Real-time in-memory charge computation

• US 10,049,338 B2
• Filed: 11/11/2013
• Issued: 08/14/2018
• Est. Priority Date: 11/11/2013
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: SAP SE
• Original Assignee: SAP SE
• Inventors: Pillai, Krishnanunni Sudhakaran, Chaturvedi, Saurabh
• Primary Examiner(s): Allen, William J
• Assistant Examiner(s): Loharikar, Anand R
• Application Number:
  US14/076,265
• Publication Number:
  US 20150134489A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,737 Days
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/083 Shipping
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/08345 Pricing
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/087 Inventory or stock management, e.g. order filling, procurement or balancing against orders
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0633 Lists, e.g. purchase orders, compilation or processing
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0635 Processing of requisition or of purchase orders

Abstract

In an embodiment, a transport management application is executing in the application layer. User may place orders by specifying order data in a user interface of the transport management application, and initiate calculate charges to calculate transportation charges for the orders. Based on the initiation, the charge calculation function is invoked in the application layer. Charge calculation function reads the order data specified in the user interface, and invokes charge computation engine in an in-memory database. Orders are split and grouped based on number of dimensions in a rate table. Charge computation engine looks up master data and computes transportation charges for the grouped orders in parallel. After the charge computation engine determines the transportation charges for the orders, sum of the transportation charges is returned to the application layer.

Claims

1. An article of manufacture including a non-transitory computer readable storage medium to tangibly store instructions, which when executed by a computer, cause the computer to:

execute a transport management application, the transport management application comprising a charge calculation function executed at an application layer, and a charge computation engine executed in an in-memory database;

from a client which displays a graphical user interface of the transport management application, receive at the application layer one or more orders comprising order data, where the one or more orders relate to physical transportation of goods;

invoke, in the application layer, execution of the charge calculation function, wherein the charge calculation function reads the order data and invokes the charge computation engine in the in-memory database, the in-memory database being connected to the application layer over a network;

based on the order data and one or more master data, determine, by the charge computation engine in the in-memory database, one or more rate tables and number of required dimensions in the one or more rate tables, wherein the one or more rate tables comprises a plurality of dimensions data;

perform, by the charge computation engine, a single look up of the determined one or more rate tables for processing the one or more orders;

split, by the charge computation engine, the one or more orders into a plurality of groups based on the number of dimensions in the determined one or more rate tables required for processing the one or more orders;

initiate computation by the charge computation engine in the in-memory database to process in parallel the plurality of groups, wherein a parallel process for a group is performed for each group and comprises;

determine from the determined one or more rate tables one or more rates; and

based on the determined one or more rates, compute a real-time charge of the group;

at the application layer, receive from the in-memory database the real-time charge of the group; and

render the real-time charge of the group in the graphical user interface in the client.

2. The article of manufacture of claim 1, wherein the instruction to split the one or more orders into the plurality of groups based on the number of dimensions, furthers comprises instructions which when executed by a computer, cause the computer to:

split, by the charge computation engine, the one or more orders into a first group based on a first number of dimension and a second group based on a second number of dimension;

initiate computation by the charge computation engine in the in-memory database to process in parallel the first group and the second group, wherein a first parallel process for the first group, comprises;

determine from the determined one or more rate tables one or more rates; and

based on the determined one or more rates, compute a real-time charge for the first group;

wherein a second parallel process for the second group, comprises;

determine from the determined one or more rate tables one or more rates; and

based on the determined one or more rates, compute a real-time charge for the second group.

3. The article of manufacture of claim 2, further comprising instructions which when executed by the computer further causes the computer to:

consolidate the computed real-time charge for the first group and the computed real-time charge for the second group;

receive the real-time charge of the first group and the second group from the in-memory database at the application layer; and

return the consolidated computed real-time charge of the first group and the second group in the graphical user interface to the client.

4. The article of manufacture of claim 1, wherein determining from the one or more rate tables the one or more rates is based on one or more logical computations on the one or more of the plurality of dimensions data.

5. The article of manufacture of claim 1, further comprising instructions which when executed by the computer further causes the computer to:

return the computed real-time charge of the group to the client.

6. The article of manufacture of claim 1, wherein performing lookup in the one or more master data comprises using a single join operation in the in-memory database.

7. The article of manufacture of claim 1, wherein while determining the one or more rate tables, perform an implicit conversion of the order data to a system generated unique identifier.

8. A computer implemented method of real-time in-memory charge calculation, the method comprising:

executing a transport management application, the transport management application comprising a charge calculation function executed at an application layer, and a charge computation engine executed in an in-memory database;

from a client which displays a graphical user interface of the transport management application, receiving at the application layer one or more orders comprising order data, where the one or more orders relate to physical transportation of goods;

invoking in the application layer execution of the charge calculation function, wherein the charge calculation function reads the order data and invokes the charge computation engine in the in-memory database, the in-memory database being connected to the application layer over a network;

based on the order data, performing, by the charge computation engine, a single lookup in one or more master data stored in the in-memory database, wherein the lookup is based on one or more logical computations on the one or more master data;

based on the order data and the one or more master data, determining by the charge computation engine in the in-memory database, one or more rate tables and number of required dimensions in the one or more rate tables, wherein the one or more rate tables comprises a plurality of dimensions data;

performing, by the charge computation engine, a single look up of the determined one or more rate tables for processing the one or more orders;

splitting, by the charge computation engine, the one or more orders into a plurality of groups based on the number of dimensions in the determined one or more rate tables required for processing the one or more orders; and

initiating computation by the charge computation engine in the in-memory database to process in parallel the plurality of groups, wherein a parallel process for a group is performed for each group and comprises;

determine from the determined one or more rate tables one or more rates; and

based on the determined one or more rates, computing a real-time charge of the group;

at the application layer, receive from the in-memory database the real-time charge of the group; and

rendering the real-time charge of the group in the graphical user interface in the client.

9. The method of claim 8, splitting the one or more orders into the plurality of groups based on the number of dimensions, furthers comprises instructions which when executed by a computer, cause the computer to:

splitting, by the charge computation engine, the one or more orders into a first group based on a first number of dimension and a second group based on a second number of dimension;

initiating computation by the charge computation engine in the in-memory database to processes in parallel the first group and the second group, wherein a first parallel process for the first group, comprises;

determine from the determined one or more rate tables one or more rates; and

based on the determined one or more rates, computing a real-time charge for the first group;

wherein a second parallel process for the second group, comprises;

determine from the determined one or more rate tables one or more rates; and

based on the determined one or more rates, computing a real-time charge for the second group.

10. The method of claim 9, further comprising:

consolidating the computed real-time charge for the first group and the computed real-time charge for the second group;

receive the real-time charge of the first group and the second group from the in-memory database at the application layer; and

returning the consolidated computed real-time charge of the first group and the second group in the graphical user interface to the client.

11. The method of claim 8, wherein determining from the one or more rate tables the one or more rates is based on one or more logical computations on the one or more of the plurality of dimensions data.

12. The method of claim 8, further comprising instructions which when executed by the computer further causes the computer to:

returning the computed real-time charge of the group to the client.

13. The method of claim 8, wherein performing lookup in the one or more master data comprises using a single join operation in the in-memory database.

14. The method of claim 8, wherein while determining the one or more rate tables, perform an implicit conversion of the order data to a system generated unique identifier.

15. A computer system for real-time in-memory charge computation, comprising:

a computer memory to store program code; and

a processor to execute the program code to;

execute a transport management application, the transport management application comprising a charge calculation function executed at an application layer, and a charge computation engine executed in an in-memory database;

from a client which displays a graphical user interface of the transport management application, receive at the application layer one or more orders comprising order data, where the one or more orders relate to physical transportation of goods;

invoke in the application layer execution of charge calculation function, wherein the charge calculation function reads the order data and invokes the charge computation engine in the in-memory database, the in-memory database being connected to the application layer over a network;

based on the order data, perform a single lookup in one or more master data stored in the in-memory database, wherein the lookup is based on one or more logical computations on the one or more master data;

based on the order data and the one or more master data, determine, by the charge computation engine in the in-memory database, one or more rate tables and number of required dimensions in the one or more rate tables, wherein the one or more rate tables comprises a plurality of dimensions data;

perform, by the charge computation engine, a single look up of the determined one or more rate tables for processing the one or more orders;

split, by the charge computation engine, the one or more orders into a plurality of groups based on the number of dimensions in the determined one or more rate tables required for processing the one or more orders; and

initiate computation by the charge computation engine in the in-memory database to process in parallel the plurality of groups, wherein a parallel process for a group is performed for each group and comprises;

determine from the determined one or more rate tables one or more rates; and

based on the determined one or more rates, compute a real-time charge of the group;

at the application layer, receive from the in-memory database the real-time charge of the group; and

render the real-time charge of the group in the graphical user interface in the client.

16. The system of claim 15, splitting the one or more orders into the plurality of groups based on the number of dimensions comprises:

split, by the charge computation engine, the one or more orders into a first group based on a first number of dimension and a second group based on a second number of dimension;

initiate computation by the charge computation engine in the in-memory database to process in parallel the first group and the second group, wherein a first parallel process for the first group, comprises;

determine from the determined one or more rate tables one or more rates; and

based on the determined one or more rates, compute a real-time charge for the first group;

wherein a second parallel process for the second group, comprises;

determine from the determined one or more rate tables one or more rates; and

based on the determined one or more rates, compute a real-time charge for the second group.

17. The system of claim 16, further comprises:

consolidate the computed real-time charge for the first group and the computed real-time charge for the second group;

receive the real-time charge of the first group and the second group from the in-memory database at the application layer; and

return the consolidated computed real-time charge of the first group and the second group in the graphical user interface to the client.

18. The system of claim 15, wherein determining from the one or more rate tables the one or more rates is based on one or more logical computations on the one or more of the plurality of dimensions data.

19. The system of claim 15, further comprising instructions which when executed by the computer cause the computer to:

perform lookup in the one or more master data using a single join operation in the in-memory database, wherein the lookup of the one or more rate tables occurs once.

20. The system of claim 15, wherein while determining the one or more rate tables, perform an implicit conversion of the order data to a system generated unique identifier.