Method for Intelligent Storing and Retrieving in an Enterprise Data System

• US 20070061481A1
• Filed: 08/01/2006
• Published: 03/15/2007
• Est. Priority Date: 08/15/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: National Instruments Corporation (Emerson Electric Company)
• Original Assignee: National Instruments Corporation (Emerson Electric Company)
• Inventors: Krantz, Myrle, Helpenstein, Helmut, Romainczyk, Stefan, Deininger, Ralf, Krantz, Andreas, Haub, Andreas
• Granted Patent: US 9,020,906 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 709/238
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/10 File systems; File servers
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/13 File access structures, e.g. distributed indices arrangements of input from, or output to, record carriers G06F3/06
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/2228 Indexing structures
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/907 Retrieval characterised by using metadata, e.g. metadata not derived from the content or metadata generated manually
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/06 Resources, workflows, human or project management; Enterprise or organisation planning; Enterprise or organisation modelling
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/12 specially adapted for proprietary or special-purpose networking environments, e.g. medical networks, sensor networks, networks in vehicles or remote metering networks

Abstract

A method and system is presented which provides a TDM framework for managing self-describing measurement data. The TDM framework provides applications with a central platform for accessing measurement data across an entire enterprise system. By means of individual plug-ins, which are specific to a given data file format, meta-data for each data store in the enterprise may be indexed in a unified manner. The unified indexing, in turn, provides the ability to browse and query the indexed measurement data without requiring the opening or reading from a source data file.

Claims

1. A method for storing and retrieving measurement data comprising:

storing measurement data in a plurality of data files in an enterprise system, wherein said storing measurement data includes storing meta-data associated with the measurement data, wherein the meta-data describes characteristics of the measurement data;

receiving a query for measurement data, wherein the query includes parameters of meta-data associated with the measurement data; and

searching an index of the plurality of data files according to the query, wherein the index is created according to the meta-data, wherein a plug-in associated with the file type of each data file is used to retrieve meta-data from each data file.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

determining a match in the index according to the query;

selecting a first plug-in associated with a first data file; and

retrieving first measurement data according to the query, wherein the first plug-in retrieves the first measurement data from the first data file.

3. The method of claim 2, further comprising:

selecting a second plug-in associated with a second data file; and

retrieving second measurement data according to the query, wherein the second plug-in retrieves the second measurement data from the second data file.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the meta-data comprise a hierarchical data model including:

a file/root level;

a group/type/setup level; and

a signal/channel/trace level.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein the file/root level of meta-data includes one or more of the following:

timestamp information for the measurement data;

owner of the measurement data;

name of the file/root;

type of the file/root;

format of the file/root;

or

path/location of the file/root.

6. The method of claim 4, wherein the group/type/setup level of meta-data includes one or more of the following:

type of measurement of the group/type/setup;

description of the type of measurement;

operator of the group/type/setup;

recommended type of analysis/post-processing for the group/type/setup;

reference to another document describing the measurement setup/channel list in the group/type/setup;

or

measurement setup/channel list in the group/type/setup.

7. The method of claim 4, wherein the signal/channel/trace level of meta-data includes one or more of the following:

name of the signal/channel/trace;

engineering unit for the signal/channel/trace;

description of the engineering unit;

description of the signal/channel/trace;

unique ID for the signal/channel/trace;

unique ID for the sensor/transducer measuring the signal/channel/trace;

an image of the signal/channel/trace;

or

a set of data points included in the signal/channel/trace.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the query is received in response to user input specifying the conditions of the query.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the query is received in response to an application issuing a request, wherein the request includes a specification of the conditions of the query.

10. A computer system comprising:

a memory;

a processor; and

computer-readable code stored on said memory and processable by said processor, said computer-readable code including instructions for causing said processor to;

store measurement data in a plurality of data files in an enterprise system, wherein said storing measurement data includes storing meta-data associated with the measurement data, wherein the meta-data describes characteristics of the measurement data;

receive a query for measurement data, wherein the query includes parameters of meta-data associated with the measurement data; and

search an index of the plurality of data files according to the query, wherein the index is created according to the meta-data, wherein a plug-in associated with the file type of each data file is used to retrieve meta-data from each data file.

11. The system of claim 10, wherein said computer-readable code further includes instructions for causing said processor to:

determine a match in the index according to the query;

select a first plug-in associated with a first data file; and

retrieve first measurement data according to the query, wherein the first plug-in retrieves the first measurement data from the first data file.

12. The system of claim 11, wherein said computer-readable code further includes instructions for causing said processor to:

select a second plug-in associated with a second data file; and

retrieve second measurement data according to the query, wherein the second plug-in retrieves the second measurement data from the second data file.

13. The system of claim 10, wherein the query is received in response to user input specifying the conditions of the query.

14. The system of claim 13, wherein measurement data retrieved according to the query are displayed to a user.

15. The system of claim 10, wherein the query is received in response to an application issuing a request, wherein the request includes a specification of the conditions of the query.

16. A memory medium comprising program instructions executable to:

store measurement data in a plurality of data files in an enterprise system, wherein said storing measurement data includes storing meta-data associated with the measurement data, wherein the meta-data describes characteristics of the measurement data;

receive a query for measurement data, wherein the query includes parameters of meta-data associated with the measurement data; and

search an index of the plurality of data files according to the query, wherein the index is created according to the meta-data, wherein a plug-in associated with the file type of each data file is used to retrieve meta-data from each data file.

17. The memory medium of claim 16, further comprising program instructions executable to:

determine a match in the index according to the query;

select a first plug-in associated with a first data file; and

retrieve first measurement data according to the query, wherein the first plug-in retrieves the first measurement data from the first data file.

18. The memory medium of claim 17, further comprising program instructions executable to:

select a second plug-in associated with a second data file; and

retrieve second measurement data according to the query, wherein the second plug-in retrieves the second measurement data from the second data file.

19. The memory medium of claim 16, wherein the query is received in response to user input specifying the conditions of the query.

20. The memory medium of claim 16, wherein the query is received in response to an application issuing a request, wherein the request includes a specification of the conditions of the query.