Geometric Performance Metric Data Rendering

• US 20080172629A1
• Filed: 01/17/2007
• Published: 07/17/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 01/17/2007
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Lim, Chen-I, Tien, Ian, Arimilli, Ramesh, Hulen, Corey J.
• Application Number:
  US11/624,171
• Publication Number:
  US 20080172629A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 715/771
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/10 Office automation; Time management

Abstract

Users are enabled to utilize data from performance metrics to drive the behavior of geometric shapes to visualize business performance and create new composite objects that show magnitude, patterns of structured and unstructured data, interrelationships, causalities, and dependencies. Presentations are then rendered in a performance metric application or in another application through an embeddable user interface using the geometric shapes and composite objects. Automatic update of presented information in response to changes in the underlying data is enabled through the use of composite objects.

Claims

1. A method to be executed at least in part in a computing device for rendering a performance metric based presentation using geometric objects, the method comprising:

receiving performance metric data;

mapping a portion of the performance metric data to at least one from a set of;

a first geometric object, an attribute of the first geometric object and a relationship between the first geometric object and a second geometric object representing another portion of the performance metric data;

receiving configuration input associated with the presentation;

generating a layout for the presentation based on the mapping and the configuration input; and

rendering the presentation based on the layout.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the performance metric data includes at least one from a set of:

a scorecard element value, an analysis result, a partial scorecard view, a full scorecard view, a report view, and unstructured data.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein receiving the configuration input includes at least one from a set of:

receiving a user selection of the first geometric object and the second geometric object from a group of available objects;

receiving a user selection for at least one attribute of the first geometric object and at least one attribute of the second geometric object; and

receiving a user selection for a lay out attribute.

4. The method of claim 3, further comprising:

receiving a user selection for a delivery of the presentation including at least one from a set of;

electronic mail, file share, web publishing, creating a dynamic visual representation, and storage at a designated data store;

receiving a user selection for a frequency of delivery of the presentation; and

delivering the presentation based on the received user selections.

5. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

caching the performance metric data such that a plurality of versions of the presentation can be rendered.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the first and second geometric objects are composite objects such that elements of the presentation are updated when the performance metric data is modified.

7. The method of claim 1, further comprising at least one of:

exporting the presentation to a static image representation, and storing the rendered presentation in one of a local and a remote data store employing one of a default and a user-defined file format.

8. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

storing at least one of the mappings and definitions of the first and second object as an Extensible Markup Language (XML) file.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein rendering the presentation includes providing a user interaction feature comprising at least one from a set of:

zoom, pan, and search on the presentation.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein a property of the second geometric object is configured to represent a portion of performance metric data associated with the first geometric object.

11. The method of claim 1, wherein the mapped attribute of the first geometric object includes at least one from a set of:

a size, a rotation, a background color, a foreground color, an outline color, an outline thickness, a position of the object.

12. The method of claim 1, wherein mapping the portion of the performance metric data and rendering the presentation are performed employing one of:

a user interface in a native performance metric application and an embeddable user interface embedded in another application.

13. A system for rendering a performance metric based presentation using geometric objects, comprising:

a memory;

a processor coupled to the memory, wherein the processor is configured to execute instructions to perform actions including;

receive performance metric data;

determine a selection of objects to be associated with portions of the performance metric data;

map the portions of the performance metric data to the selected objects, properties of selected objects, and visual relationships between the selected objects;

provide a preview of the presentation based on a layout generated employing the mapped objects, properties, and object relationships;

receive configuration input associated with the presentation; and

render the presentation based on the input.

14. The system of claim 13, wherein the processor is further configured to determine the selection of objects by one of:

an automatic assignment and a user selection.

15. The system of claim 13, wherein the processor is further configured to:

cache received performance data; and

automatically filter the presentation based on a dimension member selection using the cached data.

16. The system of claim 13, wherein the processor is further configured to accept configuration input from a user and deliver the rendered presentation to the user based on a permission level of the user.

17. A computer-readable storage medium with instructions stored thereon for rendering a performance metric based presentation using geometric objects, the instructions comprising:

receiving performance metric data from at least one data source;

selecting at least one object to be associated with a portion of the performance metric data;

mapping the portion of the performance metric data to one of the selected object, a property of the selected object, and a visual relationship between the selected object and another object;

providing a preview of the presentation based on a layout generated employing the mapped object, property, and object relationship;

receiving a configuration input associated with the presentation;

rendering the presentation based on the input;

delivering the presentation using at least one from a set of;

electronic mail, file share, web publishing, storage at a designated data store based on one of a default parameter and a user defined parameter; and

enabling a user to perform operations including at least one of;

zoom, pan, and search on the rendered presentation.

18. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 17, wherein the instructions further include providing the preview and the rendered presentation and receiving the user input employing an embeddable user interface.

19. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 18, wherein the embeddable user interface is embedded into a graphics application and the object is one of a group of objects available from the graphics application.

20. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 17, wherein the object is a composite object that is automatically updated based on a change to the performance metric data.