Drag-and drop dynamic distributed object model

• US 20030120711A1
• Filed: 12/06/2002
• Published: 06/26/2003
• Est. Priority Date: 12/07/2001
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Data Based Intelligence, Inc., Intellectual Ventures Fund 83 LLC (Intellectual Ventures LLC)
• Original Assignee: Data Base Intelligence, Inc.
• Inventors: Katz, Alan A.
• Granted Patent: US 7,178,129 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 718/106
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/34 Graphical or visual programming
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/75 Indicating network or usage conditions on the user display
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/329 in the application layer [OSI layer 7]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 9/40 Network security protocols

Abstract

A Windows workstation user is provided with a quick, simple, easily-managed path to combinations of available applications on a network of systems, in such a way that the user can establish and exploit complex data relationships and software capabilities on the workstation without application installation, significant access effort, or specialized knowledge. Runtime binding prepares and links user forms and reports to application programs as desired, without preparatory steps. An external object model is built into a comprehensive, drag-and-drop, dynamic, distributed object model, to offer its users lower total cost of ownership than do conventional user interface applications and application builders.

The definition and use of query objects to view concurrently multiple database tables offers the unique ability to combine fields from dissimilar database engines into a single view. An alias feature allows the databases to reside on the same or on different servers in the network. Thus any user with access to multiple databases of different types in different places can produce a single coherent view of the combined data, with no explicit program development effort.

Claims

1. A system for accessing and operating distributed objects across a computer network, in response to an application program on at least one client computer comprising:

one or more server computers, each one further comprising one or more interconnected processors, one or more main memory subsystems, one or more mass storage subsystems, and one or more connections to wide area networks or local area networks;

at least one client computer comprising one or more interconnected processors, one or more main memory subsystems, one or more mass storage subsystems, and one or more connections to the server computers via wide area networks or local area networks;

an application software program operating on the client computer for presenting a first form or menu to a user of the client computer and including locations of objects used by the application program and for creating an instance of one or more of the dynamic distributed objects on the client computer;

a set of dynamic external object classes including methods and attributes, stored on one or more of the server computers or on one or more of the client computers,

an interpreting software program for resolving the class inheritances, polymorphic behaviors, and encapsulation behaviors of the objects, classes, methods, and attributes, across client and server computers in a network, at the time of the user'"'"'s request for execution of the programs.

2. The system of claim 1, further comprising one or more user interface programs operating on the client computer for interpreting mouse and keyboard actions of the user computer to select the computers on the network holding the objects required by the application program.

3. The system of claim 2, wherein the application programs further comprise data entry, data retrieval, and reporting programs.

4. The system of claim 1, further comprising a compiler software program operating on the client computer for compiling the objects of the application program into working binary executable objects, classes, methods, and attributes, based on the dynamic external object classes, at the time of the user'"'"'s request for execution of the programs.

5. The system of claim 4 wherein the interpreting software program operating on the client computer interprets the compiled code into machine executable code to create an instance of the object in the client computer.

6. The system of claim 4, wherein the application programs further comprise data entry, data retrieval, and reporting programs.

7. The system of claim 1, further comprising means for providing a user with an alias name for each computer accessed by the application program using the distributed objects.

8. A drag and drop, dynamic, distributed, object model based software user interface system for accessing and operating distributed applications across computer networks, comprising:

two or more peer-to-peer computers, each one further comprising one or more interconnected processors, one or more main memory subsystems, one or more mass storage subsystems, and one or more connections to wide area networks or local area networks;

a first peer computer comprising one or more interconnected processors, one or more main memory subsystems, one or more mass storage subsystems, and one or more connections to the server computers via wide area networks or local area networks;

an application software program operating on the first peer computer for presenting a first form or menu to a user of the first peer computer and including locations of objects used by the application program and for creating an instance of one or more of the dynamic distributed objects on the first peer computer;

a set of dynamic external object classes including methods and attributes, stored on one or more of the peer-to-peer computers,

an interpreting software program for resolving class inheritances, polymorphic behaviors, and encapsulation behaviors of the objects, classes, methods, and attributes, across computers in the network, at the time of the user'"'"'s request for execution of the application program.

9. The system of claim 8, further comprising a one or more user interface programs operating on the first peer computer for interpreting mouse and keyboard actions of the user computer to select the computers on the network holding the objects required by the application program.

10. The system of claim 8, wherein the application program further comprises data entry, data retrieval, and reporting programs.

11. The system of claim 8, further comprising a compiler software program operating on the first peer computer for compiling the objects of the application program into working binary executable objects, classes, methods, and attributes, based on the dynamic external object classes, at the time of the user'"'"'s request for execution of the programs.

12. The system of claim 11 wherein the interpreting software program operating on the first peer computer for interpreting the compiled code into machine executable code to create an instance of the object in the client computer.

13. The system of claim 11, wherein the user application program further comprises data entry, data retrieval, and reporting programs.

14. The system of claim 8, further comprising means for providing a user with an alias name for each computer accessed by the user'"'"'s application program using the distributed objects.

15. A method for implementing dynamic external objects, comprising the steps of:

compiling source code for the objects;

installing a launching application to enable a user to locate and create an instance of the objects on the user'"'"'s computer; and

interpreting objects on the user'"'"'s machine to create the application program.

16. A method for using dynamic external objects, comprising the steps of:

on the user'"'"'s computer, running an application program that includes information about the location of objects used in the application program;

accepting the user'"'"'s selection of one or more task of the application for execution;

on the network of computers connected to the user'"'"'s computer, locating the objects required to execute each application;

creating an instance of the object on the user'"'"'s computer for execution; and

executing the application on the user'"'"'s computer.

17. The method of claim 16, wherein the step of locating the objects further comprises the steps of:

reading the application'"'"'s initialization (.ini) file to obtain one or more search paths for locating the required compiled objects;

searching in the search paths in their given order to locate each required compiled object;

searching in the folder from which the application was launched for each required compiled object not found in the preceding steps; and

searching in the applications executable (.exe) file for each required compiled object not found in the preceding steps.

18. The method of claim 16, wherein the step of locating the compiled objects further comprises the steps of:

reading the application'"'"'s entry in the operating system'"'"'s registry to obtain one or more search paths for locating the required compiled objects; and

searching in the search paths in their given order to locate each required compiled object;

searching in the folder from which the application was launched for each required compiled object not found in the preceding steps; and

searching in the applications executable (.exe) file for each required compiled object not found in the preceding steps.

19. The method of claim 16, wherein the step of copying the required compiled objects to the user'"'"'s computer for execution further comprises the step of copying all parent objects of the required compiled objects to the user'"'"'s computer.

20. The method of claim 16, wherein the step of executing the application further comprises the steps of:

resolving all object hierarchy inheritances for each compiled object;

executing the application with all inheritances resolved.

21. A method for deploying objects of an application program comprising:

on a network of computers, storing a plurality of objects each of which is has inheritance, polymorphism, and encapsulation;

on one of the computers installing an application program that has the location of objects needed to run the application program;

creating an instance of an object on the computer with the application program; and

on the computer with the instance of the object, executing the program.

22. The method of claim 21 comprising the further step of changing the objects on the network.

23. The method of claim 21 wherein the objects are executed without registration

24. The method of claim 21 wherein the objects inherit properties from their classes.