Automatic and Dynamic Generation of Customized Computer User Interface Screens

• US 20200134001A1
• Filed: 10/29/2018
• Published: 04/30/2020
• Est. Priority Date: 10/29/2018
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: FMR LLC
• Original Assignee: FMR LLC
• Inventors: Kantamsetty, Prasant, Gupta, Amit, Mathew, Jerry, Nair, Subhash
• Granted Patent: US 10,810,358 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/2246 Trees, e.g. B+trees
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0482 Interaction with lists of selectable items, e.g. menus
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/14 Tree-structured documents parsing G06F40/205; validation G06F40/226
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/38 for implementing user interfaces
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/451 Execution arrangements for user interfaces

Abstract

Methods and systems are described for automatically rendering a customized user interface (UI). A server receives a request to generate a UI, the request including a user identifier and a workflow identifier. The server determines a template based upon the workflow identifier, comprising areas for insertion of custom UI elements. The server captures a list of UI nodes, each UI node comprising metadata. The server organizes the UI nodes into (i) a tree data structure comprising an anchor UI node and child UI nodes, and (ii) a table data structure of identifiers for the nodes in the tree structure, values, constraints, and the metadata for the corresponding UI node. The server inserts the metadata into the areas for insertion using the tree data structure and the table data structure. The server renders a graphical UI based upon the metadata.

Claims

1. A system for automatically rendering a customized computer graphical user interface using hyperconverged data structures, the system comprising:

a server computing device having a memory for storing computer-executable instructions and a processor that executes the computer-executable instructions to;

receive, from a client computing device, a request to generate a user interface, the request including an identifier associated with a user of the client computing device and an identifier associated with an application workflow;

determine a user interface template based upon the identifier associated with the application workflow, the template comprising a layout of a user interface screen with one or more areas for insertion of custom user interface elements and associated with one or more rules for arranging the custom user interface elements;

capture a list of user interface nodes from a database, each user interface node comprising metadata for rendering a user interface element and including one or more values associated with the user interface element, each value having one or more constraints;

convert the user interface nodes into (i) a tree data structure based upon the rules from the user interface template, the tree data structure comprising an anchor user interface node and a plurality of child user interface nodes and defining hierarchical relationships among the user interface nodes, each user interface node assigned a unique identifier, and (ii) a table data structure comprising a list of the identifiers for the nodes in the tree structure, the values, the constraints, and the metadata for the corresponding user interface node;

insert the metadata from the user interface nodes into the areas for insertion in the user interface template using the tree data structure and the table data structure;

render a graphical user interface based upon the metadata contained in the user interface template for display at the client computing device; and

transmit the rendered graphical user interface to the client computing device in response to the request.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein the one or more rules for arranging the custom user interface elements comprise a hierarchical relationship definition for two or more of the user interface nodes.

3. The system of claim 2, wherein the hierarchical relationship definition comprises a parent user interface node and one or more child user interface nodes.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein the one or more values for the user interface node comprise values for data entered into a user interface element associated with the user interface node.

5. The system of claim 4, wherein the one or more constraints comprise data types for data entered into the user interface element associated with the user interface node.

6. The system of claim 1, wherein the server computing device retrieves one or more user-specific data elements based upon the identifier associated with a user of the client computing device and updates at least one of the values in the user interface nodes using the user-specific data elements.

7. The system of claim 1, wherein inserting the metadata from the user interface nodes into the areas for insertion in the user interface template using the tree structure and the table data structure comprises:

traversing the tree data structure to assign an identifier from each user interface node in the tree structure to a corresponding area for insertion in the user interface template;

extracting the values, the constraints, and the metadata for each user interface node from the table data structure based upon the assigned identifier; and

inserting the metadata for each user interface node into the corresponding area for insertion in the user interface template.

8. The system of claim 1, wherein the anchor user interface node is a root of the tree data structure.

9. A computerized method of automatically rendering a customized computer graphical user interface using hyperconverged data structures, the method comprising:

receiving, from a client computing device, a request to generate a user interface, the request including an identifier associated with a user of the client computing device and an identifier associated with an application workflow;

determining, by the server computing device, a user interface template based upon the identifier associated with the application workflow, the template comprising a layout of a user interface screen with one or more areas for insertion of custom user interface elements and associated with one or more rules for arranging the custom user interface elements;

capturing, by the server computing device, a list of user interface nodes from a database, each user interface node comprising metadata for rendering a user interface element and including one or more values associated with the user interface element, each value having one or more constraints;

converting, by the server computing device, the user interface nodes into (i) a tree data structure based upon the rules from the user interface template, the tree data structure comprising an anchor user interface node and a plurality of child user interface nodes and defining hierarchical relationships among the user interface nodes, and (ii) a table data structure comprising a list of the identifiers for the nodes in the tree structure, the values, the constraints, and the metadata for the corresponding user interface node;

inserting, by the server computing device, the metadata from the user interface nodes into the areas for insertion in the user interface template using the tree data structure and the table data structure;

rendering, by the server computing device, a graphical user interface based upon the metadata contained in the user interface template for display at the client computing device; and

transmitting, by the server computing device, the rendered graphical user interface to the client computing device in response to the request.

10. The method of claim 9, wherein the one or more rules for arranging the custom user interface elements comprise a hierarchical relationship definition for two or more of the user interface nodes.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein the hierarchical relationship definition comprises a parent user interface node and one or more child user interface nodes.

12. The method of claim 9, wherein the one or more values for the user interface node comprise values for data entered into a user interface element associated with the user interface node.

13. The method of claim 12, wherein the one or more constraints comprise data types for data entered into the user interface element associated with the user interface node.

14. The method of claim 9, wherein the server computing device retrieves one or more user-specific data elements based upon the identifier associated with a user of the client computing device and updates at least one of the values in the user interface nodes using the user-specific data elements.

15. The method of claim 9, wherein inserting the metadata from the user interface nodes into the areas for insertion in the user interface template using the tree data structure and the table data structure comprises:

traversing the tree data structure to assign an identifier from each node in the tree data structure to a corresponding area for insertion in the user interface template;

extracting the values, the constraints, and the metadata for each user interface node from the table data structure based upon the assigned identifier; and

inserting the metadata for each user interface node into the corresponding area for insertion in the user interface template.

16. The method of claim 9, wherein the anchor user interface node is a root of the tree data structure.