Method and system for extending the capabilities of embedded devices through network clients

摘要

A method and system for extending the capabilities of resource-constrained embedded devices by leveraging the memory and processing resources of clients such as web browsers (“clients”) installed on host computational devices (“host computers”). The embedded device delegates computational tasks such as generation of content (e.g., user interfaces, reports, configuration files, etc.) to clients and acts as a simple file and data server. The embedded device provides static resource files to each client, including static template files and a client processing engine. The client processing engine: interprets processing instructions contained in static template files; utilizes managed communication channels to exchange dynamic data sets with the embedded device in real-time; generates various forms of content by processing, transforming, manipulating, and aggregating dynamic data sets and static resource files; and reads and writes arbitrarily large files from and to the host computer, overcoming resource limitations of the embedded device.

主权项

1. A method for enabling an embedded device to work in concert with a client on a host computer, to access content of a file, comprising the steps of:
selecting a file accessible to the host computer, but not directly accessible to the client, at the client; establishing a communication link between the client and the embedded device; sending a portion of the file from the client to the embedded device of a size that fits within the resource limitations of the embedded device, which then returns the portion to the client; adding the portion of the file returned by the embedded device to any previous portions received at the client; and repeating the previous sending and adding steps until the file has been completely reconstructed at the client; wherein the client accesses the reconstructed file as a proxy for the embedded device.