Dynamic script management

• US 8,522,203 B1
• Filed: 08/28/2009
• Issued: 08/27/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 08/28/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Adobe Inc.
• Original Assignee: Adobe Systems Incorporated (Adobe Inc.)
• Inventors: Tibbett, Steve, Leyden, Mark C.
• Primary Examiner(s): Das, Chameli
• Application Number:
  US12/549,967
• Time in Patent Office: 1,460 Days
• Field of Search: 717/115
• US Class Current: 717/115
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/34 Graphical or visual programming

Abstract

A method for managing script added to an interactive document or fillable, electronic form. The method includes receiving user input for generating a script and then generating a script based on the user input. The method further includes as part of script generation providing a header in the script that includes a management flag or data in a header block indicating that the script is managed, a managed script object, and an edit verification value such as a cyclic redundancy check value. After the script is generated, the method includes parsing the document to determine whether the managed script has been edited or to otherwise verify the script'"'"'s integrity. The method includes when the script has been edited modifying the management flag to indicate the script is released from script management. Unmanaged editing may be detected by comparing a stored edit verification value with the header value from each snippet.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method, comprising:

associating an event with an object of a form using a form creation application module;

generating, using a script generator associated with the form creation application module, a script to perform a function during use of the form based on the event and the object, the script including one or more snippets, each snippet including a header having an edit verification value and an identification associated with the script;

using a processor, associating data with the script, wherein the data comprises a management flag indicating whether or not a script manager should manage the script;

after the generating of the script, parsing the script, using the script generator, to determine whether the script has been edited outside of the script generator, the parsing linking the one or more snippets to the script based on the identification found in each snippet header, whereby the modification of one of the edit verification values results in all snippets in the script being removed from management; and

in response to a determination that the script has been edited outside of the script generator, modifying the management flag to indicate the script manager should not manage the script.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the script includes one or more headers, wherein at least one of the headers includes an edit verification value, the method further including storing a first edit verification value for at least one of the headers in memory when the script is created, wherein the determining whether the script has been edited outside of the script generator comprises comparing the stored edit verification value with a second edit verification value for a corresponding at least one of the headers in the script.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein the first and second edit verification values comprises cyclic redundancy checking values.

4. The method of claim 2, wherein the modifying of the management flag comprises deleting the management flag from a block of the header.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the script comprises a plurality of snippets, wherein each of the snippets comprises a header with an object identification (ID), and wherein the object ID is equal for each of the snippets of the script.

6. The method of claim 5, wherein the parsing of the script comprises grouping snippets in a document with the object ID and inspecting an edit verification value in each of the snippets headers to verify integrity of the snippet since the generating of the script.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein the modifying of the management flag is performed for all the snippets when anyone of the snippets is determined, via the inspecting step, to have been edited.

8. A non-transitory computer readable medium storing computer readable code comprising:

computer readable program code causing a script generation module to generate a script for a document;

computer readable program code causing the script generation module to provide a header in each snippet of the managed script, wherein the header includes an edit verification value, wherein each of the headers includes an ID associated with the managed script;

computer readable program code causing the computer to parse the generated document to determine whether the edit verification value for any of the snippets has been modified, wherein the parsing comprises linking the snippets to the managed script based on the ID found in the snippet headers, whereby the modification of one of the edit verification values results in all the snippets in the managed script to be removed from management; and

computer readable program code causing the computer to modify each of the headers of the snippets of the managed script to indicate that a script manager should not manage the managed script in response to the determining indicating modification of at least one of the edit verification values.

9. The computer readable medium of claim 8, wherein the edit verification value comprises a cyclic redundancy checking value.

10. The computer readable medium of claim 8, further comprising computer readable program code devices causing the computer to load the document with the managed script, to scan the snippets, to link the snippets, and to regenerate the document with the snippet in an original order associated with the managed script during the generating of the managed script for the document.

11. The computer readable medium of claim 8, wherein the header of each snippet further comprises a script management flag identifying the snippet as belonging to a managed script object, the managed script object being identified with a managed script ID value included in the snippet.

12. A computer system comprising:

a processor;

data storage accessible by the processor storing an interactive, digital document;

a script generator run by the processor to generate script comprising a plurality of snippets for the document, each snippet containing a header having an edit verification value; and

a script manager run by the processor to provide a management flag in each of the snippets indicating active management of the snippet by the script manager and wherein each of the snippets is associated with one of a set of managed script objects, the script manager further including an ID in each of the snippets linking each of the snippets with a corresponding one of the managed script objects, the script manager also to stop management of the script in response to a detection of editing of the script outside of the script generator, whereby modification of one of the edit verification values results in all the snippets in the managed script to be removed from management.

13. The system of claim 12, wherein the script manager inserts a header into each of the snippets, the header containing a block with the management flag and a block with the ID.

14. The system of claim 12, wherein the script manager provides a CRC value in each of the snippets during the generating of the script by the script generator and wherein comparison of the CRC value with a CRC value of the scanned document is used by the script manager to determine editing without use of the script generator.

15. The system of claim 12, wherein the script generator generates a form validation user interface for receiving user input, wherein the script generator performs the script generating based on the user input, and wherein at least a portion of the snippets are associated with data entry fields in the document.

16. The system of claim 12, wherein the digital document further comprises unmanaged script and wherein the script manager parses the unmanaged script and the managed script objects to identify the snippets associated with the managed script objects based on the management flags.

17. The system of claim 16, further comprising a form creation application run by the processor for creating the digital document stored in data storage based on user input received from a user input device.

18. The system of claim 16, further comprising a user interface generator run by the processor generating a managed script user interface on a client device and wherein the managed script user interface displays the snippets of the managed script objects and does not display the unmanaged script.