Using an abstract messaging interface and associated parsers to access standard document object models

摘要

A data processing apparatus has: a memory unit 402; a system software unit 401 including a plurality of parsers 401A, 401B, for implementing a Document Object Mode (DOM) application programming interface, including a unit for receiving documents from an originating application 11, 21 and a unit for processing received documents using one of the parsers in order to convert each received document into an object model; and a system software unit for storing each object model into the memory unit; where the unit for processing sends a received document to a particular one of the plurality of parsers depending on the format of the received document. This allows the DOM to accept documents in formats other than XML/HTML, e.g in COBOL.