ENTERPRISE WEB SERVICE DATA TO MOBILE DEVICE SYNCHRONIZATION

• US 20080176536A1
• Filed: 01/23/2007
• Published: 07/24/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 01/23/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Oracle America, Inc. (Oracle Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Sun Microsystems Incorporated (Oracle Corporation)
• Inventors: Galluzzo, John, Nemitz, George
• Granted Patent: US 7,983,249 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 455/414.1
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/02 based on web technology, e.g. hypertext transfer protocol [HTTP]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/1095 Replication or mirroring of data, e.g. scheduling or transport for data synchronisation between network nodes

Abstract

A Mobile Enterprise Platform utilizes a web based service that synchronizes enterprise data between a plurality of disparate mobile devices and a plurality of backend enterprise resources. The Mobile Enterprise Platform creates a web service synchronization source instance using Hypertext Transfer Protocol (“HTTP”) for each application or database present on a plurality of mobile devices. Corresponding to each of these web service synchronization source instances is a web based synchronization service associated with a specific backend enterprise resource. Each synchronization service is web based and can thus live anywhere on the network or on a dedicated services tie as they need only to supply a small set of operations to offer synchronization capability to a variety of mobile devices.

Claims

1. A mobile enterprise system for synchronizing on a network mobile devices with backend resources, the system comprising:

a plurality of mobile devices capable of enterprise operations;

a plurality of backend enterprise resources wherein each backend enterprise resource is associated with a resource specific synchronization service; and

a mobile enterprise platform comprising at least one synchronization software portion configured to communicatively link any of the plurality of mobile devices to any of the plurality of backend enterprise resources via the resource specific synchronization service enabling enterprise operations conducted on the plurality of mobile devices to be synchronized with the plurality of backend enterprise resources independent of the type of mobile device and operating system associated with the mobile device.

2. The system of claim 1 wherein the at least one synchronization software portion creates a synchronization source instance that is associated with the resource specific synchronization service for a targeted backend enterprise resource of the plurality of backend enterprise resources.

3. The system of claim 2 wherein each resource specific synchronization service may reside anywhere on the network.

4. The system of claim 1 wherein the resource specific synchronization service communications from the mobile enterprise platform to the plurality of backend enterprise resources using SOAP/HTTP protocols.

5. The system of claim 1 wherein the mobile enterprise platform interfaces with the resource specific synchronization service so that only required information is accessed from the enterprise resource.

6. The system of claim 1 wherein the mobile enterprise platform comprises a server isolated from both the plurality of mobile devices and the plurality of enterprise resources by a firewall.

7. The system of claim 1 wherein the mobile enterprise platform comprises at least one resource proxy server and wherein the resource proxy server creates synchronization source instances.

8. The system of claim 1 wherein the mobile enterprise platform is XML based representation protocol wherein XML defined document type and is used for SyncML commands and data representation.

9. The system of claim 1 wherein the mobile enterprise platform is based on Open Mobile Alliance.

10. The system of claim 9 wherein SyncML is represented in XML and transported using HTTP.

11. A method for synchronizing enterprise data between a backend enterprise resource and a mobile device, the method comprising:

sending a request from the mobile device to a synchronization server to synchronize enterprise data present on the mobile device and on the backend enterprise resource, wherein the synchronization server is communicatively interposed between the backend enterprise resource and the mobile device;

identifying enterprise data present on the mobile device that has been modified;

detecting by a synchronization service independent of the synchronization server, enterprise data present on the backend enterprise resource that has been modified;

gathering all modified enterprise data at the synchronization server;

synchronizing the modified enterprise data at the synchronization server; and

updating enterprise data present on the backend enterprise resource via the synchronization service and enterprise data present on the mobile device with unified synchronized enterprise data independent of the type of mobile device and operating system associated with the mobile device.

12. The method of claim 11 wherein communications among the synchronization server, the backend enterprise resource and the mobile device is represented in XML and transported using HTTP.

13. The method of claim 11 wherein the synchronization server authenticates the mobile device.

14. The method of claim 11 wherein identifying and detecting are accomplished by the synchronization server.

15. The method of claim 11 wherein enterprise data that has been modified comprises new, updated and deleted enterprise data.

16. A computer-readable storage medium tangibly embodying a program of instructions executable by a machine for synchronizing enterprise data between a backend enterprise resource and a mobile device, the medium comprising:

program code for identifying enterprise data present on the mobile device that has been modified;

program code for detecting enterprise data present on the backend enterprise resource that has been modified, wherein detecting is accomplished by a synchronization service independent of the synchronization server;

program code for gathering all modified enterprise data at a synchronization server;

program code for synchronizing the modified enterprise data at the synchronization server creating unified synchronized enterprise data; and

program code for updating enterprise data present on the backend enterprise resource via the synchronization service and the enterprise data present on the mobile device with unified synchronized enterprise data independent of the type of mobile device and operating system associated with the mobile device.

17. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 16 further comprising program code for communicating among the synchronization server, the backend enterprise resource and the mobile device via a synchronization web service.

18. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 17 wherein the program code for communicating among the synchronization server, the backend enterprise resource and the mobile device is represented in XML and transported using HTTP.

19. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 16 further comprising program code for authenticating the mobile device.

20. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 16 wherein the program code for synchronizing includes program code for comparing modified enterprise data from the mobile device to modified data from the backend enterprise resource.