Methods and systems for creating, interacting with, and utilizing a superactive document

• US 9,727,543 B2
• Filed: 08/27/2010
• Issued: 08/08/2017
• Est. Priority Date: 10/25/2006
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Open Text Corporation
• Original Assignee: Open Text Corporation
• Inventors: Guckenberger, Robert C., Kloiber, Daniel J., Marksbury, Davis L., Heinz, Christopher J., Heiney, Ronald L., Gibbs, Kenneth E.
• Primary Examiner(s): HUYNH, THU V
• Application Number:
  US12/870,497
• Publication Number:
  US 20100332973A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,538 Days
• Field of Search: 715200, 715255, 715206, 715209, 715221, 715234
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/93 Document management systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/958 Organisation or management of web site content, e.g. publishing, maintaining pages or automatic linking
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/103 Formatting, i.e. changing of presentation of documents automatic justification G06F40/189; automatic line break hyphenation G06F40/191
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/143 Markup, e.g. Standard Generalized Markup Language [SGML] or Document Type Definition [DTD]
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/166 Editing, e.g. inserting or deleting

Abstract

A method of processing an interactive document is enclosed.

Claims

1. A computer program product comprising:

a non-transitory computer readable medium storing computer-executable instructions to;

provide an interactive document, via a document manipulation process within a thick client computing environment, including;

a user interface including at least one interactive interview component providing user selectable content choices and user selectable format choices;

receive user input via interaction of a user with the at least one interactive interview component of the interactive document, wherein the user interaction includes capturing live information based on a live person-to-person interaction;

in response to the received user input that is related to information stored in an external data source, retrieve predetermined external data from the external data source;

modify the interactive document utilizing aggregate information aggregated from the received live information and the external data to produce a live-information-based interactive document; and

automatically spawn, via the modified live-information-based interactive document, at least one of a plurality of utilization processes with each respective utilization process based on the aggregate information and including use of at least some content from the user selectable content choices from the live-information-based interactive document, wherein at least some of the utilization processes include causing a physical action related to goods or services, external to the interactive document, and based on the live information from the live-information-based interactive document.

2. The computer program product of claim 1, in which the computer-executable instructions:

upon completion of the information being aggregated, perform the automatic spawning in real time without additional user prompts.

3. The computer program product of claim 1, in which the computer-executable instructions:

after the automatic spawning, store updated aggregate information in the external data source to cause updating of the predetermined external data in the external data source.

4. The computer program product of claim 1, the computer-executable instructions to:

provide the live-information-based interactive document as an implemented design that establishes a scope of the live-information-based interactive document that is not changeable by the user of the live-information-based interactive document, the scope including at least one of;

a type of content;

which external data sources are accessible during the document manipulation process;

a format of the user interface, and

allowable user actions during the document manipulation process.

5. The computer program product of claim 1, in which the instructions:

communicate the aggregate information to the external data source to cause updating of the predetermined external data in the external data source; and

in response to the communicating, performing the automatically spawning of the at least one of a plurality of utilization processes.

6. The computer program product of claim 5, wherein the user interface is configured to operate independent of the external data source during the user selectable content choices and user selectable format choices.

7. The computer program product of claim 1, wherein the live person-to-person interaction is a verbal interaction.

8. A document-centric information system comprising:

an information database;

an interactive document usable at a user station, the interactive document including;

a graphical user interface including an interview pane providing user selectable content choices and user selectable format choices to modify the interactive document, the user interface to operate independent of the information database during the user selectable content choices and user selectable format choice and the user interface to capture live information based on a live verbal person-to-person interaction to result in the modified interactive document being a live-information-based interactive document; and

a communication module configured to directly supply updated information to the information database based upon, and after completion of, user modification to the live-information-based interactive document via the user selectable content choices and user selectable format choices; and

an utilization mechanism linked to the information database and configured to directly and automatically initiate at least one of a plurality of utilization processes upon the communication module supplying the updated information to the information database, wherein the respective utilization processes include use of at least some content from the user selectable content choices from the live-information-based interactive document and at least some of the utilization processes include causing a physical action related to goods or services, external to the interactive document, and based on the live information in the live-information-based interactive document.

9. The document-centric information system of claim 8, wherein the physical action of at least some of the utilization processes of the utilization mechanism comprise at least one of:

creating, printing, or mailing a document;

causing manufacture of a product related to the information in the live-information-based interactive document; and

delivering a product related to the information in the live-information-based interactive document.

10. The document-centric information system of claim 8, comprising:

a feedback module configured to update, independent of the information database, the modified live-information-based interactive document, based on a result of one of the utilization processes, with at least one of content and format.

11. The document-centric information system of claim 10, wherein the feedback module is configured to update the utilization mechanism to provide second utilization processes based upon the results of one or more the respective first utilization processes.

12. The document-centric information system of claim 10, wherein the updated content of the live-information-based interactive document includes a tracking component that tracks at least one of:

the information supplied to the information database that prompted the modification of the live-information-based interactive document that led to the respective utilization processes; and

a report of utilization processes initiated upon updating the information database with information from the modified live-information-based interactive document.

13. The document-centric information system of claim 8, comprising:

wherein a first instance of the live-information-based interactive document includes an implemented design that establishes a scope of the live-information-based interactive document that is not changeable by the user during modification of the live-information-based interactive document, the scope including at least one of;

a type of content;

which non-asynchronous external data sources are accessible during the document manipulation process;

when the non-asynchronous external data sources are accessible relative to selecting the content of the live-information-based interactive document;

authentication rules regarding an ability, based on an identity of a user type, to change content elements or format elements of the live-information-based interactive document; and

format of components forming the graphical user interface.

14. The document-centric information system of claim 8, wherein the live-information-based interactive document is expressed in an electronic file format structure as a container storable in a non-transitory computer readable medium.

15. The document-centric information system of claim 8, wherein the interactive document is a non-payment-related interactive document.

16. The document-centric information system of claim 8, wherein the user station is a workstation computer and the interactive document is accessible at, and locally storable on, the workstation computer.