Patent attributes
Methods and apparatuses for efficiently accessing and downloading web pages on high-latency communication networks are provided. After a user requests a web page, the web page is retrieved from a web server, image portions of the web page are separated from non-image portions, and an image-free web page comprising the non-image portions of the original web page is prepared such that the images of the original web page are replaced in the image-free web page by correspondingly sized and positioned placeholders. Additionally, an image including the non-image portions of the original web page is created such that the non-image portions are made transparent, and the original images are grouped into a single composite image while maintaining their positions and sizes. The image-free page and the image are then superimposed to form an optimised web page suitable for downloading to a user.
