WO2003077160A1

WO2003077160A1 - Method and system for web navigation using a hyperlink database

Info

Publication number: WO2003077160A1
Application number: PCT/SE2003/000321
Authority: WO
Inventors: Alex Breton
Original assignee: Print Dreams Europe Ab
Priority date: 2002-03-11
Filing date: 2003-02-26
Publication date: 2003-09-18
Also published as: SE0200723L; AU2003212734A1; SE522047C2; SE0200723D0

Abstract

The invention relates to a mobile system (1) comprising a mobile terminal (10) cooperating with a communication central (5) where the mobile terminal is connected to a preferably mobile printer (11) and is able to retrieve information from e.g. the Internet via the communication central to print out the same with said printer after conversion in the communication central to a print file or a bitmap file. A method is described where the web site browsing and navigating facilities is enhanced by using a program module (40) for storing hyperlinks (52) associated with retrieved information in a database (41) in said communication central (5) in form of short references or indexes (51). The references are depicted on the print out next to the hyperlinks when using the printer. The references could then be used for addressing of desired hyperlinks.

Description

METHOD AND SYSTEM FOR WEB NAVIGATION USING A HYPERLINK DATABASE

TECHNICAL FIELD OF THE INVENTION

The present invention relates to a method for navigating on web sites in a mobile system of the kind used for wireless data communication between handheld mobile terminals and Internet/Intranet.

DESCRIPTION OF RELATED ART

The wireless environment of today creates totally different requirements for displaying of information compared to the fixed or stationary environment. The demand of mobility puts high requirements in the dimensioning of the mobile terminals and associated graphical screens. These are generally too small to be able to display standard data contents from the Internet in a satisfying way.

New protocols have been put forward to enable "optimisation" of Internet contents for the small screens of the data terminals. This optimisation consists in principle of a substantial downsizing of information so that it fits into the small screens. WAP (Wireless Application Protocol) is one such protocol developed just for following the restrictions in the wireless environment.

Other restrictions besides the size of the screen, is that Internet standard, such as HTTP and TCP, is not adapted for intermittent coverage, long waiting time and limited bandwidth that are characterising for wireless environments.

HTTP sends its commands in an inefficient text format instead of compressed binary format. Another major problem that the wireless systems face is that an increasing part of the information on the Internet is presented in file formats other than the web browser friendly formats (HTML, XML, GIF, JPG, etc.). Examples of these more and more common file formats are PDF, DOC, XLS, TIFF, EPS, and also file formats handled by special so called "plug-ins", or additional programs to the web browsers. These different file formats require special applications to be installed in the receiver's terminal, which places high demand on memory space, processing capacity etc. Wireless terminals cannot reasonably handle all these applications, and even if they could, their screens would not be able to display the contents in a satisfactory manner.

Another problem with mobile units compared to fixed network computers are the entering of characters in the wireless environment. Most handheld mobile devices are too small to accommodate a keyboard and other methods of entering characters such as T9 input or handwriting recognition while writing on the display with a pen-like object has turned out to only marginally increase the speed. The entering of characters is therefore not only slow but also unreliable since mistypes easily occur in such small devices. These limitations make Web-browsing/surfing less customer friendly.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

It is an object of the present invention to overcome the abovementioned problems by providing a method for, and a mobile system comprising mobile terminals, so that standard optional Internet contents and services can be obtained and visualised regardless of the user's location and where the limitations and difficulties of entering new text, e.g. Internet addresses no longer exists. It is also an object of the invention to improve the browsing/surfing functionality in connection with the presented mobile system.

The object is achieved with a method for navigating on the Internet and/or an Intranet in a mobile system comprising a printer device and a mobile terminal cooperating with a communication central via some mobile network according to the accompanying claim 1.

Furthermore, the invention sets forth a mobile system comprising a mobile terminal cooperating with a communication central via some mobile network adapted for wireless data communication, the mobile terminal being connected to a built-, in or separate printer device according to the accompanying claim 10.

Additional objects of the invention are apparent directly or indirectly in the following.

By having a mobile terminal provided with a thereto connectable preferably mobile printer device, one is able to visualize information on considerably larger areas than is available with small screens. In addition, the information becomes clearer on a printout surface than on a computer screen. The connection to the mobile terminal is preferably wireless, such as e.g. by IR or Bluetooth. A user of the mobile terminal enters the Internet or Intranet via the mobile network and the communication central. A desired web page is addressed, retrieved and processed by the communication central before being transferred to the users mobile terminal, where after the web page is forwarded to the printer device for printing. The only file format that such a terminal needs to be able to handle is bmp or prn, so called bitmap files or print files. The transformation from all existing file formats on the Internet to bitmap files is accomplished at a server level at the communication central. This allows the hardware and software structure of the mobile terminals to become very simple and the manufacturing costs can be kept very low. The servers can on the contrary be very powerful, with the necessary applications stored thereon, the applications being needed for interpretation of all existing file formats.

In this environment, the problem with safe and fast entering of characters during web navigation is solved by a method and a system employing said method, where a search of hyperlinks is performed during said file transformation. A database comprising said hyperlinks attached to short references, e.g. consecutive numbers, is set up with a dynamic look-up table in the communication central. These short references are presented on the printout surface next to the hyperlinks and by selecting such a reference; the user can address a related Internet link without having to type the whole address.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The features of the invention believed to be novel are set forth with particularity in the appended claims. The invention itself however, both as to organisation and method of operation, together with further objects and advantages thereof, may be best understood by reference to the following description with the accompanying drawings, in the several Figures in which:

Fig. 1 shows a schematic view over the system and method according to the invention and Fig. 2 shows an example of a print out generated by employing the method and a system according to the invention.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF EMBODIMENTS

In the international patent application PCT/SE01/02204 , which hereby is incorporated by reference, a mobile system for access to and visualisation of Internet contents and services is shown, where a mobile terminal, having a preferably wireless connection with a mobile printer device, is able to present information on considerably larger areas than is available with small screens. The only file format such a terminal needs to be able to handle is bitmap files. Said application proposes that a transformation from all existing file formats on the Internet to print files is accomplished at a server level. The print file could be converted to a bitmap file and then sent to the mobile terminal. Thereby a mobile user could fetch any file from Internet and after the conversion in a communication central to a print file or a bitmap file, be able to receive it in a mobile printer on a preferably wireless connection. In an alternative embodiment it is also possible to convert the retrieved file to a bitmap file directly and then send it to the printer device. The mobile printer device could comprise a receiver but preferably the printer or bitmap file is received by the mobile terminal and forwarded to a separate mobile printer via e.g. IR or Bluetooth or any other wireless technique. A fixed coupling between the mobile terminal and the printer is also feasible.

According to an embodiment of this invention, a mobile system such as described in PCT/SE01/02204 and in Fig. 1 is shown, together with a functionality, which will be further disclosed. In fig. 1 a user is shown, the user having a mobile terminal 10. When the user wishes to retrieve some information from some source to his printing device 11, preferably a hand-held and hand-operated mobile printer device (such as e.g. presented by the same applicant in SE 0102542-8) , he or she sends a request 30 over some communication network 31 to a communication central 5. The communication network 31 may, as described above, be any network, as for example SMS, WAP, Internet or telephone. The communication central 5 includes several interface units 32 for receiving the print orders from the communication network. A central unit 33 in the communication central 5 thereafter processes the received order. The user's identity is authenticated by means of a database 22 containing the users profiles.

The central unit 33 use various interface units 34 for accessing information from external resources through various communication networks 35, which can be websites on the Internet, Intranet, electronic mail or unified messaging servers, fax servers, online databases accessed through the Internet, telephone networks, satellites, wired or wireless or any combination thereof.

If the user for example wishes to retrieve electronic mail, the interface unit 34 thus consists of a mail agent. The information thus retrieved is compiled and formatted in the central unit 33 for enabling printing of the requested file to the user's printing device 11, which preferably is mobile.

The communication central 5 has several interface units (36) for enabling delivery to the user's printer device (11) over various communication networks 37 via the mobile terminal or directly to the printer device. The retrieved file is thus subsequently printed at the user's printer device 11. The present invention is preferably working on the above described technique and comprises a method for simplifying navigation on web pages .

According to fig. 1 the information retrieved from the various communication networks 35 is compiled and formatted in the central unit 33 to a print file or a bitmap file, suitable for being printed out on the mobile printing device 11. By having a program module 40 in the communication central 5, and preferably in the central unit 33, searching for hyperlinks in the retrieved information, a database 41 could be created for copying and storing the hyperlinks in a predefined manner.

This database is preferably located in the communication central 5. The program module 40 scans the retrieved web page for all hyperlinks and stores them in the database 41, each associated with a reference. The references should preferably be very short such as e.g. consecutive numbers starting from 1. It is obvious and within the scope of the invention that other references than consecutive numbers could be used. For example, the references could be constituted of letter (a,b, c .. etc. )

The database 41 is preferably dynamic so that the program module 40 sets up a new set of references each time a new web site is requested and retrieved by the user. Furthermore, the database should preferably be separated from the user profile database 22, however not necessarily.

The desired website is preferably transferred to the mobile terminal 10 from the communication central 5 and further to the mobile printing device 11. The program module is arranged to attach said short indexes or references 51 to the hyperlinks 52 so that the printout surface visualise these references next to, or in the immediate vicinity of, the hyperlinks on the print out surface. This is shown in Figure 2, where an example of an Internet web page is given, containing some hyperlinks 52. A user, who wants to read the content related to one of the hyperlinks depicted on the retrieved web page, just has to address corresponding reference 51 instead of entering e . g. a complete new Internet address on his mobile terminal .

There are a number of imaginable ways to perform said addressing of the hyperlinks. In PCT/SE01/02204 , which is referred to above, it is shown how to address any web page using a voice controlled interface as a receiving means for receiving the addressing and transfer it further to the ^• communication central 5 for processing. Likewise, when addressing a web page using present invention, the user merely could say the reference corresponding to the hyperlink he wants to address, e.g. "three" or "five" to his mobile terminal. The voice-controlled interface can be pre-programmed to recognize e.g. all numbers from 1-50. Since the database 41 that controls what references belonging to what hyperlinks is dynamic, so that the latest retrieved web page's associated hyperlinks are stored, the addressing will be correct no matter what web page is originally retrieved. Consequently the references matches the latest requested and retrieved web page.

Other conceivable ways of addressing hyperlinks with the aid of the references could e.g. be by sending an SMS from the mobile terminal to the communication central 5 over an SMS- bridge or by having a dialogue with the communication central over a WAP-bridge, thereby using the keyboard on the mobile terminal when choosing a reference associated with a desired hyperlink. The addressing may be realised in a number of different ways and be received by a numerous of receiving means and the scope of the invention should not be limited to which technique is chosen.

Claims

1. A method for navigating on web sites in a mobile system (1) comprising a mobile terminal (10) cooperating with a communication central (5) via some communication network (31) adapted for wireless data communication, the mobile terminal connected to a built-in or separate printing device (11) , c h a r a c t e r i z e d in that the communication central is connected to the Internet (35) or some other communication networks (35) , and that in the communication central (5) a for the purpose intended stored software application transforms a, by a user of the mobile system, requested Internet contents and/or services to one or more print files or bit map files which thereafter are sent to a user's mobile terminal (10), furthermore comprising the steps of; having a program module (40) in the communication central (5) searching for hyperlinks (52) in the said requested Internet contents and/or services creating a database (41) for storing said hyperlinks in a predefined manner associating each hyperlink (52) with a reference (51) .

2. A method for navigating on websites in a mobile system according to claim 1, c h a r a c t e r i z e d in that said requested information is visualised by the printing device (11) on a print out surface where said references (51) are presented as indexes next to any hyperlinks (52) visualised on the print out surface .

3. A method for navigating on websites in a mobile system according to claim 1 or 2 , c h a r a c t e r i z e d in that a user navigates to a hyperlink (52) on said print out surface by addressing the reference (51) associated to said hyperlink.

4. A method for navigating on websites in a mobile system according to claim 3, c h a r a c t e r i z e d in that said addressing of hyperlinks is voice controlled.

5. A method for navigating on websites in a mobile system according to claim 3, c h a r a c t e r i z e d in that said addressing of hyperlinks is performed via an SMS message.

6. A method for navigating on websites in a mobile system according to claim 3, c h a r a c t e r i z e d in that the addressing is communicated by having a dialogue between the mobile terminal and the communication central (5) over some protocol, e.g. WAP.

7. A method for navigating on websites in a mobile system according to any of claims 1-6, c h a r a c t e r i z e d in that the database (41) stores the hyperlinks dynamically so that the references matches the latest requested and retrieved web page.

8. A method for navigating on websites in a mobile system according to any of claims 1-7, c h a r a c t e r i z e d in that the references are consecutive numbers starting from 1.

9. A method for navigating on websites in a mobile system according to any of claims 1-8, c h a r a c t e r ! z e d in that the printer device (11) is a hand-held and hand-operated mobile printer.

10 A mobile system comprising a mobile terminal (10) cooperating with a communication central (5) via some communication network (31) adapted for wireless data communication, the mobile terminal being connected to a built- in or separate printer device (11) , c h a r a c t e r t z e d in that the communication central is connected to the Internet or some other communication network (35) , and that in the communication central (5) a for the purpose intended stored software application transforms a, by a user of the mobile system, requested Internet contents and/or services to one or more print files or bitmap files which thereafter are sent to a user's mobile terminal (10) and that the system provides a method for web browsing by comprising a; program module (40) in the communication central (5) that searches for hyperlinks (51) in said requested Internet contents and/or services a database (41) for storing said hyperlinks (52) in a predefined manner and where each hyperlink is associated with a reference (51) .

11. A mobile system according to claim 10, c h a r a c t e r i z e d in that said system comprises means for having the printer device (11) visualising said requested information on a print out surface where said references (51) are presented as indexes next to any hyperlinks (52) visualised on the print out surface .

12. A mobile system according to claim 10 or 11, c h a r a c t e r i z e d in that said system comprises receiving means for receiving addressing of said references associated with said hyperlinks (52) .

13. A mobile system according to claim 12, c h a r a c t e r i z e d in that said receiving means are voice controlled.

14. A mobile system according to claim 12, c h a r a c t e r i z e d in that said receiving means comprises a SMS-bridge.

15. A mobile system according to claim 12, c h a r a c t e r i z e d in that said receiving means comprises a WAP-bridge.

16. A mobile system according to any of claims 10-15, c h a r a c t e r i z e d in that said database (41) is a dynamic look-up table.

17 A mobile system according to any of claims 10-16, c h a r a c t e r i z e d in that the printing device is a hand-held and hand-operated mobile printer.