Patent ID: 7051015

Claim:
A method retrieving and presenting data from a target system, comprising: receiving target system information from the target system, wherein the target system information includes a processor type of the target system and an operating system type of the target system; retrieving a set of object description files corresponding to the target system information, the set of object description files being a set of XML object description files, wherein retrieving the set of object description files corresponding to the target system information includes retrieving the set of XML object description files corresponding to the operating system type of the target system; sending to a client a set of objects supported based on the set object description files retrieved; receiving a select object from the client; selecting one of the set of object description files corresponding to the selected object; retrieving one of a set of data retrieval programs corresponding to the target system information, wherein the set of data retrieval programs is a set of Gopher programs; retrieving object data about the selected object using the retrieved one of the set of data retrieval programs; decoding the object data about the user selected object using the selected one of the set of object description files corresponding to the selected object to form decoded object data; and sending the decoded object data and a presentation format to the client allowing the client to be data driven.