Producing persistent representations of complex data structures

• US 6,096,095 A
• Filed: 06/04/1998
• Issued: 08/01/2000
• Est. Priority Date: 06/04/1998
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Halstead, Mark A. B.
• Primary Examiner(s): Teska, Kevin J.
• Assistant Examiner(s): BOOKER, KELVIN
• Application Number:
  US09/090,818
• Time in Patent Office: 789 Days
• Field of Search: 395/705, 395/704, 717/5, 345/440
• US Class Current: 717/107
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/4493 Object persistence

Abstract

The structure of a complex data object such as a multimedia presentation is stored in a persistent representation comprising a directly executable program. The instructions of the program are created by translating recorded method calls on a function library when the object is created. The structure of the object is recreated during playback by executing the program instructions in a stack-based virtual machine in a user'"'"'s computer. The persistent representation thus stores the structure as a series of operations for building the object, rather than as a static plan of the structure itself.

Claims

1. A system for producing a persistent represntation of a complex data object, comprising:

a library having a set of data types and methods for creating complex data objects, and augmented to include readable information concerning the methods;

an authoring tool for creating the data object by calling a sequence of methods from the library and for recording a sequence of code fragments derived from the readable information of the called methods; and

a program generator for assembling the code fragments into a program constituting the persistent representation of the data object.

3. A system according to claim 1, wherein some of the methods produce explicit results, and further including a dictionary of references to code fragments, each reference corresponding to one of the explicit results returned by a called method.

2. A system for producing a persistent representation of a complex data object, comprising:

a library having a set of data types and methods for creating complex data objects, and augmented to include additional information concerning the methods, wherein the additional information for each method includes the name of the method and the number of its arguments;

an authoring tool for creating the data object by calling a sequence of methods from the library and for recording a sequence of code fragments derived from the readable information of the called methods; and

a program generator for assembling the code fragments into a program constituting the persistent representation of the data object.

4. A system for producing a persistent representation of a complex data object comprising:

a library having a set of data types and methods for creating complex data objects, and augmented to include readable information concerning the methods;

an authoring tool for creating the data object by calling a sequence of methods from the library and for recording a sequence of code fragments derived from the readable information of the called methods, wherein each code fragment includes the name of a called method and a list of arguments for the called method; and

a program generator for assembling the code fragments into a program constituting the persistent representation of the data object.

5. A system according to claim 4, wherein each code fragment includes a key identifying the fragment.

6. A system according to claim 5, wherein an argument of one code fragment that is another code fragment comprises the key of the other fragment in the argument list of the one fragment.

7. A system according to claim 4, wherein each code fragment further includes a flag indicating whether or not that fragment can be reordered.

8. A method executed in a digital computer for producing a persistent representation of a multi-component data structure created by a designer with an authoring tool, by executing instructions in a suitably programmed digital computer, the method comprising:

recording a sequence of method calls made by the authoring tool for the data structure;

generating a list of code fragments from the method calls;

translating the code fragments into a sequence of instructions forming a program in an instruction set executable by a predefined interpreter;

storing the program as the representation of the data structure.

9. A method according to claim 8, wherein generating the sequence of code fragments comprises generating a separate code fragment for each method call.

10. A method executed in a digital computer for producing a persistent representation of a multi-component data structure created by a designer with an authoring tool, by executing instructions in a suitably programmed digital computer, the method comprising:

recording a sequence of method calls made by the authoring tool for the data structure;

generating a separate code fragment for each method call, including

recording the name of a function associated with the call;

recording any arguments of the function associated with the call; and

producing an key identifying the code fragment;

translating the code fragments into a sequence of instructions forming a program in an instruction set executable by a predefined interpreter; and

storing the program as the representation of the data structure.

11. A method according to claim 10, wherein generating the separate code fragment further comprises:

determining that the function produces an explicit result; and

recording a reference to the current fragment in a dictionary.

12. A method according to claim 10, wherein generating the separate code fragment further comprises:

determining that one of the arguments represents a result produced by another of the code fragments; and

recording the key of the other code fragment in the separate code fragment.

13. A method according to claim 12, wherein generating the separate code fragment further comprises searching a dictionary for a reference to the other code fragment.

14. A method executed in a digital computer for producing a persistent representation of a multi-component data structure created by a designer with an authoring tool, by executing instructions in a suitably programmed digital computer, the method comprising:

recording a sequence of method calls made by the authoring tool for the data structure;

generating a list of code fragments from the method calls;

reordering the sequence of the code fragments;

translating the code fragments into a sequence of instructions forming a program in an instruction set executable by a predefined interpreter; and

storing the program as the representation of the data structure.

15. A method according to claim 14, wherein code fragments producing side effects are not reordered.

16. A method executed in a digital computer for producing a persistent representation of a multi-component data structure created by a designer with an authoring tool, by executing instructions in a suitably programmed digital computer the method comprising:

recording a sequence of method calls made by the authoring tool for the data structure;

generating a list of code fragments from the method calls;

translating the code fragments into a sequence of instructions forming a program in an instruction set executable by a predefined interpreter, comprising, for each code fragment;

generating instruction code representing the name of one of the functions;

for each argument of the function, if any

if the argument is a constant, placing a representation thereof into the code fragment;

if the argument is a reference to another code fragment, repeating all of these steps for the other code fragment;

storing the program as the representation of the data structure.

17. A method executed in a digital computer for producing a persistent representation of the structure of a complex data object by executing instructions in a suitably programmed digital computer, the method comprising:

calling a plurality of methods from a predefined set of methods in a library so as to build the structure of the data object;

recording the sequence of the method calls as a list of code fragments;

translating the code fragments into a sequence of instructions forming a program in an instruction set executable by a predefined virtual machine;

storing the program as the representation of the data structure.

19. A method according to claim 17, wherein the virtual machine is a stack-based machine, and wherein the program represents a set of instructions directly executable by the virtual machine.

20. A method according to claim 17, wherein at least some of the method calls have arguments comprising methods called by other fragments, and wherein translating the code fragments comprises:

in a first pass, recording references to certain fragments serving as arguments to more than one other fragment;

generating temporary variables for the certain fragments;

in a second pass producing instructions from the temporary variables for the certain code fragments, wherein the instructions contain identifiers associated with the methods and representations of constants.

18. A method executed in a digital computer for producing a persistent representation of the structure of a complex data object by executing instructions in a suitably programmed digital computer, the method comprising:

calling a plurality of methods from a predefined set of methods in a library so as to build the structure of the data object, wherein at least some of the method calls have arguments comprising methods called by other fragments;

recording the sequence of the method calls as a list of code fragments;

translating the code fragments into a sequence of instructions forming a program in an instruction set executable by a predefined virtual machine, comprising

in a first pass, recording references to certain fragments serving as arguments to more than one other fragment;

generating temporary variables for the certain fragments;

in a second pass, producing instructions from the temporary variables for the certain code fragments; and

storing the program as the representation of the data structure.

21. A storage medium containing instructions and data executable by a suitably programmed computer for performing a method for producing a persistent representation of a multi-component data structure, the method comprising:

recording a sequence of method calls made by an authoring tool for the creation of the data structure;

generating a list of code fragments from the method calls;

translating the code fragments into a sequence of instructions forming a program in an instruction set executable by a predefined virtual machine;

storing the program as the representation of the data structure.

23. A storage medium according to claim 21, wherein at least some of the method calls have arguments comprising methods called by other fragments, and wherein translating the code fragments comprises:

in a first pass, recording references to certain fragments serving as arguments to more than one other fragment;

generating temporary variables for the certain fragments;

in a second pass, producing instructions from the temporary variables for the certain code fragments.

22. A storage medium containing instructions and data executable by a suitably programmed computer for performing a method for producing a persistent representation of a multi-component data structure, the method comprising:

recording a sequence of method calls made by an authoring tool for the creation of the data structure;

generating a list of code fragments from the method calls, wherein each code fragment includes the name of a called method and a list of arguments for the called method;

translating the code fragments into a sequence of instructions forming a program in an instruction set executable by a predefined virtual machine;

storing the program as the representation of the data structure.

24. A storage medium containing instructions and data executable by a suitably programmed computer for performing a set of predefined methods for constructing a complex data object, each of the methods further including augmented information describing the respective methods.

25. A storage medium according to claim 24, wherein the augmented information includes function names of the methods.

26. A storage medium according to claim 25, wherein the augmented information further includes the number of arguments required by the respective functions.

27. A storage medium according to claim 25, wherein the augmented information further includes an indication as to whether or not the respective functions produce explicit results.

28. A storage medium according to claim 24, wherein the methods relate to constructing multimedia presentations.