Application assignment reconciliation and license management

• US 10,015,279 B2
• Filed: 02/09/2015
• Issued: 07/03/2018
• Est. Priority Date: 11/13/2014
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Malikie Innovations Limited (Key Patent Innovations Limited)
• Original Assignee: Blackberry Limited
• Inventors: Smith, Andrew Christopher, Kheiri, Haseem Ul Haq, Wang, Qiusheng, Morley, Paul Douglas, Smith, Kelsey McKinnon
• Primary Examiner(s): Keller, Michael A
• Application Number:
  US14/617,623
• Publication Number:
  US 20160142511A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,240 Days
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/06 Buying, selling or leasing transactions
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/02 based on web technology, e.g. hypertext transfer protocol [HTTP]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/63 Routing a service request depending on the request content or context

Abstract

The present disclosure involves systems, software, and computer-implemented methods for reconciling application assignments of different types to users and devices, and associating appropriate licenses for the applications to the users from purchase accounts managed by an external application store. An example method includes identifying a change in an assignment configuration for a user, the assignment configuration including a plurality of assignments of an application to the user; determining a winning assignment from the plurality of assignments; in response to determining the winning assignment, determining that the winning assignment requires a change to an external application store; and in response to determining that the winning assignment requires a change to the external application store, instructing the external application store to perform a configuration change corresponding to the winning assignment.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method executed by one or more hardware processors of a device management server, the method comprising:

identifying, by the one or more hardware processors of the device management server, a new assignment of an application to a user using a new purchase account, wherein the new purchase account includes a first plurality of licenses for the application, and the user is associated with a device manager identifier associated with the device management server;

determining, by the one or more hardware processors of the device management server, that the user has been previously associated with the application by a previous assignment using a previous purchase account different than the new purchase account, wherein the previous purchase account includes a second plurality of licenses for the application, and the first plurality of licenses are different than the second plurality of licenses;

in response to determining that the user has been previously associated with the application, determining, by the one or more hardware processors of the device management server, that a new assignment type for the new assignment has a higher priority than a previous assignment type for the previous assignment, wherein each of the new assignment type and the previous assignment type includes a respective one of;

a device group assignment assigning the application to users associated with devices in a device group, a direct assignment assigning the application directly to the user, a user group assignment assigning the application to user groups including the user, or a global assignment assigning the application to all users managed by the device management server, wherein the device group assignment has a highest priority, the direct assignment has a second highest priority, the user group assignment has a third highest priority, and the global assignment has a fourth highest priority; and

in response to determining that the new assignment type has the higher priority than the previous assignment type;

transmitting a first instruction, from the one or more hardware processors of the device management server to an external application store, the first instruction instructing the external application store to disassociate a previous license for the application from the user, and the previous license selected from the second plurality of licenses for the application associated with the previous purchase account;

transmitting a second instruction, from the one or more hardware processors of the device management server to the external application store, the second instruction instructing the external application store to register a new application store identifier for the user, associate the new application store identifier with the device manager identifier for the user, and associate the new application store identifier with the new purchase account; and

after transmitting the second instruction, transmitting a third instruction, from the one or more hardware processors of the device management server to the external application store, the third instruction instructing the external application store to associate a new license with the user, and the new license selected from the first plurality of licenses for the application associated with the new purchase account.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the device group assignment includes criteria defining devices within the device group, the criteria including at least one of:

an operating system type, an operating system version, a device model, a device type, a minimum storage amount, a minimum processor speed, or a network connection type.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein instructing the external application store to associate the new license with the user is performed in response to the user requesting to download the application.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the new assignment and the previous assignment include a disposition attribute designating the application as mandatory or optional.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein instructing the external application store to disassociate the previous license and associate the new license are performed using a web services application programming interface (API) associated with the external application store.

6. The method of claim 1, further comprising generating an application catalog for presentation to the user including a new application.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein instructing the external application store to associate the new license with the user is performed in response to the user interacting with the application catalog to request to install the new application.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the new assignment is a first assignment, the new purchase account is a first purchase account, and the new license is a first license, the method further comprising:

after instructing the external application store to associate the new license with the user, and in response to determining that a second assignment of the application to the user is associated with the first purchase account, maintaining an association of the first license for the application to the user.

9. A non-transitory, computer-readable medium storing instructions operable when executed to cause at least one hardware processor of a device management server to perform operations comprising:

identifying, by the at least one hardware processor of the device management server, a new assignment of an application to a user using a new purchase account, wherein the new purchase account includes a first plurality of licenses for the application, and the user is associated with a device manager identifier associated with the device management server;

determining, by the at least one hardware processor of the device management server, that the user has been previously associated with the application by a previous assignment using a previous purchase account different than the new purchase account, wherein the previous purchase account includes a second plurality of licenses for the application, and the first plurality of licenses are different than the second plurality of licenses;

in response to determining that the user has been previously associated with the application, determining, by the at least one hardware processor of the device management server, that a new assignment type for the new assignment has a higher priority than a previous assignment type for the previous assignment, wherein each of the new assignment type and the previous assignment type includes a respective one of;

a device group assignment assigning the application to users associated with devices in a device group, a direct assignment assigning the application directly to the user, a user group assignment assigning the application to user groups including the user, or a global assignment assigning the application to all users managed by the device management server, wherein the device group assignment has a highest priority, the direct assignment has a second highest priority, the user group assignment has a third highest priority, and the global assignment has a fourth highest priority; and

in response to determining that the new assignment type has the higher priority than the previous assignment type;

transmitting a first instruction, from the at least one hardware processor of the device management server to an external application store, the first instruction instructing the external application store to disassociate a previous license for the application from the user, and the previous license selected from the second plurality of licenses for the application associated with the previous purchase account;

transmitting a second instruction, from the one or more hardware processors of the device management server to the external application store, the second instruction instructing the external application store to register a new application store identifier for the user, associate the new application store identifier with the device manager identifier for the user, and associate the new application store identifier with the new purchase account; and

after transmitting the second instruction, transmitting a third instruction, from the at least one hardware processor of the device management server to the external application store, the third instruction instructing the external application store to associate a new license with the user, and the new license selected from the first plurality of licenses for the application associated with the new purchase account.

10. The computer-readable medium of claim 9, wherein the device group assignment includes criteria defining devices within the device group, the criteria including at least one of:

an operating system type, an operating system version, a device model, a device type, a minimum storage amount, a minimum processor speed, or a network connection type.

11. The computer-readable medium of claim 9, wherein instructing the external application store to associate the new license with the user is performed in response to the user requesting to download the application.

12. The computer-readable medium of claim 9, wherein the new assignment and the previous assignment include a disposition attribute designating the application as mandatory or optional.

13. The computer-readable medium of claim 9, wherein instructing the external application store to disassociate the previous license and associate the new license are performed using a web services application programming interface (API) associated with the external application store.

14. The computer-readable medium of claim 9, the operations further comprising generating an application catalog for presentation to the user including a new application.

15. The computer-readable medium of claim 14, wherein instructing the external application store to associate the new license with the user is performed in response to the user interacting with the application catalog to request to install the new application.

16. The computer-readable medium of claim 9, wherein the new assignment is a first assignment, the new purchase account is a first purchase account, and the new license is a first license, the operations further comprising:

after instructing the external application store to associate the new license with the user, and in response to determining that a second assignment of the application to the user is associated with the first purchase account, maintaining an association of the first license for the application to the user.

17. A system comprising:

memory for storing data; and

one or more hardware processors of a device management server operable to perform operations comprising;

identifying, by the one or more hardware processors of the device management server, a new assignment of an application to a user using a new purchase account, wherein the new purchase account includes a first plurality of licenses for the application, and the user is associated with a device manager identifier associated with the device management server;

determining, by the one or more hardware processors of the device management server, that the user has been previously associated with the application by a previous assignment using a previous purchase account different than the new purchase account, wherein the previous purchase account includes a second plurality of licenses for the application, and the first plurality of licenses are different than the second plurality of licenses;

in response to determining that the user has been previously associated with the application, determining, by the one or more hardware processors of the device management server, that a new assignment type for the new assignment has a higher priority than a previous assignment type for the previous assignment, wherein each of the new assignment type and the previous assignment type includes a respective one of;

a device group assignment assigning the application to users associated with devices in a device group, a direct assignment assigning the application directly to the user, a user group assignment assigning the application to user groups including the user, or a global assignment assigning the application to all users managed by the device management server, wherein the device group assignment has a highest priority, the direct assignment has a second highest priority, the user group assignment has a third highest priority, and the global assignment has a fourth highest priority; and

in response to determining that the new assignment type has the higher priority than the previous assignment type;

transmitting a first instruction, from the one or more hardware processors of the device management server to an external application store, the first instruction instructing the external application store to disassociate a previous license for the application from the user, and the previous license selected from the second plurality of licenses for the application associated with the previous purchase account;

transmitting a second instruction, from the one or more hardware processors of the device management server to the external application store, the second instruction instructing the external application store to register a new application store identifier for the user, associate the new application store identifier with the device manager identifier for the user, and associate the new application store identifier with the new purchase account; and

after transmitting the second instruction, transmitting a third instruction, from the one or more hardware processors of the device management server to the external application store, the third instruction instructing the external application store to associate a new license with the user, and the new license selected from the first plurality of licenses for the application associated with the new purchase account.

18. The system of claim 17, wherein the device group assignment includes criteria defining devices within the device group, the criteria including at least one of:

an operating system type, an operating system version, a device model, a device type, a minimum storage amount, a minimum processor speed, or a network connection type.

19. The system of claim 17, wherein instructing the external application store to associate the new license with the user is performed in response to the user requesting to download the application.

20. The system of claim 17, wherein the new assignment and the previous assignment include a disposition attribute designating the application as mandatory or optional.

21. The system of claim 17, wherein instructing the external application store to disassociate the previous license and associate the new license are performed using a web services application programming interface (API) associated with the external application store.

22. The system of claim 17, the operations further comprising generating an application catalog for presentation to the user including a new application.

23. The system of claim 22, wherein instructing the external application store to associate the new license with the user is performed in response to the user interacting with the application catalog to request to install the new application.

24. The system of claim 17, wherein the new assignment is a first assignment, the new purchase account is a first purchase account, and the new license is a first license, the operations further comprising:

after instructing the external application store to associate the new license with the user, and in response to determining that a second assignment of the application to the user is associated with the first purchase account, maintaining an association of the first license for the application to the user.