Teller/scanner system and method

• US 6,978,455 B1
• Filed: 07/29/1999
• Issued: 12/20/2005
• Est. Priority Date: 09/21/1998
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Unisys Corporation
• Original Assignee: Unisys Corporation
• Inventors: Borkowski, Joseph David, Ye, Xiaozhou, Morris, Weston
• Primary Examiner(s): Courtenay, III, St. John
• Assistant Examiner(s): Ho, Andy
• Application Number:
  US09/363,766
• Time in Patent Office: 2,336 Days
• Field of Search: 709/310, 709/101, 709/311, 709/102, 709/328, 709/100, 709/208, 709/223, 709/220, 718/1, 718/106
• US Class Current: 718/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2009/45595 Network integration; Enabling network access in virtual machine instances
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/45558 Hypervisor-specific management and integration aspects

Abstract

A system and method for interfacing a single host application with multiple machines to be controlled by the host application via a local area network minimizes the complexity of dealing with multiple controlled entities by utilizing a single virtual state machine manager communicating with the host application. The virtual machine manager communicates with the controlled machines via machine proxies in conjunction with a command cache state machine and a command cache, which stores previous action requests generated by the host application. A machine epoxy is created for physical controlled entity attached to the system.

Claims

1. An interface for enabling a single application program (304), resident on a control processor (302), to communicate with any one of a plurality of machines (300) to be controlled by the application program (304), the interface comprising:

a virtual machine manager (310) in communication with the application program (304) and with each of the plurality of machines (300) that is active and operative to present the plurality of active machines (300) as a single virtual machine to the application program (304), wherein the virtual machine manager (310) is further operative to create a machine proxy for each active machine to be controlled, each machine proxy in communication with its respective active controlled machine.

2. The interface of claim 1, wherein the machine proxies communicate with respective controlled machines via a computer network.

3. The interface of claim 2, further comprising a command cache in communication with the virtual machine manager for receiving commands from the application program, and for communicating to a machine to be controlled via a respective machine proxy as it is created by the virtual machine manager.

4. The interface of claim 3, further comprising a command cache state machine, wherein the command cache includes queued commands and wherein the virtual machine manager determines whether to store a received command or delete a queued command in the command cache based on the determination of the command cache state machine.

5. The interface of claim 1 further comprising a physical machine map in communication with the virtual machine manger, the physical machine map enabling the application program to determine, via the virtual machine manager, a physical identifier for each of the plurality of machines to be controlled.

6. The interface of claim 5, wherein the physical machine map maps the physical identifier of at least one of the plurality of machines to be controlled with a unique logical identifier determined by the application program.

7. The interface of claim 6, wherein the physical identifier comprises a serial number of a machine to be controlled.

8. The interface of claim 1 further comprising a universal interface coupling the application program to the virtual machine manager and the machine proxies such that a variety of different application programs may be used with the same virtual machine manager.

9. The interface of claim 8, wherein the virtual machine manager and the machine proxies communicate with the universal interface via semaphore-protected shared memory.

10. An interface for enabling a single host application program (304), resident on a control processor (302), to communicate with any one of a plurality of document processors (300) to be controlled by the host application program (304), the interface comprising:

a virtual machine manager (310) in communication with the host (304) and with each of the plurality of document processors (300) that is in an active state via a computer network (318), and operative to present the plurality of document processors (300) as a single virtual machine to the host (304), wherein the virtual machine manager (310) is further operative to create a machine proxy for each document processor indicating an active state, each machine proxy in communication with its respective active document processor via the computer network.

11. The interface of claim 10, wherein the computer network comprises a local area network (LAN).

12. The interface of claim 10, further comprising a command cache in communication with the virtual machine manager for receiving commands from the host, and for communicating the commands to a document processor via a respective machine proxy when the document processor indicates an active state, and further comprising a command cache state machine, wherein the command cache is loaded and unloaded with commands in accordance with a state of the command cache state machine.

13. The interface of claim 12 further comprising a physical machine map in communication with the virtual machine manager, the map enabling the host to determine, via the virtual machine manager, a physical identifier, such as a serial number, of any of the plurality of document processors.

14. The interface of claim 13, wherein the physical machine map maps the physical identifier of at least one of the plurality of document processors with a unique logical identifier determined by the host.

15. The interface of claim 10 further comprising an object-oriented exchange medium coupling the host to the virtual machine manager and the machine proxies, such that a variety of different host applications may be used with the same virtual machine manager.

16. A method of providing simplified communications among a host application program (304) and a plurality of physical machines (300) to be controlled by the host (304), the method comprising the steps of:

providing a virtual machine manager (310) in communication with the host (304) and with each of the plurality of physical machines (300);

creating, via the virtual machine manager, a machine proxy for each physical machine to be controlled and placing each created proxy in communication with its associated physical machine; and

providing a command cache in communication with the virtual machine manager for receiving commands from the host, and for communicating the commands to a machine to be controlled via a respective machine proxy as it is created by the virtual machine manager, wherein the command cache is loaded and unloaded with commands in accordance with a state of a command cache state machine, whereby the plurality of physical machines (300), via the virtual machine manager (310), appear as a single virtual unit to the host (304).

17. The method of claim 16, further comprising the steps of:

creating a unique logical identifier via the host for each physical machine to be controlled;

creating a physical machine map via the host, the machine map for associating the logical identifier for a physical machine to be controlled with a physical identifier of the physical machine to be controlled;

transmitting the physical identifier of the physical machine to its associated machine proxy; and

assigning the logical identifier to the physical machine via the virtual machine manager.

18. The method of claim 17, wherein the machine proxies communicate with their associated physical machines via a computer network.

19. The method of claim 18, wherein the host communicates with the virtual machine manager and the proxies via a universal interface.