Patent ID: 7366976

Claim:
A client computer in a system including a data server and the client computer that is associated with a web browser, wherein the client computer accesses data stored on the data server and displays such data using the web browser, the client computer comprising a processor for processing computer-executable instructions stored on one or more computer-readable media of the client computer and that are configured for implementing a method for transforming the accessed data into a format for viewing using the web browser, the method comprising: an act of the client computer accessing a view descriptor, the view descriptor identifying (i) data stored at a data server in any of a plurality of formats, including one or more proprietary formats that are not natively displayable using the web browser, and (ii) one or more data transforms to be performed on the stored data for viewing with the web browser, the one or more data transforms of the view descriptor including formatting parameters on how the stored data should be styled when viewed with the web browser; an act of the client computer processing the view descriptor using a generic style sheet, the generic style sheet containing generic information on how to display the stored data for a wide variety of different output display formats, to generate a specific style sheet tailored specifically to the stored data; an act of the client computer accessing the stored data that was identified by the view descriptor; and an act of the client computer transforming the accessed data using the specific style sheet generated from the view descriptor and generic style sheet for viewing with the web browser.