METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR SERVER-INDEPENDENT CACHING OF DYNAMICALLY-GENERATED CUSTOMIZED PAGES

The invention is a method and apparatus for operating a client-server computer network such that a server computer dynacically generates and then stores customized pages requested from a client computer. Subsequent requests for previously generated customized pages are retrieved from a cache in the server computer. Since previously generated customized pages need not be re-generated, computational overhead is reduced. This functionality is achieved by transforming a file request into a customized file request. The customized includes the original file request and a selected attribute of a computer user,such as browser name, computer domain, or computer platform. When a customized file request cannot be matched to an existing file on the computer server, an error indication is generated. A customized page corresponding to the file request is created in response to the error indication.