Dynamic user experience with semantic rich objects

• US 20060294509A1
• Filed: 06/28/2005
• Published: 12/28/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 06/28/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Mital, Vijay, Stojanovic, Alexander
• Granted Patent: US 7,774,713 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 717/143
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/451 Execution arrangements for user interfaces

Abstract

Semantic rich objects for a dynamic user experience. One or more actions in the process are represented by semantic rich objects (SROs) for exposing functionality of the process. Each of the SROs includes metadata associated with an action and an execution environment therefor. In response to an interactive gesture from a user selecting at least one of the SROs to perform a desired action in the process, metadata is extracted from the selected SROs to determine whether the desired action is available in the execution environment of the process.

Claims

1. A computerized method of providing a dynamic user experience within a process, said computerized method comprising:

representing one or more actions in the process by semantic rich objects (SROs) for exposing functionality of the process, said SROs each including metadata associated with an action and data relating to an execution environment therefor;

receiving an interactive gesture from a user for selecting at least one of the SROs to perform a desired action in the process; and

extracting the metadata from the selected SROs to determine whether the desired action is available in the execution environment of the process in response to the received interactive gesture.

2. The computerized method of claim 1 wherein each of the SROs further includes code for execution of the action, and wherein extracting the metadata comprises executing the included code to determine whether the desired action is available in the execution environment of the process in response to the received interactive gesture.

3. The computerized method of claim 1 further comprising providing, in response to the received interactive gesture, a set of available actions for the user to interact with the process based on the extracted metadata.

4. The computerized method of claim 3 wherein providing the set of available actions comprises at least one of the following:

displaying the set of available actions exposed through the SROs in a form-based user interface and generating a user interface for selectively displaying the set of available actions for the user to interact with the process, and wherein the process includes one or more of the following;

an application program, an application software, and a workflow processing application.

5. The computerized method of claim 1 further comprising performing the desired action based on the extracted metadata and the received interactive gesture, and further comprising defining a set of semantic rules to interpret the received interactive gestures from the user.

6. The computerized method of claim 1 further comprising providing a plurality of SROs in response to a query from a user, and further comprising correlating the extracted metadata with one or more of the following:

a performance history of the execution of the process, prior user interactions with the execution of the process, and a process execution model.

7. The computerized method of claim 1 further comprising mapping the interactive gestures to the metadata of each of the SROs, and further comprising associating the extracted metadata of the selected SROs with metadata of one or more other SROs to compose a set of available actions as a semantic sentence that includes actions represented by the selected SROs and the one or more other SROs.

8. The computerized method of claim 1 wherein one or more computer-readable metadata include computer-executable instructions for performing the computerized method recited in claim 1.

9. A system for actively generating behaviors for a user to interact within a process, said system comprising:

a memory for storing one or more semantic rich objects (SROs), each of said SROs including metadata corresponding to a behavior and an execution environment therefor, each of said SROs also including data relating to execution of the behavior;

an interface for receiving a selection of one or more SROs from the user;

a processor for executing computer-executable instructions for generating a set of available behaviors to the user by associating the received selection from the interface with stored metadata in the selected SRO; and

wherein the interface provides the generated set of behaviors to the user for interacting with the process in the execution environment.

10. The system of claim 9 further comprising a user interface having a user selection device for receiving the selection of the one or more SROs from the user.

11. The system of claim 9 wherein the processor is further configured to map the received selection from the interface to the stored metadata of each of the SROs.

12. The system of claim 11 further comprising a database mapping a set of speech acts to the stored metadata of each of the SROs.

13. The system of claim 9 wherein the interface receives a selection of one SRO from the user to associate with one or more other SROs and wherein the processor is configured to generate a set of available behaviors to the user to associate the one SRO with the one or more other SROs based on the received selection and the stored metadata in the one SRO and the one or more other SROs.

14. The system of claim 9 wherein the processor is further configured to execute the stored data relating to execution of the behavior to generate the set of behaviors based on the stored metadata and the received selection from the interface.

15. The system of claim 9 wherein,

the interface is configured to provide one or more SROs in response to a query from the user, selectively provides the generated set of behaviors of the SROs based on the execution environment of the process, and receive a selection of one or more SROs from the user via a form-based user interface, and

the processor is further configured to correlate the stored metadata with one or more of the following:

a performance history of the execution of the process, the prior user interactions with the execution of the process, and the process execution model.

16. The system of claim 9 wherein the processor is further configured to define set of semantic rules to interpret the received selection from the user via the interface and wherein the processor generates the set of available behaviors by determining whether the set of desired behaviors is available in the execution environment of the process based on the defined set of semantic rules.

17. A computer-readable medium having stored thereon a data structure for a semantic rich object, said computer-readable medium comprising:

a first data field including metadata representing one or more actions associated with a process; and

a second data field including metadata representing an execution environment of the process, said first data field being associated with said second data field to define a set of available actions to be performed in the execution environment of the process.

18. The computer-readable medium of claim 17 further comprising a third data field including metadata representing a set of semantic rules, said semantic rules defining one or more interactive gestures associated with the metadata in the first data field and the metadata in the second data field.

19. The computer-readable medium of claim 18 wherein metadata in the third data field includes metadata representing a set of interactive gestures and a set of speech acts, said set of interactive gestures and said set of speech acts being mapped to the metadata in the first data field and the metadata in the second data field.

20. The computer-readable medium of claim 17 further comprising one or more data fields including metadata associated with one or more of the following:

a set of process ambient service definition, interactive gesture pins, process extensibility methods, a process object model, a performance history of the execution of the process, the prior user interactions with the execution of the process, execution of the behavior, and a process execution model.