Methods and apparatus for business rules authoring and operation employing a customizable vocabulary

• US 7,444,314 B2
• Filed: 12/01/2003
• Issued: 10/28/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 12/01/2003
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Chan, Hoi Y., Fokoue-Nkoutche, Achille B., Rouvellou, Isabelle M., Degenaro, Louis R., Linehan, Mark H., Diament, Judah M., Weber, Samuel M., Rajpurohit, Arvind, Kerr, Charles A. Jr.
• Primary Examiner(s): Hirt; Joseph P.
• Assistant Examiner(s): Fernandez Rivas; Omar F
• Application Number:
  US10/725,352
• Publication Number:
  US 20050119984A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,793 Days
• Field of Search: 706/16, 706/19, 706 45- 48, 706/903, 706/919, 706/922, 717100-106, 717/117, 717/142, 700/90, 700/103, 700/104, 705/1, 705 7- 11
• US Class Current: 706/47
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/31 Programming languages or programming paradigms

Abstract

Methods and apparatus for authoring and executing an individualized language business rule. In one embodiment, a method comprises creating at least one individualized language resource, creating at least one individualized language rule referencing at least one of said individualized language resource, and transforming said at least one individualized language rule into computer executable format.

Claims

1. A method of authoring and executing an individualized language business rule, the method comprising:

creating a plurality of individualized vocabularies, each of plurality of individualized vocabularies comprising at least one individualized vocabulary term that is a noun, a verb, or a sentence fragment, said at least one individualized vocabulary term being mapped onto at least one executable object;

creating the individualized language business rule, where the individualized language business rule references at least one individualized vocabulary term from one of said plurality of individualized vocabularies, where said creating comprises;

receiving a selection from an end-user of said one of the plurality of individualized vocabularies;

creating a rule set input group and a rule set output group, each of the rule set input group and the rule set output group comprising individualized vocabulary terms that are available to the end-user for building the individualized language business rule, where the individualized vocabulary terms are limited to individualized vocabulary terms contained in the one of said plurality of individualized vocabularies that was selected by the end-user such that at least one of the rule set input group and the rule set output group includes the at least one individualized vocabulary term from the one of said plurality of individualized vocabularies;

creating at least one individualized rule template; and

creating at least one individualized rule from said at least one individualized rule template, based on end-user-selected inputs and outputs to the individualized rule template, the end-user-selected inputs and outputs being selected by the end-user from the rule set input group and the rule set output group, respectively, where at least one of the end-user-selected inputs and the end-user-selected outouts includes the at least one individualized vocabulary term from the one of said plurality of individualized vocabularies;

organizing said at least one individualized vocabulary term from said one of said plurality of vocabularies and said at least one individualized language business rule into at least one individualized language rule set; and

transforming said at least one individualized language business rule into computer executable format.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein creating at least one individualized language business rule referencing at least one of said individualized vocabulary term from one of said plurality of individualized vocabularies further comprises preventing a syntactically incorrect individualized language statement from being authored.

3. The method of claim 1, further comprising deploying said at least one transformed executable to a runtime environment and executing said at least one transformed individualized language business rule.

4. The method of claim 3, further comprising executing at least one non-individualized language business rule.

5. The method of claim 3, further comprising coordinating and cooperating by a runtime engine with other rules engines in a runtime environment.

6. The method of claim 1, further comprising transforming said at least one of an individualized vocabulary term, an individualized language business rule, an individualized rule template, and individualized language rule set into a standardized format.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein the at least one individualized language rule set influences at least one of application behavior and application state.

8. The method of claim 7, further comprising directly or indirectly linking an application to an execution of at least one individualized language rule set.

9. The method of claim 8, further comprising creating a type-safe linkage between an application and said at least one individualized language rule set.

10. The method of claim 9, further comprising deploying said type-safe linkage in a runtime environment.

11. The method of claim 10, further comprising finding, updating and deleting en item contained within said standardized format.

12. The method of claim 9, further comprising employing said type-safe linkage to select said at least one individualized rule set based on externalized criteria.

13. The method of claim 9, further comprising transforming said type-safe linkage into a standardized format.