Automatic upgrade of pluggable components

• US 20060026585A1
• Filed: 07/28/2004
• Published: 02/02/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 07/28/2004
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Haselden, J. Kirk, Ivanov, Sergei, David, Matthew E., Shatnawi, Mohammed F.
• Granted Patent: US 7,788,662 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 717/168
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/65 Updates security arrangements therefor G06F21/57

Abstract

When a component is to be loaded or executed, the version of the component to be loaded may be compared with available versions of the component. If an upgraded version of the component is available, the upgraded version of the component may be enabled to dynamically and deterministically update itself. The component may be an object in an object model. The upgraded version of the component may update itself by calling an update method. The component may be upgraded with minimum user intervention, dynamically as the object is loaded.

Claims

1. A system for automatically upgrading pluggable components comprising:

a persistence engine that receives an input to be loaded, the input comprising a metadata defining a pluggable object, the pluggable object associated with a first version specified by the metadata and a second version associated with an object model, the persistence engine comparing the first version and the second version and in response to determining that the second version is an updated version and the first version is an outdated version, modifying the metadata to be compatible with the second version of the pluggable object.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein the updated version is a more current version of the first version of the pluggable object.

3. The system of claim 1, further comprising an update module, wherein the update module is called by the object model.

4. The system of claim 3, wherein the update module modifies the metadata.

5. The system of claim 1, wherein the pluggable object is associated with a property, the property specifying that the pluggable object is upgradeable.

6. The system of claim 5, wherein in response to determining that the pluggable object is upgradeable, the update module is invoked.

7. The system of claim 1, wherein the persistence engine compares the first version and the second version dynamically when an execute command is received.

8. The system of claim 1, wherein the persistence engine compares the first version and the second version dynamically when a load command is received.

9. The system of claim 1, wherein the metadata is represented in XML.

10. A method for automatically upgrading pluggable components comprising:

receiving input to an application implemented as an object model, the input comprising a metadata for a first component, the first component associated with a first version number;

in response to receiving a command, comparing the first version number with a second version of the first component available in a registry of components for the object model; and

in response to determining that the second version of the first component is an upgraded version of the first component, modifying the metadata for the first component to be compatible with the upgraded version of the first component.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein the command is an execute command.

12. The method of claim 10, wherein the command is a load command.

13. The method of claim 10, further comprising setting a property on the first component, a value set for the property indicating that the first component is upgradeable.

14. The method of claim 10, further comprising setting a property on the first component, a value set for the property indicating that the first component cannot be upgraded.

15. The method of claim 10, wherein the metadata is encoded in XML.

16. The method of claim 13, where in response to determining that the first component is upgradeable, the metadata is upgraded.

17. The method of claim 10, wherein the first component is provided by a third party.

18. A computer-readable medium comprising computer-executable instructions for:

receiving input to an application implemented as an object model, the input comprising metadata for a first component, the first component associated with a first version number;

in response to receiving a command, comparing the first version number with a second version of the first component available in a registry of components for the object model; and

in response to determining that the second version of the first component is an upgraded version of the first component, modifying the metadata for the first component to be compatible with the upgraded version of the first component.

19. The computer-readable medium of claim 18, comprising further computer-readable instructions for:

receiving a load command.

20. The computer-readable medium of claim 18, comprising further computer-readable instructions for:

receiving an execute command.

21. The computer-readable medium of claim 18, comprising further computer-readable instructions for:

setting a property on the first component, a value set for the property indicating that the first component is upgradeable.