Method of retrieving schemas for interpreting documents in an electronic commerce system

• US 6,591,260 B1
• Filed: 01/28/2000
• Issued: 07/08/2003
• Est. Priority Date: 01/28/2000
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Red Hat, Inc. (International Business Machines Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Commerce One Operations Incorporated (Proactis Holdings Plc)
• Inventors: Venkat, Ramshankar, Schwarzhoff, Kelly
• Primary Examiner(s): AMSBURY, WAYNE P
• Application Number:
  US09/493,954
• Time in Patent Office: 1,257 Days
• Field of Search: 707/2, 707/10
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 40/02 Banking, e.g. interest calculation or account maintenance credit or loans G06Q40/03
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99932 Access augmentation or optimizing

Abstract

A method and computer system are described for conducting commercial transactions by the exchange of electronic documents. The computer system includes a transaction services network, which comprises a plurality of transaction servers for providing services to support commercial transactions. Trading partners operate servers which communicate with the transaction services network via the Internet. The electronic documents are exchanged between trading partners engaged in a transaction. The documents are written in a markup language such as XML. The tags used in the document instances are defined in schemas. Each schema defines a document type, which corresponds to a type of transaction. An enhanced type of XML schema may be used which supports integrity constraints and polymorphism. Schemas are identified by the use of Uniform Resource Names. XML processors residing on transaction servers or trading partner servers parse document instances by retrieving the URNs corresponding to the schemas used to interpret the document. The URNs are converted to location-specific URIs in order to locate the schemas. URNs are resolved to location-specific URIs by use of the LDAP protocol. URNs may be converted to LDAP URLs which are used to search LDAP compliant directories. The directories serve as registries for the location-specific URI values corresponding to the URNs.

Claims

1. A method of processing documents in a distributed electronic commerce computing system, the method comprising:

creating an electronic document, the document containing a network location independent identifier of a commerce schema, the commerce schema defining validity constraints for interpreting the electronic document;

processing the document, including resolving the network location independent identifier to determine a hierarchically resolvable network location dependent identifier;

using the location specific identifier to access the commerce schema;

using the commerce schema to interpret the document.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the electronic document is written in a markup language.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein the markup language comprises XML.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the network location independent identifier comprises a Uniform Resource Name (URN).

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the network location specific identifier comprises a Uniform Resource Locator (URL).

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the network location independent identifier is resolved by use of a directory access protocol.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein the directory access protocol is Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP).

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the document corresponds to at least one of a purchase order, a purchase order acknowledgement, an order status check, an availability check, a price check, an invoice, an invoice acknowledgement.

9. A computer network system for exchanging electronic documents, wherein the electronic documents are written in a schema-based markup language, the computer network system including a first server, a second server, a third server, and a fourth server, the computer network system comprising:

memory for storing a first schema, the first schema comprising a file which defines tags in the markup language, wherein the memory for storing the first schema resides on the first server in the computer network system;

memory for storing a document instance written in the markup language, the memory for storing the document instance residing on the second server in the computer network system, wherein the document instance is interpreted by use of the first schema, and the document instance contains a location independent identifier for the first schema;

a parser for the markup language, the parser comprising a computer program residing on the third server connected in the computer network system, wherein the parser receives the document instance from the second server;

a directory service in communication with the parser, the directory service residing on the fourth server in the computer system;

wherein the parser processes the document instance by retrieving the location independent identifier for the first schema, and searches for a corresponding location specific identifier in the directory service.

10. The computer system of claim 9, wherein the directory service includes a plurality of nodes arranged in a tree data structure.

11. The computer system of claim 10, wherein the location specific identifier is contained in a leaf of the tree data structure.

12. The computer system of claim 10, wherein the schema based markup language comprises XML.

13. The computer system of claim 10, wherein the processor searches for the location specific identifier in the directory server by use of a Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP).

14. The computer system of claim 10, wherein the directory server is LDAP compliant.

15. The computer system of claim 14, wherein the directory server comprises an x.500 directory server.

16. The computer system of claim 14, wherein the content of the document includes information to facilitate a commercial transaction.

17. The computer system of claim 16, wherein the commercial transaction is at least one of a purchase order, a purchase order acknowledgement, an order status check, an availability check, a price check, an invoice, an invoice acknowledgement.

18. The computer system of claim 16, wherein the first, second, and third servers are administered by trading partners in a commercial transaction.

19. The computer system of claim 16, wherein the location specific identifier comprises a Uniform Resource Identifier (URI) indicating a physical location for the schema.

20. The computer system of claim 19, wherein the URI comprises an HTTP site.

21. The computer system of claim 19, wherein the URI comprises a file location.

22. The computer system of claim 19, wherein the URI comprises an FTP site.

23. The computer system of claim 10, wherein a first node in the plurality of nodes resides in a first server from the plurality of servers, and a second node in the plurality of nodes resides in a second server from the plurality of servers.

24. A method of processing document instances of a markup language, the method comprising:

retrieving a URN for a schema from a document instance, wherein the document instance is to be interpreted by use of the schema;

converting the URN to an LDAP URL;

searching for a URI corresponding to the schema in an LDAP directory, wherein the LDAP URL is used as a primary key in the directory;

retrieving the schema from a physical location indicated by the URI;

interpreting the document instance with the schema.

25. The method of claim 24, wherein the markup language comprises XML.

26. The method of claim 24, wherein the LDAP directory comprises an x.500 directory.

27. The method of claim 24, wherein the document instance describes a commercial transaction.

28. The method of claim 27, wherein the commercial transaction is at least one of a purchase order, a purchase order acknowledgement, an order status check, an availability check, a price check, an invoice, an invoice acknowledgement.

29. The method of claim 24, wherein the LDAP directory has the structure of an LDAP directory tree, wherein each leaf in the LDAP directory tree contains a URI for a schema.

30. The method of claim 29, wherein the LDAP directory includes a distributed directory.

31. The method of claim 24, wherein the URI comprises an HTTP site.

32. The method of claim 24, wherein the URI comprises an FTP site.

33. The method of claim 24, wherein the URI comprises a file location.

34. In a computer system for electronic commerce, a collection of electronic documents, wherein the documents are written in a markup language, the documents comprising:

a first document schema, the first document schema defining a first collection of tags;

a second document schema, the second document schema defining a second collection of tags, such that a tag from the second collection of tags extends a definition of a tag in the first collection of tags;

a document instance, the document instance further comprising

an first identifier for the first schema

a second identifier for the second schema

text embedded with a plurality of tags from the first collection of tags and a plurality of tags from the second collection of tags, the plurality of tags from the second collection including the tag from the second collection of tags which extends the definition of the tag in the first collection of tags.

35. The documents of claim 34, wherein the first and second identifiers comprise URNs for the first and second schemas, respectively.

36. The documents of claim 35, wherein the markup language comprises XML.

37. The documents of claim 35, wherein the first document schema describes a commercial transaction.

38. The documents of claim 37, wherein the commercial transaction is at least one of a purchase order, a purchase order acknowledgement, an order status check, an availability check, a price check, an invoice, an invoice acknowledgement.

39. A computer system for processing document instances of a markup language, the computer system comprising:

means for retrieving a URN for a schema from a document instance, wherein the schema comprises a file containing definitions for tags in the markup language, and the document instance is to be interpreted by use of the schema;

means for converting the URN to a location-specific URI;

means for retrieving the schema from the location-specific URI.

40. The computer system of claim 39, wherein the means for converting the URN to the location-specific URI comprises means for converting the URN to an LDAP URL.

41. The computer system of claim 40, wherein the means for converting the URN to the location-specific URI comprises means for searching an LDAP directory with the LDAP URL.

42. A computer network system for processing XML documents, the computer network system comprising:

a communications channel;

one or more XML servers for interpreting XML documents, wherein each of the one or more XML servers includes an XML parser for parsing XML documents, and each of the one or more XML servers is in communication with the communications channel;

a directory server, wherein the directory server maps a plurality of URNs identifying a plurality of XML schemas to a plurality of URIs which locate the plurality of XML schemas, wherein the directory server is in communication with the communications channel.

43. The computer network system of claim 42, wherein the communications channel includes a local area network (LAN).

44. The computer network system of claim 42, wherein the communications channel includes a wide area network (WAN).

45. The computer network system of claim 42, wherein the communications channel includes the Internet.

46. The computer network system of claim 42, wherein the communications channel includes an Ethernet connection.

47. The computer network system of claim 42, wherein the directory server comprises an LDAP directory server.