Patent ID: 7389344

Claim:
A method of obtaining operational data provided by an electronic device linked to a network, comprising: receiving, at a computer located remotely from the electronic device, information input by a user, wherein the information includes an alias name for the electronic device and a command indicating a type of operational data associated with the electronic device to be obtained; scanning an alias script file stored on the computer for the alias name, the alias script file including the alias name, a product name corresponding to the alias name, and an address where an electronic information page of the electronic device is located; once the alias name is found in the alias script file, scanning a command script file stored on the computer for the command indexed by the product name obtained from the alias script file, the command script file including a path at the address obtained from the alias script file to the electronic information page provided by the electronic device, a variable name within the electronic information page that points to the operational data to be obtained, and strings indicating how to provide the operational data; accessing through the network via a hypertext transfer protocol the electronic information page of the electronic device provided at the address obtained from the alias script file and the path obtained from the command script file, the electronic information page including a plurality of operational data entries; scanning the electronic information page for the variable name obtained from the command script file; obtaining the operational data corresponding to the variable name from the electronic information page obtaining the strings from the command script file, the strings including display formatting for the operational data, unit conversions for the operational data, and an acceptable range for comparing with the operational data; converting the operational data obtained from the electronic information page based on the unit conversions from the strings of the command script file; comparing the operational data obtained from the electronic information page with the acceptable range from the command script file to determine whether the operational data is within the acceptable range; and providing, at the computer, a display including the operational data obtained from the electronic information page and converted based on the unit conversions, an alert indicating whether the operational data is within the acceptable range, and a graph illustrating the acceptable range and the operational data relative to the acceptable range, the display provided based on the display formatting from the strings of the command script file.