received over the network connection.

24. The system of claim 23, wherein the at least one content personalization service configuration is initially defined by the at least one principal.

25. The system of claim 23, wherein the at least one content personalization service configuration is initially defined by an administrator on behalf of the at least one principal.

26. The system of claim 23, wherein the at least one content personalization service is a World-Wide Web (WWW) browser plug-in that is delivered to at least one WWW browser for dynamic loading and processing within the at least one client processing environment.

27. The system of claim 23, wherein the personalization delivery service is automatically invoked for processing by one or more of the following:

specific requests received from the at least one principal, a login attempt made by the at least one principal to access the network connection, and login attempts made by the at least one principal to access the personalization delivery service.

28. The system of claim 23, wherein the at least one principal supplies the at least one content personalization service as an implementation or definition to the personalization delivery service for on demand delivery to the at least one principal when requested by the at least one principal in a different transaction with the personalization delivery service.