Arbitrary Object Editing

• US 20080256465A1
• Filed: 04/16/2007
• Published: 10/16/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 04/16/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Pepin, Brian K., Jazdzewski, Charles P., Hlavac, Juraj, Boulter, Mark A., Nakashima, James S., Kelly, Jeffrey W., Ravindranathan, Unnikrishnan, Gasperini, Alan J., Linscott, Gary K.
• Granted Patent: US 8,959,489 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 715/762
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/24 Object-oriented

Abstract

The present invention provides technologies for forming an editing interface for editing arbitrary objects. In particular, the present invention provides system and methods for enumerating object properties, selecting a suitable pre-existing object editor and, if no such pre-existing editor is available, constructing an object editor on the fly suitable for editing the properties of the object where the object may include properties and/or collections of objects. Construction of a suitable editor is based on enumeration of object properties and on the serialization of the object using a descriptive language such as extensible markup language (“XML”) or the like. Property values specified by a user via the object interface and editors are stored in a descriptive format such as XML and generally specify the initial characteristics of the object.

Claims

1. A method for editing an object, the method comprising:

selecting the object;

enumerating object properties of the object, the enumerating based on object metadata of the object; and

iterating through at least a portion of the enumerated object properties, the iterating for each of at least a portion of the enumerated object properties including selecting a pre-existing editor or constructing a suitable editor.

2. The method of claim 1 further comprising determining if the pre-existing editor is suitable for editing one of the at least a portion of the enumerated object properties.

3. The method of claim 1 further comprising determining if one of the at least a portion of the enumerated object properties is a collection.

4. The method of claim 1 wherein the constructing a suitable editor includes constructing a collection editor.

5. The method of claim 1 wherein the constructing and editor includes constructing a sub-property editor.

6. The method of claim 1 further comprising serializing the object.

7. The method of claim 6 wherein the serialization results in an extensible markup language (“

XML”

) description of the object.

8. The method of claim 6 wherein the serializing utilizes extensible application markup language (“

XAML”

).

9. The method of claim 6 wherein the serialized object includes property values established during editing.

10. The method of claim 1 further comprising forming an interface including a plurality of editors including the selected existing editor or the constructed editor.

11. The method of claim 1 wherein an object file or a binary file include at least a portion of the object metadata.

12. The method of claim 1 embodied as computer-executable instructions stored on a computer-readable medium.

13. A system for providing an editing interface for editing an object, the system comprising:

an object enumerator operable to search object metadata for a definition of the object and enumerate properties of the object from the metadata;

an object iterator operable to process at least a subset of the properties; and

an editor selector operable to determine if a pre-defined editor is available suitable for editing one of the at least a subset of the properties.

14. The system of claim 13 wherein the object metadata is stored in an object file or a binary file.

15. The system of claim 13 further comprising:

the object selector operable to select the pre-defined editor and add the pre-defined editor to the editing interface if the pre-defined editor is suitable for editing the one of the at least a subset of the properties; and

an editor constructor operable to construct a suitable editor and add the suitable editor to the editing interface if the pre-defined editor is not suitable for editing the one of the at least a subset of the properties.

16. The system of claim 13 further comprising an object serializer operable to serialize the object including the at least a subset of the properties.

17. The system of claim 16 wherein the object serializer utilizes extensible application markup language (“

XAML”

) to serialize the object including the at least a subset of the properties.

18. The system of claim 16 wherein the object serializer creates an extensible markup language (“

XML”

) description of the object including the at least a subset of the properties.

19. A method for forming an editing interface for editing an object, the method comprising:

enumerating object properties of the object, the enumerating based on object metadata of the object;

iterating through at least a portion of the enumerated object properties, the iterating including processing each of the at least a portion of the enumerated object properties, the processing including;

determining if a pre-existing editor exists suitable for editing the each of at least a portion of the enumerated object properties and, if so, selecting the pre-existing editor, otherwise constructing a suitable editor, and

adding the selected pre-existing editor or the constructed suitable editor to the editing interface, the editing interface including a plurality of editors; and

serializing the object including the at least a portion of the enumerated object properties.

20. The method of claim 19 embodied as computer-executable instruction stored on a computer-readable medium.