System for communicating with servers using message definitions

A method in a computer system for communicating with servers using different communications procedures, the method comprising:

• for each server, providing message definitions defining the communications procedure for the server, each message definition defining an HTTP-request message to be sent to the server;
• and
• when communications with a server is to occur,
• retrieving the provided message definitions for that server;
• and
• sending an HTTP-request message to the server in accordance with the retrieved message definitions.

A computer-readable medium containing a data structure comprising:

• an authorization element specifying a form and an http element and having a domain attribute;
• a form element specifying a post and a get element;
• a get element specifying a name attribute and a url attribute;
• a post element specifying a name attribute, a url attribute, and a data attribute;
• and
• an http element that specifies a scheme attribute and a realm attribute.

A computer-readable medium containing instructions for controlling a computer system to communicate with servers using different communications procedures, by a method comprising:

• for each server, providing one or more message definitions defining the communications procedure for the server, each message definition defining a request message to be sent to the server;
• and
• when communications with a server is to occur,
• retrieving the provided message definitions for that server;
• and
• sending a request message to the server in accordance with the retrieved message definitions.

A computer-readable medium containing a data structure for specifying a sequence of messages defining a communications procedure for a domain, the data structure comprising:

• an identification of the domain;
• and
• a plurality of message definitions, each message definition specifying a request message, the message definition for a request message specifying a uniform resource identifier and specifying a name
• wherein the communications with the domain occurs by sending messages in accordance with the message definitions.