Business processing system employing a notice board business system database and method of processing the same

• US 20010008998A1
• Filed: 03/06/2001
• Published: 07/19/2001
• Est. Priority Date: 05/15/1996
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Akiko Nagayama, Eiji Takamatsu, Makoto Ogawa, Masato Tamaki, Naofumi Hosoda, Yuji Tsusaka
• Original Assignee: Akiko Nagayama, Eiji Takamatsu, Makoto Ogawa, Masato Tamaki, Naofumi Hosoda, Yuji Tsusaka
• Inventors: Takamatsu, Eiji, Tsusaka, Yuji, Tamaki, Masato, Nagayama, Akiko, Hosoda, Naofumi, Ogawa, Makoto
• Granted Patent: US 7,076,440 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 705/8
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/06311 Scheduling, planning or task assignment for a person or group
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/06316 Sequencing of tasks or work
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/10 Office automation; Time management

Abstract

A notice board business system database stores therein collectively the contents of all the data heads relating to a series of business processes, and is held in common in the form of a notice board through clients by all the related persons in charge of the tasks. A status change rule sets the data head in which the data input should be completed with respect to each of the task processes. A status watcher refers to both the notice board business system database and the status change rule to make the task process change from the current task process to the next task process when the predetermined data input has been completed in the process in task so as to inform the related client of that the status change has occurred. In addition, the status watcher refers to a status change limit rule for setting the data input completion due date for each of the task processes so as to inform, when the processing due date is drawing near, the related client of that the processing due date is drawing near.

Claims

1. A business processing method which is carried out by a first memory for holding, through a flow of a business processing constituted by a sequence of a plurality of task processes, a plurality of data heads data of which has been inputted as the result of the business processing through terminal units by the respective persons in charge of the plurality of task processes and for storing therein a notice board business system database which is opened to all the persons in charge of the plurality of task processes, a second memory for storing therein a status change rule for setting the status which the plurality of data heads should fulfill in order for the task process to change with respect to each of the plurality of task processes, and an information processor for accessing to said first memory and said second memory, said method comprising the steps of:

receiving a request for inputting the data from the terminal unit to said notice board business system database;

updating, in respect to the input request, the data of the corresponding data head in said notice board business system database;

judging on the basis of said status change rule whether or not the task process can change; and

informing, when it is judged as the result of the judgement that the task process can change, the terminal unit of the person in charge of the task process the task of which can be newly carried out of that the task process has changed.

2. A business processing method according to

claim 1

, wherein said notice board business system database further holds an identifier of the task process, which is currently in the task state, as an identifier of the current process, and said information step includes the step of updating the identifier from the identifier of the current process to an identifier of the task process the task of which can be newly carried out.

3. A business processing method according to

claim 1

, wherein said status change rule has information representing whether or not the plurality of data heads is the data heads, in which the data input is to be completed, with respect to the plurality of task processes, and said judgement step is to judge that when the operation of inputting the data has been completed with respect to all the data heads which are set for the current process, the task process can change from the current task process to the next task process.

4. A business processing method according to

claim 3

, wherein said status change rule has degree information representing whether the degree of the data which is inputted with respect to each of the plurality of task processes is decided or undecided, and said judgement step is to set decided or undecided to the data corresponding to the degree information on the basis of the input request, and to judge, when all the data of the data head becomes decided in which it is shown that the data input should be completed, that the task process can change from the current task process to the next task process.

5. A business processing method according to

claim 1

, wherein a third memory for storing therein a limit rule for setting the due date, when the data input should be completed, with respect to each of the task processes having the respective processing limits is further provided, said third memory being accessed by said information processor, and

wherein said step of receiving the request includes the step of judging whether or not the current form has passed the processing limit which is set for the current process, and the step of informing, when it is judged that the current term has passed the processing limit, the terminal unit of that the data can not be inputted and also of prohibiting the data input through the terminal limit.

6. A business processing method according to

claim 5

, further comprising the steps of:

judging on the basis of said limit rule whether or not the current term has reached a predetermined term before the processing limit which is set with respect to the current process; and

informing, when it is judged that the current term has reached a predetermined term, the terminal unit of the person in charge of the current task process of that the due date is drawing near.

7. A business processing method according to

claim 3

, wherein said update step comprises the steps of:

judging whether or not the person in charge of the task process who has requested the input on the basis of the input request is the person in charge of the task process subsequent to the current task process; and

setting, when it is judged that the person in charge of the task process who has requested the input is the person in charge of the subsequent task process, an advanced input flag, representing that the data has been advancedly inputted, in correspondence to the data head in said notice head business system database which is to be updated on the basis of the input request.

8. A business processing method according to

claim 7

, wherein said update step further comprises the steps of:

judging, when it is judged in said judgement step that the person in charge of the task process who has requested the input is not the person in charge of the subsequent task process, whether or not the modification is carried out with respect to the undecided advancedly inputted data in which the advanced input flag is set in the data head in said notice board business system database; and

informing, when it is judged that the modification is carried out with respect to the advancedly inputted data, the terminal unit of the person in charge of the subsequent task process of the data modification.

9. A business processing method according to

claim 1

, wherein said notice board business system database has degree information representing whether the degree of the inputted data is decided or undecided every data head, and said judgement step is to judge, when all the data of the data head for which the data input should be completed by said status change rule has become decided, that the task process can change from the current task process to the next task process.

10. A business processing method according to

claim 9

, wherein said notice board business system database has a get notice flag representing the terminal unit of which person in charge of the task process the data set every data head is got from, and

wherein said business processing method further comprises the steps of:

judging whether or not there is the data head to which said get notice flag is set, the data head being represented as being undecided by the degree information; and

transferring, when there is the corresponding data head, in response to a notice board business system database transfer request issued from the terminal unit, information reporting that the get notice is carried out for the data of the corresponding data head as well as the data in said notice board business system database which has been requested.

11. A business processing method according to

claim 9

, wherein said notice board business system database has a conference flag for representing whether or not the conference is required for deciding the data, which is set, every data head, and also has a decision flag for representing whether or not there is carried out the decision making for the data, which is set, every person in charge of the task process who participates in the conference, as the degree information of the data head in which it is shown by the conference flag that the conference is required, and

wherein said judgement step includes the step of judging whether or not all the decision flags show that the decision making has been made by the persons in charge of the task processes, with respect to the data head in which it is shown by the conference flag that the conference is required, and in which it is shown by said status change rule that the data input should be completed, and the step of judging, when all the decision flags show that the decision making has been made by the persons in charge of the processes, that the data which is set to the data head of interest is decided.

12. A business processing method according to

claim 1

, wherein said notice board business system database has degree information for representing whether or not the data which is set is decided every data head, and said status change rule has, every data head of said notice board business system database, in correspondence to each of the task processes of the business processing, status change value information for representing whether or not the data head needs to be decided in order to execute the processing of the task process of interest, and

wherein said judgement step includes the step of referring to the decided information to search said status change value in order to judge the task process in which the processing can be executed.

13. A business processing method according to

claim 12

, wherein the status change rule information corresponding to the data heads in which a plurality of data is set in said notice board business system database includes information for representing whether all the set data needs to be decided or a part of the data has only to be decided.

14. A business processing system for executing the business processing constituted by a sequence of a plurality of task processes, comprising:

a plurality of clients which are arranged in the plurality of task processes, respectively;

a database for holding therein notice board data which is inputted/updated by the clients and which includes a plurality of data heads utilized in the business processing;

a server to which said database is connected and which serves to fetch, in response to a request from the client, data belonging to the notice board data corresponding to the request from said database to send the data thus fetched to the client and to control input/update of the data to/in the data heads included in the corresponding notice board data; and

a status change rule possessed by said server for specifying which task process of the plurality of task processes the business processing in execution is in using the notice board data.

15. A business processing system according to

claim 14

, wherein said notice board business system database has degree information for representing whether or not the set data is decided with respect to each of the plurality of dataheads.

16. A business processing system according to

claim 15

, wherein said notice board business system database has a conference flag for representing whether or not the conference by a plurality of persons in charges of the task processes is required in order to decide the set data with respect to each of the plurality of data heads.

17. A business processing system according to

claim 16

, wherein in said notice board business system database, the degree information corresponding to the data head in which the conference is represented as being required by the conference flag includes decision information for representing whether or not there is shown the decision making for the data, which is set in the data head, every person in charge of the task process who participates in the decision of the corresponding data head.

18. A business processing system according to

claim 15

, wherein said notice board business system database has an advanced input flag for representing whether or not the data is set in the corresponding data head by the person in charge of the task process after completion of the current task process, with respect to each of the plurality of data heads.

19. A business processing system according to

claim 14

, wherein said status change rule has the status change rule information for representing, every data head of the notice board data, the status which the data, which is set in the data head of interest, should fulfill, in correspondence to the task processes constituting the business processing.

20. A business processing system according to

claim 19

, wherein the status change rule information for representing whether or not in order for the task process to change from the current task process to the next task process, the data which is set in the data heads corresponding thereto should be decided.

21. A business processing system according to

claim 20

, wherein said server judges on the basis of said status change rule whether or not the data which is set in the data heads of said notice board business system database can change to the next task process, and informs, when it is judged that the data can change to the next task process, the client of the next task process of that the change in the task process occurs.

22. A business processing system according to

claim 19

, wherein said status change rule information represents whether or not the data which is set in the database needs to be decided in order to carry out the business processing of the corresponding task process.

23. A business processing system according to

claim 22

, wherein said status change rule information represents whether when there is a plurality of data which is set in the corresponding data head, all the data needs to be decided or a part of the data has only to be decided.

24. A business processing system according to

claim 22

, wherein said server judges on the basis of said status change rule the status of the task process of the business processing which is carried out by the notice board data, and informs the client of the task process in which the task becomes newly possible of that the change occurs in the task process.