Drag and drop creation and editing of a page incorporating scripts

• US 7,543,267 B2
• Filed: 10/08/2003
• Issued: 06/02/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 12/31/1998
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Shewchuk, John P., Millet, Stephen J., Lindhorst, Gregory S.
• Primary Examiner(s): YAARY, MICHAEL D
• Application Number:
  US10/680,238
• Publication Number:
  US 20040066410A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,064 Days
• Field of Search: 717/100, 717/103, 717/105, 717/113, 715500-542, 715700-866, 715/967
• US Class Current: 717/105
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/34 Graphical or visual programming

Abstract

An environment for developing clientside/serverside code is disclosed. The environment supports programming in an event-driven paradigm while the execution of the resultant programs are executed in a serial execution paradigm. Through shielding the developer from complex scripting segments, the environment provides the developer with the suggestion that that resultant execution model is event-driven. By treating scripts as later-definable objects, the designing phase of a page may be lessened, as the appropriate codings needed to implement a page are determined at a later date. In one example, the codings may be preliminary set as server side or client side, with the environment later adding the appropriate scripting language to complete the developed page.

Claims

1. A system for providing a designer with an enhanced programming environment comprising:

a user interface including;

a first display portion representing a page to be sent from the server to the client using a browser, the first display portion receiving dragged and dropped objects;

a second display portion representing a library of the objects for dragging and dropping the objects into the first display portion, said objects executable on at least one of the server and client; and

a third display portion for configuring a method of one of the objects after the one of the objects has been dragged and dropped into the first display portion, and

a component for automatically creating client and server scripts for a particular object that has been dragged and dropped into the first display portion, one of the client and server scripts being executable to send an event related to the particular object, the other of the client and server scripts being executable to handle the event,

wherein the user interface represents the client and server runtime environments as a single unified environment to the designer.

2. The user interface according to claim 1, further comprising:

a fourth display portion providing a selection for scripting another of the dragged and dropped objects for said server or for said client.

3. The system of claim 1, wherein the component is a design-time control that automatically creates the client and server script after the page is saved to the server.

4. The system of claim 3, wherein the design-time control is configured to capture user inputs for configuring the method of the one of the objects.

5. The system of claim 1, wherein the client script is executable to send events to the server, and the server script is executable to handle events from the client.

6. A system for providing a designer with an enhanced programming environment comprising:

a library of objects, said objects including script that executes on one of a server and a client, and

a user interface including;

a first display portion representing a first page to be sent from a server to a client using a browser, the first display portion receiving dragged and dropped objects;

a second display portion displaying said library of objects, said system providing for dragging and dropping the objects from said second display portion into the first display portion; and

a third display portion for configuring one of the objects after the one of the objects has been dragged and dropped into the first display portion;

a fourth display portion representing a second page to be sent from the server to the client, said system providing for dragging and dropping the objects from said second display portion into the fourth display portion; and

a fifth display portion for configuring one or more methods of one or more objects that have been dragged and dropped into the second display portion,

wherein the user interface represents the second page as a page object,

wherein the third display portion provides for configuring the one of the objects to include a call to the configured one or more methods of the second page, and

wherein the system automatically generates code for the first page for invoking the configured one or more methods of the second page in response to an event at the client relating to the first page.

7. The system according to claim 6, wherein said event comprises a call from the first page to said object representing said second page.

8. The system according to claim 6, further comprising a storage accessible by said server for storing said page as including said object being scripted for at least one of said server or said client.

9. The system of claim 6, wherein the second page is an active server page.

10. The system of claim 6, wherein a design-time control is used for automatically generating at least one of client and server script for instantiating the one or more objects that have been dragged and dropped into the second display portion.

11. A method for designing a page in a first language model comprising the steps of:

dragging and dropping objects from a first display portion representing an object library onto a second display portion representing a page to be sent from a server to a client using a browser;

capturing user inputs via a design-time control in order to configure a method, property, and event associated with at least one of the objects in the second display portion;

designating via the design-time control whether said event should occur at the server or the client;

saving the objects at the server; and

in response to saving the objects, utilizing the design-time control to automatically create client and server scripts for the at least one of the objects, one of the client and server scripts being executable to send the event, the other of the client and server scripts being executable to handle the event, depending on the designation.

12. The method of claim 11, wherein at least one of the objects saved at the server represents a second page to be transmitted from the server to the client in response to the event being sent.