EVENT AGGREGATION FOR BACKGROUND WORK EXECUTION

• US 20130061251A1
• Filed: 09/01/2011
• Published: 03/07/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 09/01/2011
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Schwartz, James A. Jr., Kishan, Arun U., Neves, Richard K., Probert, David B., Pulapaka, Hari, Gefflaut, Alain F.
• Granted Patent: US 9,063,775 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 719/320
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/4812 by interrupt, e.g. masked

Abstract

Systems, methods, and apparatus for separately managing foreground work and background work. In some embodiments, an operating system may identify at least one foreground component and at least one background component of a same application or different applications, and may manage the execution of the components differently. For example, the operating system may receive a request that at least one background component of an application be executed in response to at least one event. In response to detecting an occurrence of the at least one event, the operating system may determine whether at least one first condition set by the application is satisfied and whether at least one second condition set by the operating system is satisfied, and may execute the at least one background component when it is determined that the at least one first and second conditions are satisfied following the occurrence of the at least one event.

Claims

1. A method for use by an operating system executing on at least one computer, the method comprising acts of:

identifying at least one background component of an application;

determining whether at least one condition is satisfied; and

executing the at least one background component only when it is determined that the at least one condition is satisfied.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising acts of:

identifying at least one foreground component of the application; and

managing execution of the background component differently from execution of the at least one foreground component, comprising executing the at least one foreground component regardless of the at least one condition.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein the act of managing execution of the background component differently from execution of the at least one foreground component further comprises:

determining whether a user is actively interacting with the application;

executing the at least one foreground component only when it is determined that the user is actively interacting with the application; and

executing the at least one background component regardless of whether the user is actively interacting with the application.

4. The method of claim 1, further comprising an act of:

executing the at least one background component only in response to a brokered event signaled by an operating system broker component.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein the at least one condition is associated with the brokered event, and wherein the method further comprises acts of:

detecting, at the operating system broker component, an occurrence of at least one trigger associated with the brokered event;

in response to detecting the occurrence of the at least one trigger, determining, at the operating system broker component, whether the at least one condition is satisfied; and

signaling, by the operating system broker component, the brokered event only when it is determined that the at least one condition is satisfied.

6. The method of claim 5, further comprising an act of:

in response to determining that the at least one condition is not satisfied, latching, at the operating system broker component, the at least one trigger so as to signal the brokered event when the at least one condition becomes satisfied at a future time.

7. The method of claim 4, further comprising acts of:

receiving the brokered event signaled by the operating system broker component; and

in response to receiving the brokered event, determining, by the operating system, whether to execute the at least one background component based at least in part on at least one operating condition of the at least one computer.

8. At least one computer readable medium having encoded thereon, at least:

at least one first piece of computer executable code implementing at least one foreground component of an application;

a specification identifying at least one second piece of computer executable code for performing background work for the application; and

at least one second piece of executable code for specifying, to an operating system, at least one condition to be satisfied prior to starting the background work.

9. The at least one computer readable medium of claim 8, wherein the specification further identifies a start interface for use by the operating system to start the background work and a cancel interface for use by the operating system to cancel the background work.

10. The at least one computer readable medium of claim 8, further having encoded thereon computer executable code for performing acts of:

invoking an application programming interface (API) of an operating system broker component to request that a brokered event be signaled in response to at least one trigger; and

requesting that the at least one second piece of computer executable code be executed to perform the background work for the application in response to the operating system broker component signaling the brokered event.

11. The at least one computer readable medium of claim 10, wherein the act of invoking an application programming interface (API) of an operating system broker component to request that a brokered event be signaled in response to the operating system broker component signaling the brokered event comprises:

specifying, through the API of the operating system broker component, at least one condition to be satisfied prior to signaling the brokered event.

12. The at least one computer readable medium of claim 10, wherein the act of requesting that the at least one second piece of computer executable code be executed in response to the operating system broker component signaling the brokered event comprises:

invoking the API of the operating system broker component to request that the at least one second piece of computer executable code be executed in response to the operating system broker component signaling the brokered event.

13. The at least one computer readable medium of claim 8, wherein the at least one second piece of computer executable code is provided by the operating system.

14. The at least one computer readable medium of claim 8, further having encoded thereon the at least one second piece of computer executable code.

15. A computer implemented method comprising acts of:

receiving, at an operating system, a request that at least one background component of an application be executed in response to at least one event;

in response to detecting an occurrence of the at least one event, determining, by the operating system, whether at least one first condition set by the application is satisfied and whether at least one second condition set by the operating system is satisfied; and

executing the at least one background component when it is determined that the at least one first and second conditions are satisfied following the occurrence of the at least one event.

16. The method of claim 15, wherein the act of receiving a request that the at least one background component be executed in response to at least one event comprises:

receiving, at a broker infrastructure component, a request that the at least one background component be executed in response to a brokered event signaled by an operating system broker component.

17. The method of claim 15, wherein the at least one event comprises a brokered event signaled by an operating system broker component, and wherein the method further comprises an act of:

receiving, at the operating system broker component, a request that a brokered event be signaled in response to at least one trigger.

18. The method of claim 17, wherein the at least one condition is at least one first condition, and wherein the request that a brokered event be signaled in response to at least one trigger specifies at least one second condition to be satisfied prior to signaling the brokered event.

19. The method of claim 18, further comprising acts of:

maintaining, by the operating system broker component, state information for use in evaluating the at least one second condition;

latching, by the operating system broker component, the at least one trigger in response to determining that the at least one second condition is not satisfied when the at least one trigger fires;

re-evaluating, by the operating system broker component, the at least one second condition in response to a change in the maintained state information to determine whether to signal the brokered event.

20. The method of claim 15, further comprising:

determining whether a user is actively interacting with the application;

executing at least one foreground component of the application only when it is determined that the user is actively interactive with the application.