Patent ID: 8707166

Claim:
A method comprising: presenting, to a user, a user interface for entering table layout information; receiving, from the user via the user interface, a hierarchical template including table layout information associated with a table, the table layout information formatted in accordance with a non-proprietary markup language format, the table information received from the user including markup language elements, attributes including style attributes, and data items including text strings associated with the table; parsing the table layout information received from the user associated with the table to determine the markup language elements, the attributes including the style attributes, and the data items including the text strings associated with the table; storing the data items including the text strings associated with the table; determining a plain text graphical table structured layout associated with the table, the plain text graphical structured layout including a listing of the markup language elements; storing the text strings as non-marked up text; generating a plain text graphical table of the table with the text strings stored as non-marked up text; and generating a plain text graphical table structured view of the table, the generating including substituting the data items including the text strings stored as non-marked up text for the attribute values in accordance with the table layout information.