Configuration model for configuring an adapter software component to selectively access software objects and object editor using instance of same

• US 20040015858A1
• Filed: 12/09/2002
• Published: 01/22/2004
• Est. Priority Date: 02/13/2002
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Delfino, Jean-Sebastien, Seto, Norman K.
• Granted Patent: US 7,272,819 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 717/120
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/20 Software design
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/449 Object-oriented method invocation or resolution

Abstract

An object editor capable of displaying a set of application software objects, which may include objects with a dynamic reflection capability (“reflective objects”), includes an object oriented configuration model instance (CMI), a generic adapter, and a UI framework. The CMI is particular to the set of application objects to be edited and defines a particular view of these objects to be provided by the editor. The CMI is external to the generic adapter and includes settings that control which application objects will be accessed and the manner of access, and in particular, which application objects will be visible, which of the visible objects'"'"' attributes will be displayed, the arrangement of displayed application objects and attributes, and the appearance of the displayed objects and attributes. The CMI is stored as a serialized XML file. The generic adapter reads the de-serialized CMI'"'"'s current settings, selectively accesses the set of application objects to be edited and their attributes as dictated by the CMI settings, and passes the accessed information to the UI framework for display. The adapter uses reflection to access the attributes and associations of reflective objects. The CMI settings may be changed between editor invocations to cause objects or their attributes to be accessed and displayed differently, or not at all. The editor may be configured to edit a new set of software objects by substituting a new CMI corresponding to that set of objects. A CMI and generic adapter may be used in conjunction with applications other than an object editor, in which case the CMI settings define a manner of selectively accessing the application objects and may affect the operation of the application.

Claims

1. A configuration model for configuring at least one adapter software component to selectively access set of application software objects including at least one reflective application software object, said at least one adapter software component comprising a generic adapter software component which uses reflection to access reflective application software objects, said configuration model being an object oriented implementation and being external to said at least one adapter software component.

2. The configuration model of claim 1, comprising a navigator class representative of the accessing of a particular class of application software objects of said set of application software objects.

3. The configuration model of claim 1, comprising a model navigator class representative of the accessing of a particular class of reflective application software objects of said set of application software objects.

4. The configuration model of claim 2, wherein said navigator class or a descendent thereof comprises an indicator for indicating that said particular class of software objects is at a root level of said set of software objects.

5. The configuration model of claim 4, wherein said indicator is a class identifier.

6. The configuration model of claim 2, wherein said navigator class or a descendent thereof comprises an indicator for indicating that said particular class of software objects is at a level that is deeper than a root level of said set of software objects.

7. The configuration model of claim 6, wherein said indicator comprises a sequence of application software object associations comprising at least one association from an originating class of application software objects to said particular class of software objects.

8. The configuration model of claim 1, comprising an item class representative of a particular class of application software objects to be accessed.

9. The configuration model of claim 1, comprising a model item class representative of a particular class of reflective application software objects to be accessed.

10. The configuration model of claim 8, wherein said item class or a descendent thereof comprises an indicator of a custom adapter software component to be used to access objects of said particular class.

11. The configuration model of claim 8 wherein said item class further indicates that said particular class of application software objects is to be displayed.

12. The configuration model of claim 11, wherein said item class or a descendent thereof comprises an indicator of an icon to be displayed in conjunction with displayed instances of said particular class of software objects.

13. The configuration model of claim 11, wherein said item class or a descendent thereof comprises an indicator of text to be displayed in conjunction with displayed instances of said particular class of software objects.

14. The configuration model of claim 1, comprising a property class representative of an attribute of a particular class of application software objects to be accessed.

15. The configuration model of claim 14, wherein said property class or a descendent thereof comprises an indicator of an editor to be used to edit said attribute.

16. The configuration model of claim 14, wherein said property class or a descendent thereof comprises an indicator of whether instances of said attribute are modifiable.

17. The configuration model of claim 14, wherein said property class further indicates that said attribute of a particular class of software objects is to be displayed.

18. The configuration model of claim 17, wherein said property class or a descendent thereof comprises an indicator of an icon to be displayed in conjunction with displayed instances of said attribute.

19. The configuration model of claim 17, wherein said property class or a descendent thereof comprises an indicator of text to be displayed in conjunction with displayed instances of said attribute.

20. The configuration model of claim 1, implemented in the Java™

programming language.

21. A computer readable medium storing computer software that, when loaded into a computing device, adapts said device to, in an adapter software component, selectively access a reflective application software object by:

accessing a configurationmodel instance (CMI) external to said adapter software component to determine a manner of accessing said reflective application software object; and

using reflection to selectively access said reflective application software object in the manner indicated by said CMI.

22. The medium of claim 21, wherein said manner of accessing indicated by said CMI comprises an indication of an attribute of said reflective application software object to be accessed.

23. The medium of claim 21, wherein said manner of accessing indicated by said CMI comprises an indication of an associated application software object of said reflective application software object to be accessed.

24. The medium of claim 23, wherein said associated application software object is contained by said reflective application software object.

25. The medium of claim 23, wherein said reflective application software object is based on an Unified Modeling Language (UML) model, and wherein said indication of an associated application software object to be accessed comprises a sequence of rolenames comprising at least one rolename from an originating class of said object oriented application model to the class of said associated application software object.

26. The medium of claim 21, wherein said reflection used to selectively access said reflective application software object is Meta Object Facility (MOF) reflection.

27. A computer readable medium storing computer software that, when loaded into a computing device, adapts said device to, in an adapter software component, access at least one application software object of a set of application software objects, said at least one application software object having a desired relationship with a specified reflective application software object, by:

accessing a configuration model instance (CMI) external to said adapter software component to determine a manner of identifying the at least one application software object that has the desired relationship with said specified reflective application software object; and

using reflection to access said at least one application software object identified using said determined manner of identifying.

28. The medium of claim 27, wherein said desired relationship is a child relationship.

29. The medium of claim 27, wherein said desired relationship is a parent relationship.

30. The medium of claim 27, wherein said reflection used to access said at least one application software object is Meta Object Facility (MOF) reflection.

31. A method of configuring an adapter software component to selectively access application software objects, comprising:

providing a serialized configuration model instance (CMI) that is external to said adapter software component and is indicative of a desired manner of accessing said application software objects;

de-serializing said CMI; and

accessing said de-serialized CMI from said adapter software component to determine the desired manner of accessing said application software objects.

32. The method of claim 31, wherein said serialized CMI comprises eXtensible Markup Language (XML).

33. The method of claim 32, wherein said serialized CMI comprises XML Metadata Interchange (XMI).

34. A computer readable medium storing a controller software component for mapping a client software component method to a corresponding method capable returning a desired feature of a reflective application software object, said controller software component comprising:

an adapter software component having a method corresponding to said client software component method, said adapter software component method being configurable to access said desired feature of an application software object using reflection; and

a configuration model instance external to said adapter software component for configuring said adapter software component method to selectively access said desired feature of an application software object using reflection.

35. The computer readable medium of claim 34, wherein said desired feature of an application software object is an attribute.

36. The computer readable medium of claim 34, wherein said desired feature of an application software object is an associated object.

37. An object editor, comprising:

a user interface framework;

a controller software component for mapping at least one method of said user interface framework to a corresponding method capable of returning a desired feature of a reflective application software object, said controller software component comprising;

an adapter software component having a method corresponding to said user interface framework method, said adapter software component method being configurable to access said desired feature of an application software object using reflection; and

a configuration model instance external to said adapter software component for configuring said adapter software component method to selectively access said desired feature of an application software object using reflection.

38. The object editor of claim 37, wherein said user interface framework comprises a controller module, and wherein said at least one method of said user interface framework is a method of said controller module.

39. The object editor of claim 37, further comprising:

at least one custom adapter for accessing a class of non-reflective application software objects, and

an adapter factory software component for determining, for a specified application software object class, one of said generic adapter and said at least one custom adapter to be used to access application software objects of said specified class.

40. In an adapter software component, a method of selectively accessing a reflective application software object, comprising:

accessing a configuration model instance (CMI) external to said adapter software component to determine a manner of accessing said reflective application software object; and

using reflection to selectively access said reflective application software object in the manner indicated by said CMI.

41. A computing device operable to cause an adapter software component to selectively access a reflective application software object by:

accessing a configuration model instance (CMI) external to said adapter software component to determine a manner of accessing said reflective application software object; and

using reflection to selectively access said reflective application software object in the manner indicated by said CMI.

42. In an adapter software component, a method of accessing at least one application software object of a set of application software objects, said at least one application software object having a desired relationship with a specified reflective application software object, comprising:

accessing a configuration model instance (CMI) external to said adapter software component to determine a manner of identifying the at least one application software object that has the desired relationship with said specified reflective application software object; and

using reflection to access said at least one application software object identified using said determined manner of identifying.

43. A computing device operable to cause an adapter software component to access at least one application software object of a set of application software objects, said at least one application software object having a desired relationship with a specified reflective application software object, by:

accessing a configuration model instance (CMI) external to said adapter software component to determine a manner of identifying the at least one application software object that has the desired relationship with said specified reflective application software object; and

using reflection to access said at least one application software object identified using said determined manner of identifying.