System and method for enhanced direction of automated content identification in a distributed environment

• US 20090281995A1
• Filed: 05/09/2008
• Published: 11/12/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 05/09/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Software Integrity Group Incorporated
• Original Assignee: Protecode, Inc. (Synopsys Incorporated)
• Inventors: El Mously, Khalid, Wong, Benson J., Mousavi, Kianoosh
• Granted Patent: US 8,024,313 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/951 Indexing; Web crawling techniques

Abstract

The successful development of digital production content within a development organization requires that the intellectual property rights of the multiple elements of digital content introduced into the digital production content. According to the invention there is provided a means of automatically identifying the source, licenses and other associated intellectual property information associated with the digital content introduced. The invention providing for the direction of a dynamic search engine according to metadata relating to the digital content produced, wherein the digital content introduced is not identified within existing databases of intellectual properties indexed according to digital content. Further the invention provides for interfacing the dynamic search engine with a web crawler to data mine a region of the World Wide Web around the location of the digital content introduced determined by the dynamic search engine.

Claims

1. A method comprising:

providing at least a process of a plurality of processes, each process relating to automatically sourcing at least an element of a plurality of elements, each element relating of an aspect of an external digital content at least one of to be introduced and introduced into a digital content file.

2. A method according to claim 1 wherein,

an aspect of the external digital content is selected from the group comprising, a file length, a file size, a file type, a file format, an author, a copyright, a license, an owner, and an aspect of the content of the external digital content.

3. A method according to claim 1 wherein,

providing the process comprises providing at least a dynamic search engine, the dynamic search engine for automatically searching at least one source of digital content of a plurality of sources of digital content connected to a communications network and performing the search in dependence upon at least a provided data term of a plurality of data terms stored in a memory, the plurality of data terms relating to the external digital content.

4. A method according to claim 2 wherein,

providing the at least a provided data term comprises providing information relating to an aspect of the external content file, the aspect selected from the group comprising, a file length, a file size, a file type, a file format, an author, a copyright, a license, an owner, an aspect of the external content, and a specific element of the external content.

5. A method according to claim 2 further comprising:

providing a content development system allowing a user to work with the digital content file and operating upon a first computer;

providing a file alteration monitor in communication with the first computer, the file alteration monitor configured with at least one metadata of a plurality of metadata to gather for the content development system;

establishing that an event has occurred, the event determined in dependence upon a least automatically detecting when the digital content file is at least one of imported, created, moved, altered, and deleted within the content development system, the at least one of at least one of modifying the at least one metadata and adding new metadata to the plurality of metadata; and

providing the at least one of metadata and new metadata as the provided data term.

6. A method according to claim 5 further comprising:

transmitting to at least one software queue of a plurality of software queues in dependence upon establishing that an event occurred at least one of the digital content file, a predetermined portion of a plurality of metadata associated with the digital content file, and a signature associated with the digital content file;

providing at least one policy engine of a plurality of policy engines, each policy engine polling a predetermined portion of the software queues to determine whether an event has been stored within the predetermined portion of the software queues;

retrieving with the one policy engine upon determining that an event has been stored the event and applying at least one policy of a plurality of policies to the at least one of the digital content file, a predetermined portion of the plurality of metadata associated with the digital content file, and a signature associated with the digital content file associated with the event;

dispatching an action term to the memory to become one of the plurality of data terms, the dispatching determined in dependence upon at least the one policy and a result of applying the at least one policy to the at least one of the digital content file, a predetermined portion of the plurality of metadata associated with the digital content file, and a signature associated with the digital content file associated with the event.

7. A method according to claim 5 wherein,

providing the at least one of metadata and new metadata comprises providing information relating to an aspect of at least one of the digital content file, an external content file to be combined with the digital content file, and the digital content file after being combined with the external digital content, the aspect selected from the group comprising a file length, a file size, a file type, a file format, an author, a copyright, a license, an owner, an aspect of the external content, and a specific element of the external content.

8. A method according to claim 3 wherein,

providing the plurality of data terms comprises providing each data term of the plurality of data terms weighted according to a predetermined rule, the weighting determining the priority of the web crawler in searching for the data term.

9. A method according to claim 1 wherein,

providing the process comprises providing a process incorporating at least a communications step between a first system executing the process and a second system, the first and second systems attached to a communication network and the communications step executed according to a predetermined communications protocol.

10. A method according to claim 1 wherein,

the digital content file comprises digital data relating to at least one of an audiovisual content, an audio content, a visual content, a visual image, a software routine, and alphanumeric content.

11. A method according to claim 1 wherein,

providing the element comprises providing information relating to an aspect of at least one of the digital content file and an external content file to be combined with the digital content file in a predetermined manner, the aspect selected from the group comprising, a file length, a file size, a file type, a file format, an author, a copyright, a license, an owner, and an aspect of a content.

12. A method according to claim 2 wherein,

at least one of the plurality of data terms comprises an annotation provided by a user, the annotation associated with the external digital content.

13. A method according to claim 2 wherein,

providing at least one source of digital content of a plurality of digital content sources comprises providing at least one of a proprietary intellectual property database, a World Wide Web domain, a URL, a digital content repository, and a private domain accessible via the World Wide Web.

14. An apparatus comprising:

at least a processor, the processor executing at least a process of a plurality of processes, each process relating to automatically sourcing at least an element of a plurality of elements and each element relating to an aspect of an external digital content at least one of to be introduced and introduced into a digital content file.

15. An apparatus according to claim 14 wherein,

an aspect of the external digital content is selected from the group comprising, a file length, a file size, a file type, a file format, an author, a copyright, a license, an owner, an aspect of the external content, and a specific element of the external content.

16. An apparatus according to claim 14 wherein,

providing the process comprises providing at least a dynamic search engine, the dynamic search engine for automatically searching at least one source of digital content of a plurality of sources of digital content connected to a communications network and performing the search in dependence upon at least a provided data term of a plurality of data terms stored in a memory, the plurality of data terms relating to the external digital content.

17. An apparatus according to claim 15 further comprising:

a content development system allowing a user to work with the digital content file and operating upon a first computer comprising at least the processor; and

a file alteration monitor in communication with the first computer, the file alteration monitor configured with at least one metadata of a plurality of metadata to gather for the content development system, the file alteration monitor;

establishing that an event has occurred, the event determined in dependence upon a least automatically detecting when the digital content file is at least one of imported, created, moved, altered, and deleted within the content development system, the at least one of at least one of modifying the at least one metadata and adding new metadata to the plurality of metadata; and

providing the at least one of metadata and new metadata as the provided data term.

18. An apparatus according to claim 17 further comprising:

at least one software queue of a plurality of software queues, the at least one software queue receiving data from the file alteration monitor in dependence upon establishing that an event occurred at least one of the digital content file, a predetermined portion of a plurality of metadata associated with the digital content file, and a signature associated with the digital content file; and

at least one policy engine of a plurality of policy engines, each policy engine polling a predetermined portion of the software queues to determine whether an event has been stored within the predetermined portion of the software queues, retrieving the data stored within the software queue upon determining that an event has been stored the event and applying at least one policy of a plurality of policies to the at least one of the digital content file, a predetermined portion of the plurality of metadata associated with the digital content file, and a signature associated with the digital content file associated with the event, and dispatching an action term to the memory to become one of the plurality of data terms, the dispatching determined in dependence upon at least the one policy and a result of applying the at least one policy to the at least one of the digital content file, a predetermined portion of the plurality of metadata associated with the digital content file, and a signature associated with the digital content file associated with the event.

19. An apparatus according to claim 18 wherein,

providing the at least one of metadata and new metadata comprises providing information relating to an aspect of at least one of the digital content file, an external content file to be combined with the digital content file, and the digital content file after being combined with the digital content file, the aspect selected from the group comprising, a file length, a file size, a file type, a file format, an author, a copyright, a license, an owner, an aspect of the external content, and a specific element of the external content.

20. An apparatus according to claim 15 wherein,

providing the plurality of data terms comprises providing each data term of the plurality of data terms weighted according to a predetermined rule, the weighting determining the priority of the web crawler in searching for the data term.

21. An apparatus according to claim 14 wherein,

providing the process comprises providing a process incorporating at least a communications step between a first system executing the process and a second system, the first and second systems attached to a communication network and the communications step executed according to a predetermined communications protocol.

22. An apparatus according to claim 14 wherein,

the digital content file comprises digital data relating to at least one of an audiovisual content, an audio content, a visual content, a visual image, a software routine, and alphanumeric content.

23. An apparatus according to claim 14 wherein,

providing the element comprises providing information relating to an aspect of at least one of the digital content file and an external content file to be combined with the digital content file in a predetermined manner, the aspect selected from the group comprising, a file length, a file size, a file type, a file format, an author, a copyright, a license, an owner, and an aspect of a content.

24. A method according to claim 15 wherein,

at least one of the plurality of data terms comprises an annotation provided by a user, the annotation associated with the external digital content.

25. A method according to claim 15 wherein,

providing at least one source of digital content of a plurality of digital content sources comprises providing at least one of a proprietary intellectual property database, a World Wide Web domain, a URL, a digital content repository, and a private domain accessible via the World Wide Web.