Authoring tool for computer implemented decision management system
First Claim
1. A method for creating application programs for a computer-assisted decision management system, comprising:
- providing data including text, block references and conditional statements in program blocks addressable by unique names, a conditional statement within a program block constructed to accept a reference to another program block as a condition for evaluation;
providing answer choices for the application program in program blocks;
listing the names of program blocks on a display for selection; and
in response to selection of program blocks by an author, assembling the selected program blocks into a desired order to create an application program.
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Abstract
An authoring method and apparatus for creating an application for a decision management system such as a document assembly system. The method includes creating sets of question procedures, answer procedures and advice procedures for a particular application. When later executed, the procedures generate, respectively, questions, answer choices, and advice for a user of the application. Also created are procedures that may be referenced in on or more of the question, answer, or advice procedures for generating content based on an analysis of one or more answers previously provided by a user in response to a question. The content provided by these referenced procedures becomes part of the question, answer, or advice provided by the respective procedure making the reference. In this way the content of the questions, answers, and advice changes depending upon previous answers given by a user to previous questions. And because the question, answer, and advice procedures reference procedures rather than variables, the content provided by the referenced procedure is not limited to being merely a copy of an answer to a previous question.
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Citations
24 Claims
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1. A method for creating application programs for a computer-assisted decision management system, comprising:
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providing data including text, block references and conditional statements in program blocks addressable by unique names, a conditional statement within a program block constructed to accept a reference to another program block as a condition for evaluation; providing answer choices for the application program in program blocks; listing the names of program blocks on a display for selection; and in response to selection of program blocks by an author, assembling the selected program blocks into a desired order to create an application program.
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2. A computer-implemented authoring tool for creating an application for a document assembly system, comprising:
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a computer; a block editor stored in the computer for creating blocks for holding data in the form of text, references to other blocks and conditional statements, the blocks including question blocks for asking questions, answer choice blocks for accepting answers to questions, suggested answer blocks to provide suggested answers, question condition blocks to suppress the asking of inappropriate questions, help and context blocks to hold help or context, processing blocks to hold the logic of result processing, fact blocks to hold value assignments, and blocks to manage loop structures; an index stored in the computer for listing blocks created for the application; a workspace stored in the computer for entering the data into an opened block from the index; a selection mechanism stored in the computer for inserting a reference to an indexed block into the opened block; and a selection mechanism stored in the computer for inserting a conditional statement into the opened block, the conditional statement constructed to accept a reference to an indexed block as a condition for evaluation. - View Dependent Claims (3, 4, 5, 6)
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7. A method for creating an application for a computer-assisted decision management system, the method comprising the following steps:
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creating a set of question procedures for the application for asking questions of a user, one or more of the questions procedures containing a reference to a referenced procedure; creating a referenced procedure for a question procedure, the referenced procedure generating content literally different from but based on an analysis of one or more previous answers entered by a user in response to a question, the referenced procedure providing the content to the question procedure for use in generating a question; and storing the set of question procedures and referenced procedure on a computer-readable medium. - View Dependent Claims (8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14)
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15. A computer-implemented apparatus for creating an application for a computer-assisted decision management system, comprising:
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means for creating a set of question procedures for the application for asking questions of a user, one or more of the questions procedures containing a reference to a referenced procedure; means for creating a referenced procedure for a question procedure, the referenced procedure generating content literally different from but based on an analysis of one or more previous answers entered by a user in response to a question, the referenced procedure providing the content to the question procedure for use in generating a question; and means for storing the set of question procedures and referenced procedure on a computer-readable medium. - View Dependent Claims (16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22)
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23. A method for creating an application for a computer-assisted decision management system, the method comprising the following steps:
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creating a set of question procedures for the application for asking questions of a user, one or more of the questions procedures containing a reference to a referenced procedure; creating a referenced procedure for a question procedure, the referenced procedure generating content for the question based on an analysis of one or more previous answers given by a user in response to a question; and storing the question procedures and referenced procedure on a computer-readable medium.
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24. A computer-implemented apparatus for creating an application for a computer-assisted decision management system, comprising:
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means for creating a set of question procedures for the application for asking questions of a user, one or more of the questions procedures containing a reference to a referenced procedure; means for creating a referenced procedure for a question procedure, the referenced procedure generating content for the question based on an analysis of one or more previous answers given by a user in response to a question; and means for storing the question procedures and referenced procedure on a computer-readable medium.
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Specification