Systems and methods for generating tenant-specific properties for use in a provider-tenant environment

• US 7,680,825 B2
• Filed: 12/30/2005
• Issued: 03/16/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 12/30/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: SAP SE
• Original Assignee: SAP AG (SAP SE)
• Inventors: Becker, Wolfgang
• Primary Examiner(s): Fleurantin; Jean B
• Application Number:
  US11/320,748
• Publication Number:
  US 20070156700A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,537 Days
• Field of Search: 707 1- 10, 707100-1041, 707200-206, 711/154
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/958 Organisation or management of web site content, e.g. publishing, maintaining pages or automatic linking
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99948 Application of database or data structure, e.g. distributed, multimedia, or image

Abstract

Exemplary methods and systems may designate a data structure as tenant-specific or shared. By reviewing a plurality of data structures at the provider corresponding to a plurality of tenants, the provider may determine which of the plurality of data structures are specific to a first tenant of the plurality of tenants, and generate a tenant specific designation to identify a data structure as specific to the first tenant. Further, the provider may associate a data structure determined to be specific to the first tenant with the generated tenant specific designation. With this capability a provider-tenant system may separately store each tenants data.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method for designating, at a provider, a data structure as a tenant-specific data structure, the method comprising:

storing a plurality of data structures corresponding to a plurality of tenants at a first network-accessible storage location at a provider;

analyzing, at the provider, attributes of the plurality of data structures;

based on the analysis, determining which of the plurality of data structures are specific to a first tenant of the plurality of tenants;

generating a tenant-specific designation to identify a data structure of the plurality of data structures as specific to the first tenant;

appending the generated tenant-specific designation to the data structure determined to be specific to the first tenant; and

storing the appended data structure at a second network-accessible storage location at the provider.

2. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the tenant-specific designation is one of a string type, a character type, a boolean type, a date type, and a numeric type.

3. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, further comprising:

assigning each data structure associated with the tenant-specific designation to a tenant-specific data structure schema.

4. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, further comprising:

determining which of the plurality of data structures are common to the plurality of tenants; and

associating each data structure determined to be common to the plurality of tenants with a shared designation.

5. The computer-implemented method of claim 4, wherein the shared designation is one of a string type, a character type, a boolean type, a date type, and a numeric type.

6. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the plurality of data structures are in a table-based format.

7. A computer-implemented method for hosting a software application used by a plurality of tenants, wherein the software application comprises a plurality of data structures stored at a first network-accessible storage location at a provider, the method comprising:

determining which of the plurality of data structures are specific to a first tenant of the plurality of tenants based on attributes associated with the plurality of data structures;

appending a designation to a data structure determined to be specific to the first tenant;

storing the designated data structure at a second network-accessible storage location separate from the first storage location; and

hosting the software application for the first tenant by using the data structures stored at the first and second storage locations.

8. The computer-implemented method of claim 7, wherein the designation appended to:

the data structure is a tenant-specific designation that is one of a string type, a character type, a boolean type, a date type, and a numeric type.

9. The computer-implemented method of claim 7, wherein storing the designated data structure further includes:

assigning the designated data structure to a tenant-specific data structure schema.

10. The computer-implemented method of claim 7, further comprising:

determining which of the plurality of data structures are common to the plurality of tenants; and

associating each data structure determined to be common to the plurality of tenants with a shared designation.

11. The computer-implemented method of claim 10, wherein the shared designation is one of a string type, a character type, a boolean type, a date type, and a numeric type.

12. The computer-implemented method of claim 7, wherein the plurality of data structures are in a table-based format.

13. A system for designating a tenant-specific data structure comprising at least a processor, the system comprising:

means for storing a plurality of data structures corresponding to a plurality of tenants at a first network-accessible storage location at the provider;

means for analyzing, at the provider, attributes of the plurality of data structures corresponding to the plurality of tenants;

means for determining, based on the attributes, which of the plurality of data structures are specific to a first tenant of the plurality of tenants;

means for generating a tenant-specific designation to identify a data structure of the plurality of data structures as specific to the first tenant;

means for appending the generated tenant-specific designation to the data structure determined to be specific to the first tenant; and

means for storing the appended data structure at a second network-accessible storage location at the provider.

14. The system of claim 13, wherein the tenant-specific designation is one of a string type, a character type, a boolean type, a date type, and a numeric type.

15. The system of claim 13, further comprising:

means for assigning each data structure associated with the tenant-specific designation to a tenant-specific data structure schema.

16. The system of claim 13, further comprising:

means for determining which of the plurality of data structures are common to the plurality of tenants; and

means for associating each data structure determined to be common to the plurality of tenants with a shared designation.

17. The system of claim 13, wherein the shared designation is one of a string type, a character type, a boolean type, a date type, and a numeric type.