RECONSTRUCTION OF WEB PAGES BASED ON DOM SERIALIZATION
Processing a web page by receiving from a client software application a request to retrieve a web page, processing the web page at a surrogate software application, thereby representing the web page in a model that is maintained by the surrogate software application in association with the web page, serializing a copy of any portion of the model that is maintained by the surrogate software application, thereby creating serialized data, and sending the serialized data to a mediation agent executed by the client software application, where the mediation agent is configured to deserialize the serialized data, thereby creating deserialized data, and inject the deserialized data into a model that is maintained by the client software application in association with the web page.
1 . A method for processing a web page, the method comprising:
receiving from a client software application a request to retrieve a web page;
processing the web page at a surrogate software application, thereby representing the web page in a model that is maintained by the surrogate software application in association with the web page;
serializing a copy of any portion of the model that is maintained by the surrogate software application, thereby creating serialized data; and
sending the serialized data to a mediation agent executed by the client software application,
wherein the mediation agent is configured to
deserialize the serialized data, thereby creating deserialized data, and
inject the deserialized data into a model that is maintained by the client software application in association with the web page.
2 . The method according to claim 1 wherein the processing comprises processing wherein the models are any of document object models and cascading style sheet object models.
3 . The method according to claim 1 wherein the processing comprises processing wherein the client software application and the surrogate software application are web browsers.
4 . The method according to claim 1 wherein the processing comprises rendering the web page at the surrogate software application.
5 . The method according to claim 1 and further comprising modifying, in accordance with a predefined modification policy, the copy of the portion of the model that is maintained by the surrogate software application.
6 . The method according to claim 5 wherein:
communications between the client software application and the surrogate software application are mediated by a proxy server that is configured to selectably forward requests by the client software application to the surrogate software application,
the modifying comprises including a predefined indicator together with a uniform resource locator in the copy of the portion of the model that is maintained by the surrogate software application, and
the proxy server is configured, responsive to detecting the presence of the predefined indicator together with the uniform resource locator, to forward to a computer network address associated with the uniform resource locator a request by the client software application to retrieve a resource associated with the uniform resource locator.
7 . The method according to claim 1 and further comprising:
identifying a change in the model that is maintained by the surrogate software application in association with the web page; and
performing the serializing and sending wherein the change is included in the serialized data.
8 . The method according to claim 1 and further comprising:
identifying, at the surrogate software application, an action associated with the web page, wherein performing the action at the surrogate software application does not change the model that is maintained by the surrogate software application in association with the web page; and
providing to the client software application any of data and instructions associated with the action, thereby prompting the client software application to effect a result of the action in association with the web page.
9 . The method according to claim 8 wherein the providing comprises providing to the client software application a result of performing the action at the surrogate software application, thereby prompting the client software application to render the result in association with the web page.
10 . The method according to claim 1 and further comprising:
receiving from the mediation agent a notification of a user interaction associated with the web page, wherein the mediation agent is configured to detect the user interaction; and
processing the user interaction at the surrogate software application in association with the web page.
11 . The method according to claim 1 wherein the receiving, processing, serializing, and sending are implemented in any of
a) computer hardware, and
b) computer software embodied in a non-transitory, computer-readable medium.
12 . A system for processing a web page, the system comprising:
a surrogate software application configured to
receive from a client software application a request to retrieve a web page, and
process the web page, thereby representing the web page in a model that is maintained by the surrogate software application in association with the web page; and
a surrogate-to-client data manager configured to
serialize a copy of any portion of the model that is maintained by the surrogate software application, thereby creating serialized data, and
send the serialized data to the mediation agent executed by the client software application,
wherein the mediation agent is configured to
deserialize the serialized data, thereby creating deserialized data, and
inject the deserialized data into a model that is maintained by the client software application in association with the web page.
13 . The system according to claim 12 wherein the models are any of document object models and cascading style sheet object models.
14 . The system according to claim 12 wherein the client software application and the surrogate software application are web browsers.
15 . The system according to claim 12 wherein the surrogate software application is configured to render the web page.
16 . The system according to claim 12 wherein the surrogate-to-client data manager is configured to modify, in accordance with a predefined modification policy, the copy of the portion of the model that is maintained by the surrogate software application.
17 . The system according to claim 16 wherein:
communications between the client software application and the surrogate software application are mediated by a proxy server that is configured to selectably forward requests by the client software application to the surrogate software application,
the surrogate-to-client data manager is configured to include a predefined indicator together with a uniform resource locator in the copy of the portion of the model that is maintained by the surrogate software application, and
the proxy server is configured, responsive to detecting the presence of the predefined indicator together with the uniform resource locator, to forward to a computer network address associated with the uniform resource locator a request by the client software application to retrieve a resource associated with the uniform resource locator.
18 . The system according to claim 12 wherein the surrogate-to-client data manager is configured to
identify a change in the model that is maintained by the surrogate software application in association with the web page, and
include the change in the serialized data.
19 . The system according to claim 12 wherein
the surrogate software application is configured to identify an action associated with the web page, wherein performing the action at the surrogate software application does not change the model that is maintained by the surrogate software application in association with the web page, and
the surrogate-to-client data manager is configured to provide to the client software application any of data and instructions associated with the action, thereby prompting the client software application to effect a result of the action in association with the web page.
20 . The system according to claim 19 wherein the surrogate-to-client data manager is configured to provide to the client software application a result of performing the action at the surrogate software application, thereby prompting the client software application to render the result in association with the web page.
21 . The system according to claim 12 wherein the surrogate software application is configured to
receive from the mediation agent a notification of a user interaction associated with the web page, wherein the mediation agent is configured to detect the user interaction, and
process the user interaction in association with the web page.
22 . The system according to claim 12 wherein the surrogate software application and the surrogate-to-client data manager are implemented in any of
a) computer hardware, and
b) computer software embodied in a non-transitory, computer-readable medium.