DISTRIBUTED TRANSACTION SYSTEM

• US 20100180031A1
• Filed: 01/09/2010
• Published: 07/15/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 01/09/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Ganart Technologies, Inc.
• Original Assignee: Ganart Technologies, Inc.
• Inventors: CACHERIA, ANTHONY M. III, EDWARDS, WEBB, MCHUGH, WAYNE THOMAS, HOOKER, DAVID, JENKINS, BARRETT, HOLBROOK, ARTHUR MARTIN, GLOVER, KRISTOPHER
• Granted Patent: US 8,250,187 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 709/225
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/1053 Employment or hiring
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/1057 Benefits or employee welfare, e.g. insurance, holiday or retirement packages
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/1091 Recording time for administrative or management purposes
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/04 Payment circuits
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/042 characterized in that the payment protocol involves at least one cheque
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/065 using e-cash
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/08 Payment architectures
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/10 specially adapted for electronic funds transfer [EFT] systems; specially adapted for home banking systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/105 involving programming of a portable memory device, e.g. IC cards, "electronic purses"
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/1085 involving automatic teller machines [ATMs]
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/18 involving self-service terminals [SST], vending machines, kiosks or multimedia terminals
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/06 Buying, selling or leasing transactions
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0601 Electronic shopping [e-shopping]
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 40/125 Finance or payroll

Abstract

A system for interfacing predetermined services to a user at a fixed location includes a processing platform running an operating system. Also included are a plurality of physical system resource interfaces for interfacing with available physical system resources. The physical system resources allow a user to gain access to the predetermined desired services. The system further includes a data store for storing configuration information for enabling the operating system to interface with the available physical system resources through the physical system resource interface associated therewith. A communication resource for interfacing with the operating system allows communication of the operating system with a central office for downloading configuration information to selectively enable ones of the available physical system resources to interface with the operating system through associated ones of the physical system resource interfaces in accordance with the configuration information and the predetermined service selected by a user. A plurality of configurations are stored in the data store, and each is associated with a predetermined service and one or more of the available physical system resources. Each physical system resource interface is uniquely associated with a defined one of the physical system resources.

Claims

1. A distributed transaction system for enabling users to conduct transactions using services from third party service providers, the system including:

a plurality of resource managers, each of the resource managers including a processing platform running an operating system, a plurality of physical system resources enabling a user to access selected ones of the services available through the resource manager, a data store for storing configuration information identifying services available to a user from the resource manager, wherein configuration information each available service includes information for interfacing with physical system resources to enable a user to interface with selected ones of the services;

a plurality of physical system resource interfaces enabling the operating system to interface with required ones of the physical system resources to execute a predetermined series of actions required to provide a user selected service; and

a central processing center including a first communications interface with the resource managers whereby the central processing center can communicate with the resource managers to remotely enable or disable selected ones of the physical system resources required to access ones of the services.

2. The system of claim 1 wherein the central processing center includes one or more second communications interfaces whereby the central processing center can download configuration information from one or more service providers to enable one or more services on selected ones of the resource managers and whereby the configuration information is transmitted to selected ones of the resources to enable physical system resources to perform a predetermined series of actions required to access one or more services provided by the service provider.

3. The system of claim 2 wherein the central processing center communicates with selected ones of the resource managers to remotely enable or disable selected ones of the services based upon predetermined criteria.

4. The system of claim 3 wherein the predetermined criteria is the number of transactions conducted by users utilizing selected ones of the resource managers over a predetermined time period.

5. The system of claim 3 wherein the predetermined criteria is the value of transactions conducted by users utilizing selected ones of the resource managers over a predetermined time period.

6. The system of claim 3 wherein the predetermined criteria is the calendar date or date(s).

7. The system of claim 3 wherein the predetermined criteria is the time or time(s) of day.

8. The system of claim 1 wherein a physical resource is a display and wherein the resource manager is operative to display branding indicia associated with a user selected service.

9. The system of claim 1 wherein each resource manager includes a communications resource for communicating with the central processing center and wherein each resource manager transmits a message at predetermined intervals to the central processing center including the status of physical system resources available to the resource manager.

10. The system of claim 1 wherein each resource manager includes a communications resource for communicating with the central processing center and wherein each resource manager transmits a message to the central processing center at predetermined intervals including the services enabled on the resource manager.

11. A distributed transaction system for enabling users to conduct transactions using services from third party service providers, the system including:

a central processing center including one or more communications interfaces enabling the central processing center to communicate with the third party service providers whereby the central processing center receives transaction information from the third party service providers enabling the central processing center to facilitate transactions initiated by users at locations remote from the central processing center;

a plurality of resource managers located at least some of the remote locations, each of the resource managers including a communications resource to enable data transmission between the central processing center and the resource managers to facilitate transactions conducted by users at the remote locations using user selected services provided by the third party service providers;

each of the resource managers having associated physical system resources and corresponding physical system resource interfaces enabling a user to access a user selected service and a processing platform running an operating system;

each of the resource managers further comprising a data store for storing configurations associated with services provided by the third party service providers, the configurations identifying those services available through a given resource manager and wherein there are multiple configurations stored in the data store, each associated with one service provided by the third party service providers available through the given resource manager and one or more of the available physical system resources and wherein the configuration information for multiple services enables use of at least one of the same physical resources by a user to conduct user selected transactions with user selected services provided by the third party service providers; and

wherein;

the data store stores a serious of instructions to initiate a user identity session, whereby the user interfaces with one or more of the physical system resources to open the user identity session.

12. The system of claim 11 wherein the available physical resources and the physical system resources, corresponding physical system resource interfaces and operating system operate in conjunction with the central processing center to execute a script comprising instructions to execute a predetermined a series of sequential actions, each associated with a given service, enabling a user to conduct multiple transactions in a single user identity session using multiple services provided by multiple third party service providers.

13. The system of claim 12 wherein some of the predetermined sequential actions are executed by the resource manager and others of the predetermined sequential actions are executed by the central processing center to conduct a transaction within the identity session using a third party service.

14. The system of claim 11 wherein the central processing center communicates with selected ones of the resource managers to remotely enable or disable selected ones of the services based upon predetermined criteria.

15. The system of claim 14 wherein the predetermined criteria is the number of transactions conducted by users utilizing selected ones of the resource managers over a predetermined time period.

16. The system of claim 14 wherein the predetermined criteria is the value of transactions conducted by users utilizing selected ones of the resource managers over a predetermined time period.

17. The system of claim 14 wherein the predetermined criteria is the calendar date or date(s).

18. The system of claim 14 wherein the predetermined criteria is the time or time(s) of day.

19. The system of claim 14 wherein a physical resource is a display and wherein the resource manager is operative to display branding indicia associated with a user selected service.

20. The system of claim 11 wherein each resource manager includes a communications resource for communicating with the central processing center and wherein each resource manager transmits a message at predetermined intervals to the central processing center including the status of physical system resources and the services available through the resource manager.