Abstract: Fast creation of custom web portals is permitted by parsing targeted web pages into nested tables, and then selecting which table is to be a portlet in the custom portal. A parser controller and associated JavaScript parser execute all encountered JavaScript statements and replace them with results, making the resultant portlet images easier to parse and manipulate. The provided software produces portlets having several window-like capabilities, including minimizing and maximizing portlets, tiling or superimposing portlets, and dragging and dropping them to any user-selected location on the custom portal page. The user can preselect refresh rates. The portlets can be of pane, link or form varieties. The user also has the option of using portlets whose characteristics are stored in a repository by a network administrator. The software resides on a server and the user/client only needs a browser to employ the invention.