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1. this manner the user s segments logged changes produced at the different computing devices 10 can be centrally stored and shared among the computing devices US 2003 0135507 1 10 It is important to note here that the present invention is premised on the assumption that a user will use only one of the computing devices 10 at a time Further by transferring only segments logged changes to synchronize the local databases and the central repository the present invention minimizes network traffic reduces data errors during data exchange and accelerates the data synchronization process between the computing devices 10 and the central repository subsystem 60 0052 The encryption operation of the encrypt decrypt plug in 19 in the computing device 10A is now described in more detail As discussed above when the user begins a new user session at the computing device 10A the user is required to enter credentials including the connection information and pass phrase The connection information includes 1 the user s identification e g user ID 2 the user s password passcode etc and 3 the name or iden tifier of the central repository subsystem 60 e g server number or name for the subsystem 60 is etc The pass phrase can be used by the subsystem 60 to authenticate the user All or some of these pieces of information or at least a portion thereof are later used to generate an encryption key for encrypting th
2. userid identifying the user e g bob and 3 a pass word associated with the user userid e g letmein Two techniques can be used in the preferred embodiment to simplify such a user interaction First the userid and the network server can be entered in an RFC822 style string that resembles an email address e g bob www myrepository com and secondly the pass word used to authenticate the user could be algorithmically derived from the pass phrase already entered by the user using a secure one way hash or other cryptographic method 0047 In the preferred embodiment the central database manager 17 interacts with the local database manager 21 using a transactional log interface Through this process the central database manager 17 can instruct the local databases 15 to create a log of modifications add change delete of their internal elementary elements over a set time duration it can instruct the local databases 15 to apply the modifica Jul 17 2003 tions contained in an existing log to the current state of the local databases 15 it can instruct the local databases 15 to represent their current state as a log of modifications made to a null state database and it can reset the local databases 15 to a null state 0048 Once the session at the computing device begins the HAPI 14 collects any meta data processed in or resulting from the use of the applications 22 24 an
3. 42 The computer program product of claim 41 wherein the context data identify at least one of the following user roles uniform resource identifiers URIs file names and or form names pertaining to the application data 43 The computer program product of claim 41 wherein the application data include at least one of the following page display setting data file display setting data user ID password combinations field values for computer forms user s preference data bookmarks and certificates 44 The computer program product of claim 37 wherein the current context is for filling in a computer form and the Jul 17 2003 computer executable instructions for applying include com puter executable instructions for automatically filling in the computer form with said most appropriate meta data 45 The computer program product of claim 37 wherein if the current context is for filling in a computer form the computer executable instructions for utilizing further include computer executable instructions for retrieving from the meta data collection alternative meta data that are related to the current context of filling in the computer form and presenting the alternative meta data to the user for the user s consideration 46 The computer program product of claim 37 wherein the current context is for filling in a password changing computer form and the retrieved meta data includes a user identification and a passwo
4. and customization by the device 10A 0067 meta data editor 25 allows the user to edit sort and organize the meta data collection stored in the local databases 15 and to set certain criteria if desired by which the HAPI 14 operates its meta data storage search and retrieval operations The meta data editor 25 can also be used to request certain information from the user such as the current role of the user The meta data editor 25 preferably includes a Graphical User Interface GUI for communicat ing with the user and with the applications 22 24 One example of such a meta data editor GUI is found in a co pending U S application Ser No 09 862 271 filed on May 22 2001 assigned to the assignee of the present invention and entitled Data Cylinder for Managing Ad hoc Data Sets which is herein fully incorporated by reference The GUI disclosed in U S application Ser No 09 862 271 displays a cylindrically shaped graphical tool on a user s display device and allows sorting of different sets of meta data based on different roles or other criteria which can be set by the user 0068 New entries to the local databases 15 can be created and organized in many different ways For instance using the meta data editor 25 the user can manually enter new meta data into the local databases 15 e g using the data cylinder GUI discussed in the above described co pending application In a different way if the user enters data into
5. can also be found at the website of http www webdav org By using the existing WebDAV protocols in the central repository subsystem 60 the present invention eliminates the need to use special code typically used in prior art database systems 0038 still preferred embodiment existing 2069 Digest Access Authentication protocols can be further implemented in the central repository subsystem 60 so that decryption keys and other access authorizing information would not be disclosed to network monitors For instance RFC2069 see e g http www ietf org rfc rfc2069 txt HTTP extension can be used in the process of authenticating the userid with the client s password 0039 FIG 2 is a block diagram of each computing device 10A 10B or 10C in the system 100 of FIG 1 according to a preferred embodiment of the present inven tion For the sake of brevity the computing device 10A will be described However all the computing devices 10 have the same components and operate in the same manner As shown in FIG 2 the computing device 10A includes Common Data Security Architecture CDSA 30 an encrypt decrypt plug in 19 a data repository plug in 20 a Jul 17 2003 plurality of applications such as a Web browser 22 a word processor 23 and or any other application s 24 and a meta data editor 25 all operatively coupled 0040 CDSA 30 is an existing security layer figuration for providing a widely ac
6. etc Then the Retrieval interface 18 compares iteratively the user s past behaviors 1 stored context data and statistical information in filling out the same or similar form with the context of the current online form to locate values application data that the user would most likely enter into the fields of the current online form The current context of the form is identified by different properties describing the current context and such context properties may be assigned different weights to indicate which prop erties should be given more weight during the search pro cess 0064 Once the appropriate application data are found then in the retrieval operation the Retrieval interface 18 retrieves the application data from the user s meta data collection in the local databases 15 and supplies them to the appropriate application through the CDSA 30 The applica tion then applies the received application data in the current context in which the application is used In the above example the browser 22 receives the appropriate application data field values from the Remember interface 18 and automatically fills in the fields of the current form with the retrieved data field values If multiple field values are found for each field of the form then the multiple values may be displayed for the user s selection e g in a drop down list 0065 In one embodiment the Retrieval interface 18 implements the h
7. 0121 Accordingly the present invention provides sys tem and method which studies the history of the user s past behaviors in using different applications and data editors and which provides intelligent recommendations and functions that would improve greatly the user s current experience of using the applications whether it be for web browsing data processing communicating with other users executing application programs etc The features are not limited to one computing device but the present invention adds mobility to the system by collecting meta data from multiple computing devices e g from a user s home desk top office worksta tion wireless PDA etc centrally storing the meta data at a central repository subsystem and synchronizing data main tained in the computing devices and the central subsystem with minimal network traffic in a secure manner 0122 processing steps of the present invention can be implemented by computer programs in conjunction with hardware components if needed Software programming code which embodies the present invention may be stored on any of a variety of known media such as a server database diskette hard drive CD ROM or read only memory and may be distributed on such media The techniques and methods for embodying software programming code on physical media and or distributing software code are known in the art 0123 invention being thus described it will be obvious th
8. 15 creates a new segment based on the logged modifications encrypts the segment via the encrypt plug in 19 uploads the encrypted segment to the central repository at the subsystem 60 via the communications network resets its internal log file and unlocks the local databases 15 in Step S60 It should be noted that the uploading of the meta data segment from the computing device 10A to the central repository can occur incrementally as meta data are gener ated or at one time upon completion of the user session by transmitting the new segment as described below in detail in connection with FIG 7 This ends the process 0085 In certain cases if the local database 15 is at a null stage e g when a new computing device is being used or when the existing computing device is recovering from a local failure a null date time will be used to list all segments logged changes stored in the central repository so that the local database 15 can be effectively rebuilt to the level of the last user session or checkpoint from the logged US 2003 0135507 1 changes In another embodiment if the user s pass phrase is changed or when the number of segments in the central repository exceeds some garbage collection threshold then after applying the newest segments at the start of the user session at the computing device the entire local database and or central repository is dumped to a log which is then converted to a single segment
9. CURRENT CONTEXT AS ALTERNATIVE FIELD VALUES AUTOMATICALLY FILL FORM WITH MOST APPROPRIATE FIELD VALUES AND AT THE SAME TIME PROVIDE ALTERNATIVE FIELD VALUES FOR USER S SELECTION Patent Application Publication Jul 17 2003 Sheet 10 of 10 US 2003 0135507 1 FIG 10 SEARCH USER S META DATA COLLECTION FOR USER ID AND PASSWORD THAT WOULD BE MOST APPROPRIATE FOR CURRENT CONTEXT OF FILLING PASSWORD CHANGING FORM 5172 DISPLAY PASSWORD S OBFUSCATED 5176 FORMAT AND USER 10 5 IN CURRENT FORM IS IT SAFE TO REVEAL THE ACTUAL PASSWORD S YES 5180 REVEAL ACTUAL PASSWORD S US 2003 0135507 1 SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR MANAGING AND SECURING META DATA USING CENTRAL REPOSITORY RELATED APPLICATION 0001 The present application is related to a co pending U S application Ser No Attorney Docket No RSW020010101US1 filed concurrently herewith on entitled System and Method for Managing and Securing Meta Data and assigned to the assignee of the present invention which is herein fully incorporated by reference BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 0002 1 Field of the Invention 0003 The present invention relates to data management systems and more particularly to a system and method for managing and securing meta data using a central repository 0004 2 Discussion of the Related Art 0005 Meta data is known as any data that relates to or describes some other data Examp
10. Sheet 3 of 10 US 2003 0135507 A1 FIG 3A http www ibm com CUSTOMER INFORMATION 41 42 FIG 123 44 MPeters fieldname euser descript User ID form customerinfo Meta Data URL http www ibm com Group A RefURL http www ibm product com role manager 45 46 V 123 fieldname verification descript Pass Code form customerinfo Meta Data 47 lt URL http www ibm com Group B RefURL http www ibm product com role manager Patent Application Publication Jul 17 2003 Sheet 4 of 10 US 2003 0135507 A1 FIG 4 CONNECT TO CENTRAL S10 REPOSITORY RETRIEVE AND APPLY SEGMENT S S20 LOCAL DATABASE S USE META DATA COLLECTION UPLOAD SEGMENT TO S60 CENTRAL REPOSITORY 5 Patent Application Publication Jul 17 2003 Sheet 5 of 10 US 2003 0135507 A1 FIG 5 IS LOCAL SEND A REQUEST TO CENTRAL 526 DATABASE REPOSITORY SUBSYSTEM FOR NULL STATE SEGMENTS SEND A REQUEST TO CENTRAL 523 REPOSITORY SUBSYSTEM FOR ANY SEGMENT SINCE LAST UPDATE FOR CURRENT COMPUTING DEVICE RECEIVE ALL SEGMENTS FROM CENTRAL REPOSITORY SUBSYSTEM S24 RECEIVE ENCRYPTED SEGMENT S FROM CENTRAL REPOSITORY SUBSYSTEM DECRYPT ALL 529 SEGMENTS DECRYPT RECEIVED ENCRYPTED 525 SEGMENT S AND APPLY BUILD META DATA COLLECTION 530 USING DECRYPTED SEGMENTS AND STORE IT THEM TO META DATA
11. any prior art database management techniques but may be sorted according to different criteria As discussed above the meta data collections maintained in the local databases 15 are stored preferably in key value pairs and may be encoded e g using known XML encoding or other encoding techniques Certain keys in the key value pairs may be predefined by the system or created dynamically by the system and or user 0119 In another embodiment at least one of the central repository and the local database s can be implemented by using a network attached storage known in the art 0120 In still another embodiment the data repository plug in shown in FIG 2 can reside on a proxy machine connected to the CDSA by using a secure protocol This configuration is allowed by the CDSA and would be ideal for low end device that may not necessarily have the process ing memory power to store and or manage the heuristic database s but have a high speed channel connection avail Jul 17 2003 able to the proxy machine which is now possible with new digital cell phone networks radio LANs etc For instance a low end device such as a certain PDA or cell phone can be configured to connect to the proxy machine having the data repository plug in through an available high speed connec tion The proxy machine in turn connects to the server central repository browser or the like to access and interact with the central repository
12. displaying of the actual password s does not occur until the user informs the computing device 10A that it is O K to display the actual password s To increase security in one embodiment the user may need to enter a particular code or the like to verify that the user s approval for displaying the actual password s is an authorized one If only one password is displayed the user reviews it as well as the user ID to verify that they are acceptable If multiple user IDs and or passwords are dis played then the user must select one of the displayed user IDs and one of the displayed passwords for the current form 0108 It should be noted that the processes of FIGS 5 10 can be implemented sequentially or simultaneously if appropriate For instance when a form page is to be dis played the form page can be displayed according to the steps of FIG 8 and simultaneously be filled with field values according to the steps of FIG 9 0109 Although the present invention has been discussed above in connection with displaying or visually providing certain information to a user e g in FIGS 8 and 10 the present invention is not limited to such but is equally applicable to customizing and or personalizing information to be rendered to a user in any manner not just visually 0110 In one embodiment if the URI is used as a context property to search the meta data collection in the local databases 15 the Retrieval interface 18 search
13. field 41 the meta data group is established The meta data group A is composed of application data represented by a key value pair 44 and context data represented by key value pairs 45 The key value pair 44 indicates that the value V of the field key 41 is MPeters The context data 45 indicates the context in which the field value MPeters is used In this case the context of the field 41 is identified to be as follows the name of the field 41 is euser the description of the field 41 is User ID the form 40 having the field 41 is called customerinfo the URL of the form 40 is http www ib m com the URL referred in the form 40 is http www ib m product com and the role of the user role in which the user functioned in filling out this form is manager Similarly the meta data group B established for the field 42 includes a key value pair 46 indicating that the field value V is 123 and context data 47 indicating the context of the field 42 The meta data groups A B are related to each other and constitute a meta data set wherein all the data belonging to the meta data set are related to each other In this example the user s role can be collected by requesting the user to specify the user s current role e g using a pop up window the meta data editor 25 or some other means or can be determined using other available meta data e g by comparing the meta data with similar met
14. format in a local repository such as the memory of the user s PC Then each time the same data fields appear on the user s screen the auto complete function retrieves the corresponding user ID and password and decrypts them Then the auto complete func tion automatically fills in the data fields with the decrypted user ID and password Typically the password in the pass word field of the form is obfuscated by being displayed as a string of asterisks 0007 Although such conventional meta data manage ment systems are intended to be beneficial there are prob lems or limitations that are associated with the conventional systems First in conventional Web browsers all web pages are displayed using the same web page settings regardless of time website user role indicating different roles of a user e g an IBM employee a private person or a club repre Jul 17 2003 sentative and other variables But one or more users of the computer may prefer different display settings depending on the website user role etc For example the user may prefer to always view a particular website in medium font size and dark background color on the user s computer whereas the same user may prefer to view a different website in extra large font size and bright background color on the same computer In the conventional systems if the user desires to view a particular page in different display settings e g with larger font size t
15. is implemented using existing heuristics algorithms to find optimal solution s that satisfy multiple search requirements In one embodiment the search requirements are formulated based on different properties e g Uniform Resource Iden tifier also called URI user role etc that identify the current context of using the application These different context properties are assigned different weights represent ing different degrees of importance to find solution s that would be most appropriate for the current context The identified solution s will represent meta data that the user will likely use in the current context of using the application Then the system applies automatically the identified solu tion s in the user s current context of using the application 0020 The present system also provides a meta data editor that allows the user to organize sort and edit the user s meta data collection stored in the local repository using a graphi cal user interface Using the editor the user can select from multiple possible values most appropriate values to be inserted into a form on demand by using an existing selec tion technique such as a drag and drop editing operation 0021 During the user session the computing device is configured collect meta data as logged changes which result from using the applications and or meta data editor Upon completion of the user session at the computing device the computing device tempora
16. method of claim 1 further comprising the step of providing a graphical user interface GUI for allowing the user to organize the meta data collection 23 The method of claim 22 wherein the GUI displays a graphical tool in a cylindrical configuration for organizing the meta data collection 24 The method of claim 2 wherein the uploading step includes temporarily locking the local repository encrypting the new segment using an encryption key transmitting the encrypted new segment from the com puting device to the central repository subsystem for storage in the central repository and unlocking the local repository 25 The method of claim 24 wherein in the encrypting step the encryption key is represented as a hash of identi fying information associated with the new segment concat enated with a pass phrase of the user 26 The method of claim 1 wherein the computing device implements a Common Data Security Architecture CDS A and the utilizing step is performed by a CDSA add on module 27 The method of claim 1 wherein the central repository subsystem is implemented using WebDAV protocols 28 A computer program product embodied on computer readable medium readable by at least one of a computing device and a central repository subsystem for managing meta data using a central repository at the central repository subsystem the central repository being accessible by the computing device through communication ne
17. of claim 67 wherein the data repository module updates the meta data collection with the new segment if the meta data collection exists in the local repository and stores the new segment in the local reposi tory as a meta data collection for the user if the meta data collection does not exist in the local repository 69 The system of claim 67 wherein the meta data includes application data for being usable in an application executable on the computing device and context data for identifying context in which said application data are used and wherein the data repository module determines statisti cal information associated with the meta data and retrieves said appropriate meta data based on the statistical informa tion the statistical information indicating relationships between the meta data 70 The system of claim 69 wherein the context data identify at least one of the following user roles uniform resource identifiers URIs file names and or form names pertaining to the application data 71 The system of claim 69 wherein the application data include at least one of the following page display setting US 2003 0135507 1 data file display setting data user ID password combina tions field values for computer forms user s preference data bookmarks and certificates 72 system of claim 65 wherein the current context is for filling in a computer form and said appropriate one of the applications automatically
18. products see e g http www iet enri reston va us rfc rfc2518 txt for base protocol http www ietf cnri reston va us html charters webdav char ter htm for information extensions implementations simple terms WebDAV protocols allow a client to view a repository server as if it were access controlled file system A userid identifying a user client can be used to scope the files in the repository server which are available for manipulation as well as the opera tions that may be performed and a password from a user can be used to authenticate the userid that a particular client claims Based on the userids and passwords WebDAV protocols allow different users to access particular data from a central storage location central repository and to edit such data directly at that location The ordered collections feature maintains modifications to the data at the central storage location in the collection order To prevent different users from rendering modifications simul taneously the WebDAV protocols provide the locking feature that allows only a single user to access a particular file at any given time For instance if user B desires to access a particular file when user A is currently accessing the file the WebDAV system would block the access by the user B and inform user B of unavailability of the desired file A more detailed discussion on WebDAV protocols and features
19. subsystem authenti cation information from the user verifying validity of the authentication information and notifying the computing device that the user has proper authority to access the central repository if the authen tication information is verified as valid 5 The method of claim 4 wherein the authentication information includes user identification a pass phrase of the user and an identifier for the central repository or a com ponent at the central repository subsystem 6 The method of claim 5 wherein the verifying step includes determining a secret key represented as a hash of the received user identification concatenated with a hash of the received identifier encrypted with the received pass phrase and comparing the secret key with a stored key associated with the user 7 method of claim 1 wherein the updating step includes determining if the local repository is at a null state first requesting the central repository subsystem to trans mit any segment associated with the user that has not been applied to the computing device if the determining step indicates that the local repository is not at a null state and second requesting the central repository subsystem to transmit all segments associated with the user if the determining step indicates that the local repository is at a null state 8 The method of claim 7 wherein the updating step further includes receiving at least one segment from
20. the central repository subsystem in response to said first requesting step decrypting the at least one segment and applying the decrypted at least one segment to the meta data collection to produce the meta data collection associated with the user 9 method of claim 7 wherein the updating step further includes receiving at least one segment from the central repository subsystem in response to said second requesting step decrypting the at least one segment and generating the meta data collection for the user using the decrypted at least one segment 10 The method of claim 1 wherein the utilizing step includes retrieving using heuristics algorithms from the meta data collection meta data that would be most appropriate for a current context of using the computing device and applying the retrieved meta data in the current context 11 The method of claim 10 wherein the current context includes at least one of the following opening a web page Jul 17 2003 filling in a computer form filling in a password changing form providing a certificate opening a computer file pro cessing a computer file or executing an application pro gram 12 The method of claim 10 wherein the utilizing step further includes continuously collecting meta data resulting from use of the computing device during the current user session at the computing device and the method further com prises generating a new segment ba
21. then the process moves to Step S164 wherein the computing device 10A receives field values manually input by the user for example from a keyboard or keypad Then the process ends 0103 Accordingly the present invention automatically suggests using heuristics algorithms possible values for the data fields of computer forms based on the user s prior form filling acts As a result although the field names of the forms may not be identical more accurate suggestions for the fields can be made In addition all the fields of the computer forms can be filled automatically at one time 0104 In the embodiments discussed in connection with FIG 9 one skilled in the art would readily appreciate that the automatic filling of the form can occur after the blank form is displayed to the user or prior to the displaying of the form In the latter 0105 case the user will not see the blank form but the filled form will be displayed at once 0106 FIG 10 illustrates another application of Steps 545 and S46 in FIG 6 in the context of filling in a password changing form A password changing form is any known computer form for changing the user s password As shown in FIG 10 in Step S172 when a particular password changing form is displayed on the display unit of the computing device 10A the user s meta data collection in the local databases 15 is searched by the Retrieval interface 18 of the device 10A to locate a user ID password
22. with the user s pass phrase or password The segment name identifier identifies the user session at the particular computing device and can be represented as a string of some value or some other means In one embodiment the segment name identifier can be a modified base 64 encoding of the time date of the user session at which the first entry in the new segment is made A SHA1 hash is generated using hash function well known in the cryptography field A hash function is an existing technique of generating a hash based on an input value e g the time portion of the new segment name A hash represents a value of fixed length that 15 extracted from the input value using certain extraction rules A SHAT is one of different types of hash functions known in the art more Jul 17 2003 detail discussion of a general hash function as well as a SHA1 hash function is provided at the website of http www cacr math uwaterloo ca hac 0056 which provides downloadable chapters of a book directed to cryptography One skilled in the art would appreciate that other types of hash functions can be used herein and that other types of cryptography operations may be used to generate the segment identifier name and or the encryption key Further the encryption key can be based on a different combination of information For instance it can be based on the user ID and at least a portion of the segment identifier or segment identifying inf
23. CDSA 390 or other equivalent security architecture imple mentation 0116 It should be clearly understood that the process of selecting most appropriate meta data that would be suitable for the current context of using the application based on the past behavior of the user according to the present invention is applicable to any application or situation where meta data US 2003 0135507 1 is requested For example in some applications a particular website that the user is interacting with may employ well established Secured Sockets Layer SSL encryption tech niques The SSL techniques allow the website to perform an SSL handshake with the user s browser so that secured data can be transmitted between the user s device and the website server Conventional browsers utilize a predetermined client side certificate public private key pair to perform the SSL handshake with the user s device and sometimes this certificate public key is passed to the website server as a verification of the user s identity However according to the present invention before performing an SSL handshake the Web browser 22 is configured to communicate with the HAPI 14 which in turn selects a certificate public key from the user s meta data collection that is associated with the current context of selecting a certificate public key e g user role and or the URI that the browser is in the process of loading If the search results by the HAPI 14 indicate that
24. COLLECTION LOCAL DATABASE Patent Application Publication Jul 17 2003 Sheet 6 of 10 US 2003 0135507 A1 FIG 6 RETRIEVE APPROPRIATE META S45 DATA FOR CURRENT CONTEXT USING HEURISTICS ALGORITHMS APPLY RETRIEVED META DATA IN S46 CURRENT CONTEXT S47 COLLECT META DATA SETS AND STATISTICAL INFORMATION Patent Application Publication Jul 17 2003 Sheet 7 of 10 US 2003 0135507 A1 FIG 7 S62 CREATE amp ENCRYPT SEGMENT SAVE SEGMENT IDENTIFIER IN 563 LOCAL REPOSITORY TRANSMIT ENCRYPTED SEGMENT S64 TO CENTRAL REPOSITORY SUBSYSTEM STORE IN CENTRAL REPOSITORY THE _ S65 ENCRYPTED SEGMENT IN COLLECTION ORDER Patent Application Publication Jul 17 2003 Sheet 8 of 10 US 2003 0135507 A1 FIG 8 DISPLAY PAGE USING DEFAULT DISPLAY SETTING DATA ARE THERE STORED PAGE DISPLAY SETTING DATA THAT WOULD BE MOST APPROPRIATE FOR CURRENT CONTEXT OF DISPLAYING A PARTICULAR PAGE RETRIEVE THE STORED PAGE DISPLAY SETTING DATA DISPLAY PAGE USING RETRIEVED PAGE DISPLAY SETTING DATA Patent Application Publication Jul 17 2003 Sheet 9 of 10 US 2003 0135507 A1 FIG 9 ARE THERE STORED FIELD VALUES THAT WOULD BE MOST APPROPRIATE FOR CURRENT CONTEXT OF FILLING A PARTICULAR FORM RECEIVE FIELD VALUES INPUT BY USER RETRIEVE STORED FIELD VALUES THAT WOULD BE MOST APPROPRIATE FOR THE CURRENT CONTEXT RETRIEVE ANY OTHER FIELD VALUES RELATED TO
25. This single segment then replaces all the previous segments in the central repository for the current user This activity may be gated by the device capabilities and or the characteristics of the connection to the central repository In still another embodiment a seg ment representing all the changes applied to a null database starts with an indicator that will allow the central database manager 17 to reset the local database 15 to null before applying the modifications included in that segment If the segment was built because of a pass phase change then the indicator will carry an offset which will yield the previous pass phrase if it is added to the current pass phrase This scheme allows the use of the new pass phrase on computing devices following a change on the computing device which results in the creation of a consolidated replacement seg ment 0086 FIG 5 is flowchart illustrating the processing steps implementable as Step S20 of FIG 4 according to one embodiment of the present invention As shown in FIG 5 in Step S22 at the start of the user session the central database manager 17 of the computing device 10A deter mines if the local database 15 is at a null state for the current user If this determination result is no then the central database manager 17 in Step S23 instructs the central repository subsystem 60 to send all segments in collection order that were generated since the last update of the user s meta data
26. US 20030135507 1 a2 Patent Application Publication ao Pub No US 2003 0135507 1 United States Hind et al 43 Pub Date Jul 17 2003 54 SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR MANAGING AND SECURING META DATA USING CENTRAL REPOSITORY 75 Inventors John R Hind Raleigh NC US Marcia L Stockton Bakersfield CA US Correspondence Address Jeanine S Ray Yarletts Corporation 81 503 12195 Research Triangle Park 27709 US 73 Assignee International Business Machines Cor poration Armonk NY US 21 Appl No 10 051 951 22 Filed Jan 17 2002 10A COMPUTING DEVICE A SERVER 10B COMPUTING DEVICE A COMPUTING DEVICE SERVER Publication Classification GD Int Ci GO6F 7 00 707 100 57 ABSTRACT A method and system for managing meta data using a central repository are disclosed The method manages meta data for user using the central repository at a central repository subsystem wherein the central repository is accessible by a computing device through a communication network The method includes the steps of connecting to the central repository through the communications network based on a user input updating a local repository of the computing device with at least one segment from the central repository that is associated with the user to produce a meta data collection associated with the user and utiliz
27. a collection associated with the user and utilizing the meta data collection during a current user session at the comput ing device to assist the user in using the computing device 56 The system of claim 55 wherein the computing device uploads any new segment to the central repository at a predetermined time 57 The system of claim 55 wherein the computing device incrementally uploads to the central repository any new meta data generated during the current user session 58 The system of claim 55 wherein the computing device further includes a plurality of applications selectably executable on the computing device security service providing architecture structure for selectively providing security based services to at least one of the plurality of applications data repository module provided as an add in module to the security service providing architecture for utilizing the meta data collection to assist the user in using the computing device and an encryption decryption module for encryption any new segment to be transmitted to the central repository subsystem 59 The system of claim 55 wherein the central repository subsystem further includes a manager for managing the central repository and wherein the central repository sub system receives from the computing device authentication information input by the user verifies validity of the authen tication information and notifies the computing device that t
28. a computer form on a web page the data associated with that web page and the form are automatically collected by the Remember interface 16 and processed as discussed above Before saving a new entry the system can be configured to ask the user if the user desires to add certain meta data to the user s meta data collection For example a pop up window GUI or some other means can display a question such as this 0069 ADD Address of 23 Main Street Durham N C 12345 in association with 0070 Personal Role and the web page of www ibm com shopping thinkpad my order htm 0071 The pop up window or some other means could also list other addresses that are associated with this address Jul 17 2003 field and invite the user to select from the list These inquiries provide the user with an opportunity to enter and or edit the meta data if needed not have it stored or to indicate that it should be stored in some other manner e g higher in the hierarchy or in association with a different site such as www ibm com The user can also select the level of prompting desired such as always never or prompt when there is a matching field higher in the hierarchy 0072 the present invention communication between the HAPI 14 and the currently active applications 22 24 and or the editor 25 occurs in a secure manner because the CDSA 30 verifies the validity of the applications 22 24 and transmission using known v
29. a data stored in the local databases 15 This approach is applicable to all embodiments discussed herein 0076 If the Retrieval interface 18 needs to perform search and retrieval operation to fill out a new computer form that is identical to the computer form 40 shown in FIG 3A or is in a similar context then the Retrieval interface 18 may search the user s meta data collection in the local repository based on the following exemplary search require ments 0077 Retrieve best 5 V Context 50 role manager 2596URL http www ibm com 10 descript User ID 5 fieldname euser 0078 1096RefURL http www ibm product 0079 Retrieve best 5 V Context 50 role manager 25 URL http www ibm com 10 descript Pass Code 5 fieldname verification 0080 10 RefURL http Avww ibm product 0081 V stands for a value These search criteria are formulated based on the form information for the form 40 which the Retrieval interface 18 would have obtained from the browser 22 before the form 40 is displayed The search criteria essentially represent the current context of filling in the new form with different weights given to different context properties such as role URL descript etc This results in a search based on the weighted context corresponding to the current context of the new form The weights assigned to the different context properties may be determined in advance and modifi
30. at the same may be varied in many ways Such variations are not to be regarded as a departure from the spirit and scope of the invention and all such modifications as would be obvious to one skilled in the art are intended to be included within the scope of the following claims 1 A method of managing meta data using a central repository at a central repository subsystem the central repository being accessible by a computing device through acommunications network the method comprising the steps of connecting to the central repository through the commu nications network based on a user input updating a local repository of the computing device with at least one segment from the central repository that is associated with the user to produce a meta data collec tion associated with the user and utilizing by the computing device the meta data collec tion during a current user session at the computing device to assist the user in using the computing device 2 The method of claim 1 further comprising the step of uploading any new segment from the computing device to the central repository at a predetermined time 3 The method of claim 1 further comprising the step of incrementally uploading any new meta data generated during the current user session from the computing device to the central repository US 2003 0135507 1 4 The method of claim 1 wherein the connecting step includes receiving by the central repository
31. ate and zip code Although these data fields are related the conventional system stores values for each of these fields individually and does not store relational information on these fields Thus when the conventional Web browser provides a drop down list identifying suggested values for a particular data field the drop down list often includes certain items that are completely irrelevant for the particular data field Moreover since the conventional Web browser is unable to recognize related data fields a large number of items are often dis played in one drop down list As the number of items displayed in the drop down list increases it becomes more difficult for the user to view the list and find quickly the appropriate value from the list 0010 Another problem with the conventional systems is that the drop down list is displayed for one data field at a time and triggered in response to the user s manual input of some value into the data field This means that the user must type in the value to see the appropriate drop down list and needs to repeat this process for each and every data field in the form Thus the conventional form filling process can be inconvenient and time consuming to the user 0011 Yet another problem with the conventional systems is the password assist feature offered by the auto complete function of the system Although the password assist feature provides some benefits to the user because the user doe
32. cepted set of layered security services defined by Intel Architecture Labs IAL Typically the CDSA is implemented as computer software Briefly the functions and operations of the CDSA 30 will be discussed The CDSA 30 includes a Common Security Services Manager CSSM API application programming interface that interacts with the applications 22 24 and the editor 25 to allow the applications 22 24 and the editor 25 to access the security services offered by the CDSA 30 The CDSA 30 also includes a plurality of service provider modules that offer these security services Among the known service provider modules the CDSA 30 may include a Cryptographic Service Provider CSP module a Trust Policy TP module a Certificate Library CL module a Data storage Library DL module and an Authorization Computation AC module all known in the art These modules provide services such as cryptographic operations including bulk encrypting and digital signature processing accessing remote signing entities such as Certification Authorities CA storing certificates and cryptographic keys etc In addition the CDSA 30 as known includes elective module managers EMM that allow new services to be added easily Under control of the EMM new services can be added easily in a secure manner by merely providing new service provider modules as plug ins that implement the new services The process of adding and integrating the new service modules as plug i
33. collection local database at this particular com puting device 10A 0087 Then in Step S24 these segment s which will have been encrypted according to the segment encryption process discussed herein are received by the data repository plug in 20 through the communications network 0088 Then in Step S25 the encrypt decrypt plug in 19 decrypts the encrypted segment s received from the central repository subsystem 60 Then the decrypted segment s are applied to the user s current meta data collection under control of the central database manager 17 to update the users meta data collection ie local database updated meta data collection then will include the same information represented by the ordered collection of seg ments currently maintained at the central repository sub system 60 for the user 0089 the other hand at Step S22 if the computing device 10A determines that the local database 15 is at the null state e g because this is the user s first session at this computing device or the computing device is a publicly shared device that prohibits local storage of meta data collections then the central database manager 17 in Step 526 instructs the central repository subsystem 60 to transmit all segments that are associated with the user to the com puting device 10A In Step S27 if the repository manager 64 determines that there is no segment stored in the central databases 66 for the user e g becau
34. combi nation that would be most appropriate for the current context of filling in the particular form This is accomplished by performing the search and retrieve operations of the Retrieval interface 18 using heuristics algorithms as dis cussed above The search operation will locate one or more user IDs and passwords that may be most appropriate for the fields of the current form Then in Step S176 the located user ID s and password s are then retrieved from the local databases 15 and automatically filled into the appropriate fields of the current password changing form such as the old ID and old password fields The user ID s are displayed so that the user can see what they are whereas the password s are displayed in obfuscated format e g using strings of asterisks so that no one can see what the actual password s are In this way the password s can be pro tected from being seen by unauthorized individuals 0107 Then in Step S178 the user is requested to deter mine whether it is safe to reveal the actual password s This can be accomplished e g using the meta data editor 25 or by providing a pop up window or prompt requesting the user s approval for revealing the actual password s If it is determined based on the user s input that the actual pass word s can be revealed e g because no one is near the user in Step 180 the actual password s are revealed to the Jul 17 2003 user and the process ends The
35. connects to the central repository at the subsystem 60 through the communications network such as the Internet 52 using the collected information from the user in Step S10 The central repository subsystem 60 then lists any segments created or stored in the central repository after the segment representing the last segment applied as a log to the local databases 15 which is typically the segment representing the last user session on this computing device 0083 Then in Step S20 the central database manager 17 retrieves these segments in order date time decrypts them into logs and applies them in an ordered fashion to the local databases 15 to update the user s meta data collection stored in the local databases 15 This results in a local database which represents all of the meta data and statistical infor mation representing the user s prior sessions on this and all other computing devices 0084 Then in Step S40 the central database manager 17 enables the HAPI 14 whereby the updated user s meta data collection is heuristically exploited to enhance the user s experience of using the applications 22 24 and or meta data editor 25 as discussed above and at the same time turns on the process of collecting new meta data as logs of modifi cations during the user session At the end of the user session and perhaps at certain checkpoints during the user session the central database manager 17 temporarily locks the local databases
36. d the meta data editor 25 stores the meta data in the local databases 15 as part of a meta data collection associated with the user if such storage is allowed and performs search and retrieval operations to search and retrieve certain meta data from the collection that can be used in the current context in which the user is using the application 22 23 or 24 or the computing device 10A A meta data collection is an ordered collection of meta data as updated and stored in the local databases 15 for a particular user That is a meta data collection refers to all data stored in the local databases 15 for a particular user which represents all of the meta data and any statistical information representing the user s prior sessions on the particular computing device and all other computing devices Under control of the HAPI 14 the meta data collection is used to provide meta data that can be used to automate and customize the operation of the applications 22 24 as the user uses the applications 22 24 Such tions of the HAPI 14 will be discussed later in more detail 0049 Upon completion of the current user session the central database manager 17 temporarily locks the local databases 15 creates a new segment from the collected logged changes encrypts the new segment through the encrypt decrypt plug in 19 uploads the encrypted segment to the central repository subsystem 60 through the commu nications network so that the encrypted s
37. dily enjoy the automation and customization features of the present invention from any computing device BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS 0023 FIG 1 is a diagram of a system for managing and securing meta data using a central repository according to one embodiment of the present invention 0024 FIG 2 is a block diagram of each computing device in the system shown in FIG 1 according to one embodiment of the present invention Jul 17 2003 0025 FIG is a diagram of an example of a computer form usable in the present invention 0026 FIG 3B shows an example of key value pairs collectable from the computer form of FIG 3A according to one embodiment of the present invention 0027 FIG 4 is flowchart illustrating the processing steps of a method for managing meta data using a central repository according to one embodiment of the present invention 0028 5 is a flowchart illustrating the processing steps of Step S20 in FIG 4 according to one embodiment of the present invention 0029 FIG 6 is a flowchart illustrating the processing steps of Step S40 in FIG 4 according to one embodiment of the present invention 0030 FIG 7 is a flowchart illustrating the processing steps of Step S60 in FIG 4 according to one embodiment of the present invention 0031 FIG 8 is a flowchart illustrating the processing steps of Steps S45 and S46 in FIG 6 in the context of displaying web pages according to o
38. e Jul 17 2003 77 system of claim 55 further comprising a meta data editor for allowing the user to organize the meta data collection 78 The system of claim 77 wherein the meta data editor displays a graphical tool in a cylindrical configuration for organizing the meta data collection 79 system of claim 58 wherein the data repository module temporarily locks the local repository and creates the new segment based on collected meta data the encryp tion decryption module encrypts the new segment using an encryption key and the data repository module transmits the encrypted new segment to the central repository subsystem for storage in the central repository and unlocks the local repository 80 The system of claim 79 wherein the encryption key is represented as a hash of identifying information associ ated with the new segment concatenated with a pass phrase of the user 81 The system of claim 58 wherein the computing device is configured in Common Data Security Architecture CDSA and the data repository module is an add on module to the CDSA configuration 82 The system of claim 55 wherein the central repository subsystem is implemented using WebDAV protocols 83 The system of claim 55 wherein at least one of the central repository and the local repository is implemented using a network attached storage 84 The system of claim 58 wherein the data repository module resides on a proxy machine acc
39. e new segment generated upon comple tion of the current user session In different embodiments the encryption of the segment can occur at the computing device or the subsystem 60 One skilled in the art would appreciate that other types of credentials known in the art can also be used in the encryption operation by the encrypt decrypt plug in 19 Examples of other types of credentials may include but are not limited to biometric identification an X509 certificate and private key 0053 segment or a combination of segments stored in the central repository is an encrypted log representing changes made during a user session at a device or all the modifications applied to a null state database to bring the database to a certain level The name of a segment can be the base 64 encoding of the time date at which the correspond ing log of changes was created The encryption key of a segment is computed using a secure hash such as SHA1 using the following algorithm pattern 0054 S HASH lt segment name S HASH time portion segment gt lt phrase gt 0055 That is in one embodiment the encryption key is represented by a SHA1 hash of the new segment name identifier concatenated with the user s pass phrase or pass word In another embodiment the encryption key is repre sented by 5 1 hash of the new segment name concatenated with a SHA1 hash of the time portion of the new segment name concatenated
40. ed if needed by the system to find optimal solution s and they may differ depending on which application 22 23 or 24 is being used in what context In this example the role of the user is assigned to 50 of the weight indicating that the role is important importance represented by weights and should Jul 17 2003 be given certain weight 50 during the search process The Retrieval interface 18 executes the search on the user s meta data collection by executing the heuristics algorithms to find optimal solution s that would satisfy these search requirements in an optimal manner The statis tical information is used in this process to find most appro priate optimal solutions The optimal solutions s would be certain application data e g likely values for the fields of the new form that would be most appropriate for the current context of filling out the new form In this manner the meta data organization of the present invention permits data to be searched by URLs user role and or other context data 0082 FIG 4 is a flowchart illustrating the processing steps of a method for managing meta data using a central repository according to a preferred embodiment of the present invention As shown in FIG 4 at the start of a user session at a particular computing device the central database manager 17 obtains the user s pass phrase and connection information e g userid repository network name and password and
41. egment can be stored in the central database 66 in association with the current user and then clears or resets its internal log file and unlocks the local databases 15 In another embodiment as an alternative to the batch update of the central repository with the encrypted segment upon completion of the user session as discussed above it is possible to transmit incre mentally changes meta data made at the computing device to the central repository subsystem 60 as they occur or periodically 0050 update process for the central repository is repeated at the different devices 10 as the user switches between the computing devices 10 For example when the user starts a new user session at the second computing device 10B the second computing device 10B will auto matically request the central repository subsystem 60 for any segments for the user that have not been applied to the meta data collection maintained in the second computing device 10B If there are such segments then the central repository subsystem 60 transmits these segments to the second com puting device 10B which in turns applies them to the meta data collection in the second computing device 10B to update the meta data collection in the second computing device 10B Once the user s meta data collection in the second computing device 10B has been updated then this meta data collection can be used to assist the user in using the second computing device 10B 0051
42. entral repository subsystem 60 stores the received encrypted segment or adds it to the existing ordered seg ments in association with the user in the central repository This completes the segment uploading process Optionally the user s meta data collection in the local databases 15 can be updated based on the new segment The statistical infor mation indicating frequency with which certain application data are used together in the meta data sets is also updated in the local databases 15 in association with the meta data sets It should be noted that this optional step is performed only if local storage of meta data collections is permitted in the computing device If this is not permitted e g because the computing device is a publicly shared device then this step is omitted 0096 FIGS 8 10 illustrate flowcharts illustrating the processing steps implementable as Steps S45 and S46 in FIG 6 according to different embodiments of the present invention All these processing steps can be implemented in each of the computing devices 10 of FIG 2 However for the sake of brevity these steps will be explained using one computing device 10A Specifically FIG 8 illustrates pro cessing steps of Steps S45 and S46 in FIG 6 in the context of rendering web pages As the user browses through dif ferent web pages using the computing device 10A the user may prefer these web pages to be displayed in different page settings depending on the cont
43. er invocations by the Remember interface 16 This means that the remembering or collecting of meta data by the Remember interface 16 may need to occur in every use of data e g every time a form is filled out or every time a web page is loaded In one embodiment the statistical information indicates how frequently certain meta data or a particular combination of key value pairs are used together For instance if the user functions as a private person or an employee whenever the user accesses a website then the Remember interface 16 maintains statistics on the frequency in which each of the role private and the role employee of the user is used together with the URL of the website A Jul 17 2003 0062 During each user session at the computing device 10A the Retrieval interface 18 performs search and retrieval operations to utilize the user s meta data collection available from the local databases 15 in assisting the user in using the applications 22 24 When the user activates a particular application 22 24 during a user session at the computing device 10A the Retrieval interface 18 interacts continuously with the currently active application 22 23 or 24 and determines when it should perform the search and retrieval operations For instance when the currently active browser 22 is about to display a form page then the Retrieval interface 18 determines that its search and retrieval operations sho
44. er 17 turns on the logging process and activates the 114 In Step S45 at certain instances of using the applications 22 24 appropriate meta data 1 application data are retrieved from the user s current meta data collection in the local database 15 based on context data and statistical information This can be accomplished using existing heuristic algorithms to generate search require ments based on the current context of using the applications 22 24 and to search the user s meta data collection for application data that satisfy the search requirements as discussed above The user role for the current context may be determined by the system based on available data stored in the local database or by requesting it from the user e g using a pop up window or the GUI of the meta data editor 25 In Step S46 the retrieved meta data are applied appro priately in the current context of using the application 22 23 or 24 for example for rendering a web page filling in a computer form etc Steps S45 and S46 can be repeated as many times as possible during the user session at the computing device 10A 0092 In Step S47 the Remember interface 16 of the computing device 10A collects the meta data sets as the user uses the applications 22 24 and or the meta editor 25 during the session Then the process ends 0093 In certain instances when there is no user s meta data collection in the local database 15 then the HAPI 14 of t
45. ered by the CSP module of the CDSA 30 Thus with the help of the CDSA 30 any of the applications 22 24 and the editor 25 in the computing device 10A can carry out data communica tions with each other and any other communicating com ponent in a secure manner 0042 The CDSA 30 also verifies each of the GUI accel erators 22a 25a before the GUI accelerators 22a 25a can US 2003 0135507 1 access the security based services offered by the CDSA 30 This verification can occur according to existing verification techniques that are used in communication systems to authenticate the validity of communication devices In this regard the use of the CDSA 30 further enhances the data security of the computing device 10A 0043 encrypt decrypt plug in 19 and the data reposi tory plug in 20 are provided as new service provider mod ules to the CDSA 30 so that they can be easily integrated into the CDSA 30 to interact with the CSSM API of the CDSA 30 under control of the EMM This configuration allows the plug ins 19 and 20 to communicate with each other and with any of the applications 22 24 and the meta data editor 25 and to access any meta data being processed by the applications 22 24 and the meta data editor 25 in a secure manner In another embodiment the functions of the plug ins 19 and 20 can be combined into a single plug in to the CDSA 30 0044 data repository plug in 20 includes a local repository having one or more
46. erification techniques The use of the CDSA configuration also permits the meta data collection to be accessed from the local databases 15 in a secure manner well protected from unauthorized users e g hackers Further the use of the CDSA is advantageous because the CDSA provides the security services discussed above and at the same time allows additional services provided by the HAPI 14 to be added easily as a plug in to the CDSA The overall architecture of the CDSA need not be changed to add such new services Although the use of the CDSA is preferred the present invention is not limited to such and can be used in conjunction with other types of security architecture known in the art 0073 One skilled in the art would appreciate that each of the computing devices 10 can include any software and or hardware components typically found in conventional com puting devices such as processors user input devices e g keyboard keypad mouse optical pen microphone etc user input device adapters a display device a display device adapter audio output device a network interface e g modem etc operating systems etc The Web browser 22 is any browser application known in the art such as Microsoft Internet Explorer Netscape Navigator etc The word processor application 23 is any word processor appli cation known in the art e g MS Word Corel s WordPer fect etc The other application s 24 can be any other applications
47. es the entire URI string first If no matches are found then the beginning portions or other predetermined portions of the URI may be searched For example if the URI of www ibm com shop ping thinkpad my_order html is searched and no hits are found for this URI then the system may be configured to look for an entry that matches just www ibm com shop ping or www ibm com 0111 In another embodiment each field value that is suggested to the user for selection is visibly identified for the user so that the user knows the identity of the field to which it pertains For example suggested address values for the address field might be identified to the user as follows 0112 ADDRESS PERSONAL ROLE 1000 J Hind Street Durham N C 12345 0113 ADDRESS IBM EMPLOYEE ROLE P O Box 12195 Research Triangle Park N C 23232 0114 By labeling the suggested values appropriately the user is able to quickly recognize these values for what they are and the user s selection process can be facilitated significantly 0115 still another embodiment the meta data tions can be stored in the local databases 15 in encrypted form and can only be accessed if the user supplies proper credentials such as a user ID and password biometric identification etc This can be implemented using the secu rity functions provided by the CDSA 30 or by adding encryption plug in as a new service provider module to the
48. essible through a predetermined connection means
49. ext of the page i e URI of the page role of the user etc For instance the user may prefer to view a particular page in a larger font size than other pages or to view all pages in the same predetermined settings when the user functions in a particular role e g as an IBM employee 0097 In this context Step S122 when a particular web page needs to be displayed to the user 2 in response to the user s request it is determined if the user s meta data collection includes any page display setting data that would be most appropriate for the current context of displaying the particular web page This determination can be made by performing the search operation of the Retrieval interface 18 based on the current context of the particular web page as discussed above For instance the Retrieval interface 18 may search the user s meta data collection to locate display setting data application data associated with con text data that approximately matches the current context of the particular web page according to certain search require ments If multiple application data sets are found which is likely the statistical information is relied upon to select an application data set from the multiple application data sets that is most frequently used by the user in a context most closely representing the current context 0098 If the determination result at Step 5122 is yes then the most appropriate page dis
50. f FIG 5 are applicable to displaying files e g word processor files graphics files etc where the context data may identify the names of the files user roles etc 0100 FIG 9 illustrates another application of Steps S45 and S46 in FIG 6 in the context of filling in a computer form according to one embodiment of the present invention As shown in FIG 9 in Step 5152 when a particular web page containing one or more forms needs to be displayed to the user e g in response to the user s request then the Retrieval interface 18 of the computing device 10A deter mines if the user s meta data collection includes any field values that would be most appropriate for the current context of filling in this particular form This determination is made based the results of a heuristics search operation performed by the HAPI 14 based on the current context of the particular form as discussed above If the determination result at Step 5152 is yes then in Step 5154 the located field values are retrieved from the local databases 15 by the Retrieval interface 18 Then in Step 5156 the Retrieval interface 18 further searches the local databases 15 and retrieves from the local databases 15 any other field values if available that may be related to the current context of the form so that they can be used as alternative field values possibly usable to fill the fields of the current form For example the statistical info
51. fills the computer form with said most appropriate meta data 73 The system of claim 65 wherein if the current context is for filling in a computer form the data repository module retrieves from the meta data collection alternative meta data that are related to the current context of filling in the computer form and transmits the alternative meta data to said appropriate one of the applications which in turn presents the alternative meta data to the user for the user s consideration 74 The system of claim 65 wherein the current context is for filling in a password changing computer form and the retrieved meta data includes a user identification and a password and wherein the data repository module controls said appropriate one of the applications to present to the user the password in an obfuscated format determines whether it is safe to present the actual password to the user and controls said appropriate one of the applications to present the actual password in a non obfuscated format when it is determined to be safe to present the actual password 75 The system of claim 58 wherein the data repository module formulates search requirements based on a current context of using the computing device and executes a search based on the search requirements using the heuristics algo rithms 76 system of claim 75 wherein the search require ments specify weighted properties of the current context of using the computing devic
52. for example a computer a work station a mobile web pad a PDA Personal Digital Assistant a mobile telephone or any other communication device capable of carrying out functions discussed below computing devices 10 can be located at different places e g one at the user s home another one at the user s office or can be publicly shared devices such as library computers The servers 50a 50b are conventional servers or other means for providing and maintaining websites US 2003 0135507 1 0036 central repository subsystem 60 comprises a communication interface 62 for allowing the subsystem 60 to communicate with external sources such as the computing devices 10 and the servers 50 a central repository including one or more central databases 66 for storing encrypted segments in collection order for each of the different users in the system 100 and a central repository manager 64 for managing the central databases 66 all operatively coupled 0037 Ina preferred embodiment of the present invention the central repository is accessed via known Web based Distributed Authoring and Versioning WebDAV proto cols and supports the ordered collections and locking features of the WebDAV protocols known in the art As known WebDAV is an extension to the HTTP 1 1 protocol see e g http Awww ics uci edu pub ietf webdav intro webdav intro pdf and is implemented by a wide range of commercial repository
53. he computing device 10A collects the meta data sets as the user uses the application s 22 24 and or the meta data editor 25 as discussed above The collected meta data is used to create a meta data collection for the user which is then transmitted to the central repository as the user s first segment 0094 FIG 7 is a flowchart illustrating certain encryption and transmission substeps of Step S60 of FIG 4 according to one embodiment of the present invention As shown in FIG 7 in Step S62 at the end of the user session or at certain check points or determined intervals the central database manager 17 temporarily locks the local database 15 and creates a segment of logged changes corresponding to the collected meta data Then the encrypt decrypt plug in 19 encrypts the new segment using the encryption key which US 2003 0135507 1 may be represented by a hash of the segment identifier in combination with the user s pass phrase as discussed above Then in Step S63 the identifier for this encrypted segment e g the segment name is stored in the local databases 15 so that this information can be used to determine when the last update occurred 0095 Step S64 the encrypted segment is then trans mitted from the computing device 10A to the central reposi tory subsystem 60 through the communications network Then the central database manager 17 resets its internal log file and unlocks the local database 15 In Step S65 the c
54. he user has proper authority to access the central repository if the authentication information is verified as valid 60 The system of claim 59 wherein the authentication information includes user identification a pass phrase of the user and an identifier for the central repository or a com ponent at the central repository subsystem 61 The system of claim 59 wherein the central repository subsystem determines a secret key represented as a hash of the received user identification concatenated with a hash of the received identifier encrypted with the received pass Jul 17 2003 phrase and compares the secret key with a stored key associated with the user to verify the user s authentication information 62 The system of claim 58 wherein the data repository module determines if the local repository is at a null state transmits a first request to the central repository subsystem to transmit any segment associated with the user that has not been applied to the computing device if the local repository is not at a null state and transmits a second request to the central repository subsystem to transmit all segments asso ciated with the user if the local repository is at a null state 63 The system of claim 62 wherein the encryption decryption module receives at least one segment from the central repository subsystem in response to said first request and decrypts the at least one segment and wherein the data repository module applie
55. hen the user must manually change the display settings at which time all subsequent web pages will be displayed according to the newly set display settings Thus the conventional Web browsers require the user to manually change the web page settings at each desired instance This can be tedious and time consuming to the user and negatively affects the Web browsing experience of the user 0008 Another problem not addressed by conventional meta data management systems is that the conventional systems are not configured to recognize different meta data associated with different roles of a user For instance the user may function as an IBM employee an association representative or a private citizen personal use when ordering products online from a particular online vendor Depending on the user role the user utilizes different meta data such as different user ID and password mailing address payment information etc However regardless of the current user role the conventional Web browsers always supply the last used meta data when filling in forms which is often inappropriate for the current user role 0009 Another problem with conventional systems is that the conventional system does not recognize relationships between data fields of forms and pages so that the field values are often used out of context For instance an online order form may request a home address comprising four related data fields namely street name city st
56. igh level searches to encompass different US 2003 0135507 1 variations of identified search requirements according to known search techniques and rules For instance there exist a variety of different search rules that can be applied to perform searches and the Retrieval interface 18 is config ured to apply these search rules appropriately or according to certain criteria to improve the search process Examples of such search rules may include but are not limited to Case Independent Rule for disregarding the case upper case or lower case of search terms and data being searched Sounds Like Rule for automatically including terms that sound like the search terms but are spelled differently URL Match Rule for considering any URL having at least a portion of the search term or any URL having a portion that matches the search term etc The Retrieval interface 18 can be configured so that certain search rules can be selec tively applied to certain situations 0066 Overall the Retrieval interface 18 searches and retrieves from the user s meta data collection certain appli cation data suitable for use in the current context of using the applications 22 24 to enhance the experience of the user in using the applications 22 24 whether it be browsing the Web performing word processing tasks filling out com puter forms performing online transactions or any other computer based activities that can benefit from automation
57. ing by the computing device the meta data collection during a current user session at the computing device to assist the user in using the computing device 100 50a 60 CENTRAL REPOSITORY SUBSYSTEM COMMUNICATION INTERFACE CENTRAL REP MANAGER CENTRAL DATABASE S 5 2003 0135507 1 Jul 17 2003 Sheet 1 of 10 Patent Application Publication gos H3JAHJIS INILAGNOD S asvaviva TYYLINI NOLLVOINnWAOOS dau TVH LN3O V ONILAdWOS WALSASENS AHOLISOd3 IWAYLNAD V H3AH3S 001 VOL I OL 5 2003 0135507 1 Jul 17 2003 Sheet 2 of 10 Patent Application Publication 292 Sc epz C a JI 200 ec 204 10 got VOL JONN Suoneoiunujulo JojeJo ooo IND peufis peyueA JOjeJo o20V IND peuueA 2 V IND peu6is 205592019 NOILVOl lddV v IND peufis JeswoJg NOILVOMddV ul Bnjd doug 55920 9 PUNEN sjeseqered onsunoH 201 JeDeueyy 5 geq Patent Application Publication Jul 17 2003
58. ing data will be collected as appli cation data in association with corresponding context data e g URI of the page current user role In still another example if the currently active application is the word processor 23 and the user sets specific display settings or some other properties for the particular document file that the user is working on then the Remember interface 16 collects in the databases 15 these settings or parameters together with corresponding context data which may include the file name user role or some other identifier of the file user 0060 computing device 10A maintains in the local repository one or more meta data collections each assigned to a particular user The current s user s meta data collection i e data stored in the local databases 15 for the current user is updated at the beginning of the current user s session at the computing device 10A In one embodiment the meta data in the meta data collection are represented by a plurality of key value pairs A key represents a particular property and a key value represents a value assigned to the property For instance URL www ibm com indicates that a value of www ibm com is assigned to the property URL For each instance when the Remember interface 16 collects the meta data for a user session at the computing device the meta data in the meta data collection is organized into a plurality of meta data sets whe
59. insertion into forms It would also be desirable to enable a user to customize a number of different display settings for each different web site page file and or user role and to provide some means for implementing such display settings appropriately depending on the requested website page file and or user role 0013 Finally another unmet need of the conventional systems is the ability to securely access meta data from multiple computing devices e g from a user s office desk top home PC mobile web pad and perhaps a web appliance at a local Internet caf This should be done in a fashion that minimizes network traffic without compromising security And it would be cost effective to implement such a system using at least a portion of the existing protocols and stan dards if this is possible The new system will improve greatly the mobility of the user since the user will be able to switch between multiple computing devices at different locations to access and use meta data SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION 0014 present invention provides a system and method for managing and securing meta data using a central repository which overcomes problems associated with con ventional meta data management systems and which satisfy the above described needs of the conventional systems The system of the present invention provides an innovative and sophisticated approach for assisting the user with applica tion based activities such a
60. known in the art such as spreadsheets photo editors finance programs graphics programs etc 0074 Now one example of a meta data organization usable by the Remember interface 16 of the HAPI 14 will be discussed in more detail referring to FIGS 3A and 3B FIG 3A shows an example of a computer form usable in the present invention and FIG 3B shows examples of key value pairs obtainable from the computer form of FIG according to one embodiment of the present invention As shown in FIG 3A assume that a computer form 40 to be filled by a user is presented to the user on the device 10A computer form 40 includes at least two fields 41 and 42 and a Submit button 43 for sending the completed form to an appropriate receiving party The first field 41 is for entering the user ID and the second field 42 is for entering the pass code The form 40 has the URL of http www ib m com 0075 Given the form 40 the Remember interface 16 may collect meta data from the form 40 which are repre sented as a plurality of key value pairs of the user s meta data collection as shown in FIG 3B Particularly for each of the data fields 41 and 42 a meta data group is established wherein the plurality of meta data groups constitute a meta data set Each meta data group includes application data in US 2003 0135507 1 this case a field value and context data associated with that value For instance for the user ID
61. laim 10 wherein the current context is for filling in a computer form and the applying step includes automatically filling in the computer form with said most appropriate meta data 18 The method of claim 10 wherein if the current context is for filling in a computer form the utilizing step further includes retrieving from the meta data collection alternative meta data that are related to the current context of filling in the computer form and presenting the alternative meta data to the user for the user s consideration 19 The method of claim 10 wherein the current context is for filling in a password changing computer form and the retrieved meta data includes a user identification and a password and wherein the applying step includes presenting to the user the password in an obfuscated format US 2003 0135507 1 determining whether it is safe to present the actual pass word to the user and presenting the actual password in a non obfuscated format when it is determined to be safe to present the actual password 20 The method of claim 1 wherein the utilizing step includes formulating search requirements based on a current con text of using the computing device and executing a search based on the search requirements using the heuristics algorithms 21 The method of claim 20 wherein the search require ments specify weighted properties of the current context of using the computing device 22 The
62. les of meta data can include but are not limited to web page setting parameters e g font font size background color window size etc user IDs and passwords and values entered into the data fields of computer forms such as online order forms Con ventional Web browsers such as Microsoft Internet Explorer offer limited meta data management features For example an auto complete function offered by Microsoft Internet Explorer manages meta data such as Web addresses pass words and contact information that the user enters into the data fields of computer forms Subsequently when the user begins to enter a value into a particular data field of a computer form previously processed by the user s browser the auto complete function provides a drop down list sug gesting possible values for that data field The user s selec tion of one of the suggested values triggers the browser to automatically fill in the data field with the selected value 0006 One popular feature of the auto complete function is the password assist feature for assisting the user in filling in passwords and user IDs For instance when the user enters a user ID and a password into the appropriate data fields of a computer form for the first time the auto complete function of the Web browser stores the user ID and password in association with the data fields identified by particular field names The user ID and password are typically stored in an encrypted
63. local databases 15 a local database manager 21 a central database manager 17 and a Heuristic access API HAPI 14 all operatively coupled The local database manager 21 manages the local databases 15 The central database manager 17 interacts with the local databases 15 and the central repository subsystem 60 via the communications network such as the Internet 52 0045 important aspect of this invention is that exist ing central repositories and their current communications protocols e g WebDAV can be used without requiring modifications as long as they are configured to allow the central database manager 17 to save retrieve list and or delete data units also referred to herein as segments via their respective communications protocols 0046 At the start of each user session at a computing device the central database manager 17 requests the user to input connection information that will allow the central database manager 17 to connect via the communications network to the central repository and to input pass phrase e g BobsLongStringOfLettersAndNumbers which is used to derive keys that will be used to decrypt encrypt segments in the central repository and or the local database s 15 In the preferred embodiment the connec tion information needed to connect with the central reposi tory includes 1 the network name of the server holding the central repository e g www myrepository com 2
64. ne embodiment of the present invention 0032 FIG 9 is a flowchart illustrating the processing steps of Steps S45 and S46 in FIG 6 in the context of filling in forms according to one embodiment of the present invention 0033 FIG 10 is a flowchart illustrating the processing steps of Steps S45 and S46 in FIG 6 in the context of changing passwords according to one embodiment of the present invention DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS 0034 In the drawings the same reference numerals are used to indicate the same elements The term repository generally means one or more databases but can include other storage means for storing data and information 0035 FIG 1 is a diagram of a system 100 for managing and securing meta data using a central repository according to one embodiment of the present invention As shown in FIG 1 the system 100 includes a plurality of different computing devices 10A 10B and 10C collectively 10 accessible by one or more users and a central repository subsystem 60 all operatively coupled The computing devices 10 are capable of communicating with the central repository subsystem 60 and with a plurality of different servers 50a and 50b collectively 50 through a communi cations network such as the Internet 52 The central reposi tory subsystem 60 is also capable of communicating with the servers 50 through the communications network Each of the computing devices 10 can be
65. ng further include computer executable instructions for continuously collecting meta data resulting from use of the computing device during the current user session at the computing device and the method further com prises computer executable instructions for generating a new segment based on the collected meta data upon completion of the current user session and processing the new segment 40 The computer program product of claim 39 wherein the computer executable instructions for processing include computer executable instructions for updating the meta data collection with the new segment if said meta data collection exists in the local repository and storing the new segment in the local repository as a meta data collection for the user if said meta data collection does not exist in the local repository 41 The computer program product of claim 39 wherein the meta data includes application data for being usable in an application executable on the computing device and context data for identifying context in which said application data are used and wherein the computer executable instructions for utilizing further include computer executable instruc tions for determining statistical information associated with the meta data the statistical information indicating rela tionships between the meta data wherein the computer executable instructions for retrieving are performed in part based on the statistical information
66. ns into the CDSA 30 is known in the art More detailed operations and functions of the service provider modules and the CSSM API as well as the overall architecture of the CDSA 30 can be found at the website of http developer intel com ial security 0041 Each of the applications 22 24 and the meta data editor 25 is configured to interact with the CDSA 30 In this regard each of the applications 22 24 and the meta data editor 25 includes a Graphical User Interface GUI accel erator 22a 23a 24a or 25a for accelerating or facilitating the display and user interface operations of the application and the editor These GUI accelerators 22 25 are known in the art and as is well known may require some hardware to implement the functions Through the GUI accelerators 22a 25a or any other designated component of the applica tions 22 24 the applications 22 24 and the editor 25 access the security based services provided by the CDSA 30 For instance the GUI accelerator 22a of the Web browser 22 communicates with the CSSM API of the CDSA 30 accord ing to existing techniques to access any one of the security based services provided by the service provider modules such as CSP module TP module etc whenever it is necessary In one example if a particular web page received by the Web browser 22 requires decryption then the Web browser 22 communicates via the GUI accelerator 22a with the CSSM API to utilize the decryption service off
67. omatically filled into the fields of the computer form would be searched and retrieved from the user s meta data collection The retrieved meta data would then be automati cally filled into the fields of the computer form 0018 In the meta data collection all the meta data that are related to each other or used together in a particular context are associated together This permits the system to recognize and consider relationships between the meta data when accessing the stored meta data In addition the system maintains statistical information indicating how frequently certain meta data have been used together in a particular context The system relies on the statistical information during its search and retrieval operation 0019 More specifically the computing device performs sophisticated search and retrieval operations on the local repository to utilize the user s meta data collection to perform automatically certain tasks for the user Since the meta data and the statistical information represent the user s past behaviors in using the applications whether it be filling in a computer form displaying a web page or file etc the system relies on this prior use information to anticipate the likely behavior of the user during a current use of the US 2003 0135507 1 application and retrieves from the meta data collection certain meta data that would be most appropriate for the current context of using the application This process
68. onse to said first requesting instruc tions decrypting the at least one segment and applying the decrypted at least one segment to the meta data collection to produce the meta data collection associated with the user 36 The computer program product of claim 34 wherein the computer executable instructions for updating further include computer executable instructions for receiving at least one segment from the central repository subsystem in response to said second requesting instructions US 2003 0135507 1 decrypting the at least one segment and generating the meta data collection for the user using the decrypted at least one segment 37 computer program product of claim 28 wherein the computer executable instructions for utilizing include computer executable instructions for retrieving using heuristics algorithms from the meta data collection meta data that would be most appropriate for a current context of using the computing device and applying the retrieved meta data in the current context 38 The computer program product of claim 37 wherein the current context includes at least one of the following opening a web page filling in a computer form filling in a password changing form providing a certificate opening a computer file processing a computer file or executing an application program 39 The computer program product of claim 37 wherein the computer executable instructions for utilizi
69. ormation 0057 using the encryption key which is based on a combination of the user information and the segment iden tifying information the security of the system 100 can be improved significantly because both pieces of information will be needed to decrypt or access the segments Further even if an unauthorized person e g a hacker is able to access one segment the unauthorized person is not able to access other segments because it requires knowledge of the names identifiers of the other segments Thus the present invention provides a meta data management system with enhanced security 0058 the operation of the HAPI 14 in the data repository plug in 20 will be described The HAPI 14 includes a Remember interface 16 and a Retrieval interface 18 all operatively coupled The Remember interface 16 communicates with any active application 22 23 or 24 and or the editor 25 through the CDSA 30 and thereby collects meta data during the user session as a log of modifications add change delete Meta data includes application data and context data Application data is any data that is directly used in or by the application e g form data values entered into the fields of computer forms user ID and password combinations PKI certificates private key pairs user preference data including bookmarks and display setting data including web page display setting data and file display setting data etc Context da
70. play setting data are Jul 17 2003 retrieved from the local repository by the Retrieval inter face 18 in Step S124 Then in Step 126 the retrieved page display setting data are applied during the displaying process to display the current web page according to the retrieved data To accomplish this the Retrieval interface 18 sends the retrieved page display setting data to the Web browser 22 through the CDSA 30 and the browser 22 displays the current page using the retrieval display setting data On the other hand at Step 5122 if it is determined that there is no page display setting data that would be most appropriate for the current context of displaying the page then the Web browser 22 at Step S130 is configured to display the cur rently requested page using default settings or other prede termined settings and this process ends 0099 Accordingly the present invention renders auto matically different web pages according to different render ing settings that are preferred or likely preferred by the user This feature enhances the Web browsing experience of the user significantly One skilled in the art would readily appreciate that the processing steps of FIG 8 are not limited to Web page display operations but are applicable to any output operations For example the steps of FIG 8 are applicable to providing differential settings for the speech synthesis rendering of a web page In another example the steps o
71. rd and wherein the computer executable instructions for applying include computer executable instructions for presenting to the user the password in an obfuscated format determining whether it is safe to present the actual pass word to the user and presenting the actual password in a non obfuscated format when it is determined to be safe to present the actual password 47 The computer program product of claim 28 wherein the computer executable instructions for utilizing include computer executable instructions for formulating search requirements based on a current con text of using the computing device and executing a search based on the search requirements using the heuristics algorithms 48 The computer program product of claim 47 wherein the search requirements specify weighted properties of the current context of using the computing device 49 The computer program product of claim 28 further comprising computer executable instructions for providing a graphical user interface GUI for allowing the user to organize the meta data collection 50 The computer program product of claim 49 wherein the GUI displays a graphical tool in a cylindrical configu ration for organizing the meta data collection 51 The computer program product of claim 29 wherein the computer executable instructions for uploading include computer executable instructions for temporarily locking the local repository encrypting the new
72. rein all the data belonging to asingle meta data set will be related to each other Each meta data set comprises a plurality of meta data groups each group being composed of a plurality of key key value pairs representing application data and context data associated with the application data This data organization allows the local databases 15 to be searched based on context data e g a combination of URI file name and user role And with equal importance this data organization allows related meta data to be associated with each other so that relationships between the meta data may be considered whenever an access to the user s meta data collection is desired A more detailed discussion of this data organization will be provided below in connection with FIGS 3A and 3B 0061 In addition to collecting meta data for each user the Remember interface 16 keeps track of the user s use of meta data and stores this information in the databases 15 This information referred to herein as statistical informa tion contains statistics representing the past behavior of the user in using the applications 22 24 and or editor 25 The statistical information can be included as part of the context data if desired It is important to note that this statistical information is updated upon each use of the application 22 24 and or the editor 25 so that the statistical information reflects the user s usage patterns across multiple remem b
73. repository subsystem based on user input Then the central repository subsystem transmits any segment s that are currently stored in the central repository for the user but have not been applied to the computing device in association with the user Each segment carries meta data generated during a user session which is represented as logged changes from previous contents in the collection order The computing device receives these segments if available from the central repository subsystem decrypts them and applies them to a local repository 1 to the user s meta data collection stored in the local repository of the computing device This process updates the user s meta data collection at the com puting device to be consistent with the user s segments stored in the central repository 0017 Then the computing device utilizes the updated meta data collection to assist the user in using applications e g Web browser word processor etc during the current user session at the computing device To accomplish this the computing device is configured to interact with the appli cations currently active on the computing device and to heuristically search and retrieve certain meta data from the user s meta data collection that would be most appropriate for use in the current context of using the applications For instance if the Web browser is currently being used to fill a computer form then meta data field values that can be aut
74. rily locks the local database creates a segment based on the collected meta data in logged changes encrypts the segment with an encryption key transmits the encrypted segment to the central reposi tory for storage resets its internal log file for future logging and then unlocks the local database The encryption key may be formulated based on the user s pass phrase and the identifier of the new segment In this manner meta data generated from different computing devices can be collected in sequence and stored at a central location to be down loaded subsequently to the next computing device that the user desires to use 0022 Accordingly all the meta data produced from dif ferent computing devices are deposited in order as encrypted segments at a central location and are subsequently down loadable from any one of the computing devices The use of encrypted segments logged changes minimizes network traffic and downloading time and improves the security of the system The present invention intelligently provides suggestions or implements changes to the current context of using computing device in a manner that the user would likely have chosen Thus the user need not manually effec tuate such changes for each different instance of using the computing device at a particular computing device whether it be filling in a computer form changing the display setting of a page file changing a password etc As a result the user can rea
75. rmation can be used to locate values that would be second most appropriate for the current context of the form or the first several most appropriate values offered in decreasing order of probability for the current context of the form 0101 Then in Step S158 all the fields of the current form are automatically and simultaneously filled in with the most appropriate field values retrieved in Step S154 e g under control of the Web browser 22 At the same time the alternative is field values retrieved in Step 5156 may also be displayed to the user for the user s consideration This can be accomplished under control of the meta data editor 25 For example for each field on the current form a drop down list a pop up window or a graphical data cylinder displaying the alternative field values may appear on the user s screen US 2003 0135507 1 so that the user can select if desired one of the alternative field values for the particular field In this manner the user can either accept the field values that are automatically filled in or can select one of the alternative field values for the fields of the form In addition or as an alternative the user can manually enter the values into the form or modify the existing values 0102 the other hand if it is determined at Step S152 that the user s meta data collection does not include any field values that would be most appropriate for the current context of filling in the form
76. s filling in a computer form word processing a file requesting a website changing a password online etc The system collects meta data in association with the context in which such meta data are generated from multiple computing devices with the premise that the user uses only one of the computing devices at any given time and stores them at a central repository in the collection order Then from any one of the computing devices all meta data associated with the user can be downloaded from the central repository and heuristically exploited to assist the user with application based activities at that computing device The system provides mobility to Jul 17 2003 the user and greatly enhances the experience of the user in conducting application based activities at any one of the computing devices 0015 One of the main benefits of the present invention is that it utilizes existing central repositories and their com munication protocols WebDAV without requiring special code or changes to provide the advantageous features discussed below 0016 Particularly the system of the present invention comprises a plurality of different computing devices located at different places and a central repository subsystem acces sible from any one of the computing devices through a communications network such as the Internet At the start of user session at a particular computing device the com puting device connects to the central
77. s not need to remember multiple user IDs and passwords US 2003 0135507 1 this feature can have the unpleasant side effect of helping the user forget her user IDs and passwords since the browser automatically fills the user ID password fields in most cases Further when a password requesting form has a field name which is different from the stored field name associated with the password the auto complete function fails to recognize this field and the user will need to manually enter the password into the field Furthermore when a password changing form includes a field for entering the old password which often has a field name unrecognized by the browser the auto complete function will not supply the old password and the user will need to enter it manually But since the user is so used to the browser automatically filling in the passwords the user typically fails to recall the appropriate password which places the user in problematic situations 0012 addition to the above described problems asso ciated with conventional meta data management systems there are other needs that are unmet by the conventional systems For example it would be desirable to have some means by which a user can inspect edit and or organize stored meta data both online and offline It would also be desirable to have some means to intelligently search for certain meta data from a pool of stored meta data and to be able to select certain meta data for
78. s the decrypted at least one segment to the meta data collection to produce the meta data collec tion associated with the user 64 The system of claim 62 wherein the encryption decryption module receives at least one segment from the central repository subsystem in response to said second request and decrypts the at least one segment and wherein the data repository module generates the meta data collec tion for the user using the decrypted at least one segment 65 The system of claim 58 wherein the data repository module retrieves using heuristics algorithms from the meta data collection meta data that would be most appropriate for a current context of using the computing device and trans mits the retrieved meta data to an appropriate one of the applications which in turn applies the retrieved meta data in the current context 66 The system of claim 65 wherein the current context includes at least one of the following opening a web page filling in a computer form filling in a password changing form providing a certificate opening a computer file pro cessing a computer file or executing an application pro gram 67 The system of claim 65 wherein the data repository module continuously collects meta data resulting from use of the computing device during the current user session at the computing device and generates a new segment based on the collected meta data upon completion of the current user session 68 The system
79. se this is the use s first session then the process ends because no local repository updating is needed or possible 0090 However if the central repository subsystem 60 determines at Step S27 that there is at least one segment Jul 17 2003 stored in the central databases 66 for the user then in Step S28 all available segments logged changes in collection order for the user are transmitted from the central repository subsystem 60 to the computing device 10A via the commu nications network These segments will have been encrypted Then in Step S29 the received encrypted seg ments are decrypted by the encrypt decrypt plug in 19 In Step S30 the central database manager 17 builds up a meta data collection for the user using the decrypted segments and stores it in the local databases 15 in association with the user building up of the meta data collection may involve using the first segment as the starting meta data collection and applying subsequent segments composed of logged add delete change transactions to the meta data collection in the collection order Then the local database updating process ends 0091 FIG 6 is a flowchart illustrating the processing steps implementable as Step S40 of FIG 4 according to one embodiment of the present invention As shown in FIG 6 once the local database updating process is completed at the start of the current user session at the computing device 10A the central database manag
80. sed on the collected meta data upon completion of the current user session and processing the new segment 13 The method of claim 12 wherein the processing step includes updating the meta data collection with the new segment if said meta data collection exists in the local repository and storing the new segment in the local repository as a meta data collection for the user if said meta data collection does not exist in the local repository 14 The method of claim 12 wherein the meta data includes application data for being usable in an application executable on the computing device and context data for identifying context in which said application data are used and wherein the utilizing step further includes determining statistical information associated with the meta data the statistical information indicating rela tionships between the meta data wherein the retrieving step is performed in part based on the statistical infor mation 15 The method of claim 14 wherein the context data identify at least one of the following user roles uniform resource identifiers URIs file names and or form names pertaining to the application data 16 The method of claim 14 wherein the application data include at least one of the following page display setting data file display setting data user ID password combina tions field values for computer forms user s preference data bookmarks and certificates 17 The method of c
81. segment using an encryption key transmitting the encrypted new segment from the com puting device to the central repository subsystem for storage in the central repository and unlocking the local depository 52 The computer program product of claim 51 wherein the encryption key is represented as a hash of identifying information associated with the new segment concatenated with a pass phrase of the user 53 The computer program product of claim 28 wherein the computing device is configured in Common Data Secu US 2003 0135507 1 rity Architecture CDSA and the computer executable instructions for utilizing are performed by an add on module to the CDSA configuration 54 The computer program product of claim 28 wherein the central repository subsystem is implemented using Web DAV protocols 55 A system for managing meta data in a secure manner the system comprising a central repository subsystem including a central reposi tory for storing a plurality of segments associated with a user in a collection order and at least one computing device capable of communicating with the central repository subsystem through a com munications network the computing device including a local repository and being capable of connecting through the communications network to the central repository based on a user input updating the local repository with at least one of the segments from the central repository to produce a meta dat
82. ta is any data that identifies the context in which the application data is used The context data may include but are not limited to field names identifying the fields of forms files URLs of forms file names roles identifying the role in which the user functions in producing the application data statistical infor mation etc The display setting data may include but are not limited to font font size background color language encoding window screen size whether to open the window file with a new process or the existing process security settings etc 0059 In one example if the user has filled out a computer form using Web browser 22 and sent it to a receiving party by pressing a submit button the Remember interface 16 obtains form data all the values entered by the user into the data fields of this computer form and collects it in the databases 15 as application data The Remember interface 16 also collects context data associated with the form data The context data may identify the names of the fields of the form URL of the form current user role e g as a private citizen an IBM employee etc and any other property identifying the context of this computer form In another example if the user makes modifications to the display setting of the currently displayed web page new display setting data e g modifications from default setting data or US 2003 0135507 1 entire new display sett
83. there are multiple certificates public keys that satisfy this criterion then the system is configured to display to the user these certificates public keys by name in a pop up window a pull down list or some other manner along with their associated context data e g user role URI One of the certificates public keys that is most likely to match the current situation of the user may be highlighted or distin guished from other certificates public keys in some manner The user can then view the certificates public keys accept or reject the certificate public key if there is only one or select one certificate public key if there are multiple to be used for the SSL handshake The user is also able to set criteria by which the system operates in connection with the certificate public key selection For instance the user can indicate to the system whether a default certificate public key should be selected based on the role without further consultation with the user or whether the user prefers to always be prompted when a default certificate public key has to be used 0117 In another example when a server requests a cookie from the browser 22 the HAPI 14 can be configured to retrieve the user s cookie based on the current role of the user e g as an individual and as a result the browser will return the user s cookie that is appropriate for the current context 0118 local databases 15 are organized hierarchically using
84. tion is verified as valid 32 The computer program product of claim 31 wherein the authentication information includes user identification a pass phrase of the user and an identifier for the central repository or a component at the central repository sub system 33 The computer program product of claim 32 wherein the computer executable instructions for verifying include computer executable instructions for determining a secret key represented as a hash of the received user identification concatenated with a hash of the received identifier encrypted with the received pass phrase and comparing the secret key with a stored key associated with the user 34 The computer program product of claim 28 wherein the computer executable instructions for updating include computer executable instructions for determining if the local repository is at a null state first requesting the central repository subsystem to trans mit any segment associated with the user that has not been applied to the computing device if the local repository is not at a null state and second requesting the central repository subsystem to transmit all segments associated with the user if the local repository is at a null state 35 The computer program product of claim 34 wherein the computer executable instructions for updating further include computer executable instructions for receiving at least one segment from the central repository subsystem in resp
85. twork the computer program product comprising computer executable instructions for connecting through the communications network to the central repository based on a user input updating a local repository of the computing device with at least one segment from the central repository that is associated with the user to produce a meta data collec tion associated with the user and utilizing by the computing device the meta data collec tion during a current user session at the computing device to assist the user in using the computing device 29 The computer program product of claim 28 further comprising computer executable instructions for Jul 17 2003 uploading any new segment from the computing device to the central repository at a predetermined time 30 The computer program product of claim 28 further comprising computer executable instructions for incrementally uploading any new meta data generated during the current user session from the computing device to the central repository 31 The computer program product of claim 28 wherein the computer executable instructions for connecting include computer executable instructions for receiving by the central repository subsystem authenti cation information from the user verifying validity of the authentication information and notifying the computing device that the user has proper authority to access the central repository if the authen tication informa
86. uld be triggered at that instance of using the browser 22 The search operation entails searching the local databases 15 to provide most appropriate meta data ie application data that can be used in a particular instance of using the currently active application The retrieving operation entails retrieving the located meta data from the local databases 15 and supplying them to the active application 22 24 and or the editor 25 The search and retrieval operations will now be discussed in more detail 0063 search operation of the Retrieval interface 18 is accomplished using existing heuristics algorithms Heuristics algorithms are well known computer imple mented methods of iteratively solving problems based on prior usage data In the present invention the search opera tion relies on the stored context data and the statistical information to locate using iterations values application data that would be most appropriate for use in a current context For instance just before the browser is about to display a particular online form to be filled by the user the Retrieval interface 18 searches for likely field values for the form based on the stored context data and the statistical information To accomplish this the Retrieval interface 18 evaluates data pertaining to the online form as transmitted by the form sender to determine the current context of the form e g field names of the form URI of the form form name

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