Correlation, association, or correspondence of electronic forms

• US 8,429,522 B2
• Filed: 06/15/2011
• Issued: 04/23/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 08/06/2003
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Stanciu, Constantin, Halstead, Patrick, Shur, Andrey, Essey, Edward G.
• Primary Examiner(s): Queler, Adam M
• Application Number:
  US13/161,419
• Publication Number:
  US 20110246868A1
• Time in Patent Office: 678 Days
• Field of Search: 715/221, 715/234, 715/236, 715/237
• US Class Current: 715/236
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/143 Markup, e.g. Standard Generalized Markup Language [SGML] or Document Type Definition [DTD]
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/154 Tree transformation for tree-structured or markup documents, e.g. XSLT, XSL-FO or stylesheets
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/174 Form filling; Merging

Abstract

Determining correspondence, association, and/or correlation between nodes of electronic forms based on schemas of those forms is described. Importing, merging, and/or annotating data from one electronic form into another electronic form based on correspondence, association, and/or correlation between nodes is also described.

Claims

1. A method comprising:

determining a first schema of a first electronic form and a second schema of a second electronic form;

finding a transformation file based on the first schema and the second schema;

applying the transformation file on the first electronic form to annotate the first electronic form with instructions to aid in importing data from the first electronic form into the second electronic form; and

importing data included within the first electronic form into the second electronic form based on the instructions.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the determining the first schema includes analyzing a structure of the first electronic form.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the determining the first schema includes analyzing a structure of the first electronic form and comparing the structure with a list of schemas to determine if one of the listed schemas is capable of governing the structure.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the determining the first schema includes selecting the first schema from multiple schemas that are capable of governing the first electronic form.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the determining the first schema includes selecting the first schema from multiple schemas that are capable of governing the first electronic form, the first schema being selected from the multiple schemas based on which of the multiple schemas is first determined to be capable of governing the first electronic form.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the determining the first schema includes analyzing schemas from a group of multiple schemas, the first schema being the first of the multiple schemas that is capable of governing the first electronic form.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the determining the first schema includes accessing a file associated with the first electronic form that includes information related to or associated with the first schema.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the determining the first schema includes accessing a file associated with the first electronic form that includes information related to or associated with the first schema and using this information to find or build the first schema.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the determining the second schema includes accessing a file associated with the second electronic form that includes information related to or associated with the second schema.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein the determining the second schema includes accessing a file associated with the second electronic form that includes or includes a link to the second schema.

11. The method of claim 1, wherein the first schema is capable of governing only a portion of the first electronic form.

12. The method of claim 1, wherein the first schema is capable of governing only a portion of the first electronic form and the data is within the portion.

13. The method of claim 1, wherein the first schema is capable of governing only a portion of the first electronic form, the data is within the portion, and the applying the transformation file is performed on the portion.

14. The method of claim 1, wherein the finding the transformation file includes accessing a group of transformation files associated with the second schema.

15. The method of claim 1, wherein the finding the transformation file includes determining which of a group of transformation files associated with the second schema is associated with the first schema.

16. The method of claim 1, wherein the first electronic form and the second electronic form are written in part with XML.

17. One or more computer-readable storage media comprising computer-executable instructions that perform the following when executed by a computer:

determine, without user interaction, a first schema of a first electronic form and a second schema of a second electronic form;

annotate, without user interaction, the first electronic form if the first schema and the second schema are dissimilar by applying a transformation file on the first electronic form to add instructions regarding how to make the data of the first electronic form compatible with the second schema of the second electronic form;

make compatible the data of the first electronic form with the second schema of the second electronic form based on the instructions regarding how to make the data of the first electronic form compatible with the second schema of the second electronic form; and

import the compatible data of the first electronic into the second electronic form.

18. The computer-readable storage media of claim 17, wherein the importation appends the compatible data to other data in second electronic form.

19. The computer-readable storage media of claim 17, wherein the determination includes finding the transformation file associated with the first schema.

20. The computer-readable storage media of claim 17, wherein the transformation file includes code written in XSLT.