Interactive Data Sharing Mechanism for Widget-based Microsites
Name
Allar Tammik
Abstract
Nowadays it is very common that modern web sites exchange content between each other
by means of syndication and aggregation. This is enabled through APIs, protocols, tools
and platforms. The recent trend in content processing is advancing towards more extensive
use of widgets along with static content. Although web sites usually use widgets to provide
added value to their users, simpler web sites like microsites can be built entirely from
widgets. Such kinds of widgets are usually stateless, but not necessarily autonomous. In
particular they may also be able to communicate with other components in the same web
application, including microsites, which are the key focus of this thesis. Because of the
loose coupling, the widgets themselves are not able to capture the state of the microsite,
whereas the microsite itself usually does not have a mechanism for storing its state.
However, messages exchanged during communication, determine the state of the
microsite.
This thesis describes a solution for storing and sharing the state of a microsite by record-
and-replay mechanism for messages exchanged by widgets of microsites. Furthermore, the
mechanism also allows sharing the stored state of a microsite between friends via social
networks. The latter enables user-initiated inter-application content delivery and state
exchange, which has been possible so far only between tightly integrated applications.
Graduation Thesis language
English
Graduation Thesis type
Master - Computer Science
Supervisor(s)
Peep Küngas
Defence year
2011