Extensible architecture for versioning APIs

• US 20050034137A1
• Filed: 09/07/2004
• Published: 02/10/2005
• Est. Priority Date: 11/21/2000
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Kaler, Christopher G., Bartz, Bradley J., Anderson, Zachary L., Santoro, Michael R., Reeves, Christopher D.
• Granted Patent: US 7,610,316 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 719/328
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/60 Software deployment
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/44536 Selecting among different versions
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99953 Recoverability
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99954 Version management

Abstract

Some large software development projects need more than one versioning system to accommodate not only a diversity of document formats and data types, but also the geographic diversity of its programmers. However, having more than one versioning systems is generally very expensive. A major factor in this expense is the requirement for a separate application program interface (API) for each separate versioning system. Accordingly, the inventors devised an exemplary API architecture which can be extended with “plug-in” protocol providers to include virtually any number of separate version stores or versioning systems. The exemplary architecture includes a generic command parser and a command dispatcher. The command dispatcher operatively couples to one or more protocol providers, each coupled to at least one version store. Inclusion of the OLE DB-compliant interface and the command parser in the exemplary embodiment saves the protocol providers the effort and expense of replicating these features, thereby reducing the cost of adding version stores.

Claims

1. An architecture for a versioning application program interface, comprising

an OLE DB interface for communicating with a client application, said interface receiving a command from said client application;

a first command parser operatively coupled to the OLE DB interface, said first command parser parsing said command;

a command dispatcher operatively coupled to the first command parser; and

two or more protocol providers operatively couplable to the command dispatcher, with each protocol provider including a second command parser, each of said second command parsers parsing at least a portion of said command.

2. The architecture of claim 1, wherein the one or more protocol providers includes at least three protocol providers.

3. The architecture of claim 1, wherein the OLE DB interface is compatible with the OLE DB 2.5 specification.

4. The architecture of claim 1, wherein the command dispatcher functions synchronously or asynchronously and wherein one or more of the protocol providers function synchronously.

5. The architecture of claim 1, wherein one or more of the protocol providers is implemented as one or more C++ or COM objects.

6. The architecture of claim 1, further comprising one or more version stores operatively couplable to each of the one or more protocol providers.

7-13. -13. (Cancelled)

14. A versioning system comprising:

first parsing means for parsing at least a first portion of a data request or command from a client application;

one or more second parsing means for parsing at least a second portion of the data request or command;

command dispatching means for dispatching the parsed data request or command; and

two or more versioning protocol providers for receiving the dispatched request or command.

15. The system of claim 14, wherein one or more of the second parsing means are under control of a respective one of the protocol providers.

16. The system of claim 14 further comprising one or more version stores operatively couplable to two or more of the protocol providers.

17. A method of operating a computer system including two or more version stores, the method comprising:

receiving a request from a client application, with the request having at least first and second portions;

parsing the first portion of the request;

parsing the second portion of the request based on results of parsing the first portion;

dispatching the parsed first and second portions of the request to one of the two or more version stores via a selected protocol provider based on the first portion of the request.

18. The method of claim 17, wherein parsing the second portion of the request based on results of parsing the first portion comprises:

passing the second portion to a command parser associated with only with one of the version stores, based on the first portion; and

parsing the second portion at the command parser associated with the one version store.

19. The method of claim 17, wherein receiving the request from the client application occurs asynchronously and wherein dispatching the first and second portions of the request occurs synchronously.

20. A method of operating a versioning system, comprising:

receiving a request for data;

selecting at least one version store from a group of two or more version stores by partially parsing the request; and

communicating information based on the request to the selected version store using a protocol provider associated with the selected version store.

21. The method of claim 20, further comprising:

adding one or more version stores to the group of two or more version stores to form an extended group of three or more version stores.

22. The method off claim 21, further comprising:

receiving another request;

selecting at least one version store from the extended group of two or more version stores, based on the other request; and

forwarding information based on the other request to the selected version store.

23. A medium carrying computer-executable instructions for operating a versioning system, the instructions comprising:

instructions for receiving a request for data from a client application;

instructions for selecting at least one version store from a group of two or more version stores, wherein the instructions for selection comprise parsing a first potion of the request; and

instructions for communicating information based on the request to the selected version store, wherein the instructions for communication comprise communicating with a protocol provider corresponding to the selected version store.

24. A computer readable medium having executable instructions encoded thereon comprising:

an application program interface for receiving requests for versioned data; and

two or more versioning protocol providers operatively coupled to the application program interface for facilitating fulfillment of the received requests.