Structuring of temporary systems

• US 7,757,949 B2
• Filed: 06/03/2009
• Issued: 07/20/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 11/27/2002
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: SAP SE
• Original Assignee: SAP AG (SAP SE)
• Inventors: Irle, Klaus, Heusermann, Knut, Muehl, Gordon, Kienle, Walter G.
• Primary Examiner(s): Lee; Michael G
• Assistant Examiner(s): SHARIFZADA, ALI R
• Application Number:
  US12/477,439
• Publication Number:
  US 20090236421A1
• Time in Patent Office: 412 Days
• Field of Search: 235/375, 235/385, 235/492, 707/1, 707/2, 707/102
• US Class Current: 235/385
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/06 Resources, workflows, human or project management; Enterprise or organisation planning; Enterprise or organisation modelling
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99931 Database or file accessing
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99932 Access augmentation or optimizing
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99943 Generating database or data structure, e.g. via user interface

Abstract

A method for structuring a temporary system includes receiving information obtained by interrogating a tag on an article and establishing a relationship between the article and one or more other articles in the temporary system based at least in part upon the information obtained by interrogating the tag. The information obtained by interrogating the tag regards the article.

Claims

1. A method for structuring a system, comprising:

receiving, at a data processing device, information characterizing a first article as having a first characteristic, wherein the information is received by interrogating a tag associated with the first article using an interrogation device;

accessing a machine-readable description of a system of articles, the system description comprising

a collection of data objects, each data object representing an article in the system, and

a collection of descriptions of relationships between the articles in the system;

the data processing device identifying a first relationship between a second article and a third article in the system of articles, wherein;

the second and the third article are represented by second and third data objects in the collection of data objects,

the second data object characterizes the second article as having the first characteristic, and

the first relationship characterizes one or more of a chemical interaction, an operational compatibility, and an electrical compatibility between the second article and the third article;

establishing a second relationship between the first article and the third article, the second relationship emulating the one or more of the chemical interaction, the operational compatibility, and the electrical compatibility between the second article and the third article, wherein establishing the second relationship comprises the data processing device writing the second relationship into the machine-readable description of a system of articles;

the data processing device identifying a third relationship between a fourth article and a fifth article in the system of articles, wherein;

the fourth and the fifth article are represented by fourth and fifth data objects in the collection,

the fourth data object characterizes the fourth article as having the first characteristic,

the third relationship characterizes one or more of a chemical interaction, an operational compatibility, and an electrical compatibility between the fourth article and the fifth article; and

establishing a fourth relationship between the first article and the fifth article, the fourth relationship emulating the one or more of the chemical interaction, the operational compatibility, and the electrical compatibility between the fourth article and the fifth article, wherein establishing the fourth relationship comprises the data processing device writing the fourth relationship into the machine-readable description of a system of articles.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising identifying the second data object in the collection of data objects based on the first characteristic of the first article and based on a second characteristic of the first article.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the first characteristic is a category of the first article.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the first characteristic is a functional characteristic of the first article.

5. The method of claim 1, further comprising creating a new first data object representing the first article.

6. The method of claim 1, further comprising adding the first data object to the collection of data objects in the system description.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the first characteristic comprises information describing at least one of a make or a model of the first article.

8. A computer program product, tangibly embodied in one or more machine-readable data storage devices, for structuring a system, the computer program product being operable to cause one or more data processing apparatuses to perform operations, the operations comprising:

receiving information describing a first characteristic of a first article from a tag associated with the first article;

accessing a machine-readable description of a system of articles, the system description comprising

a collection of descriptions that each describes articles in the system, and

a collection of chemical interaction descriptions that each describe a chemical interaction between at least two articles in the system;

creating a new first description to represent the first article;

identifying a second description in the collection of descriptions, wherein the second description describes a second article in the system;

establishing a first chemical interaction description that describes a first chemical interaction involving the first article based on the second article sharing the first characteristic;

identifying a third description in the collection of descriptions, wherein the third description describes a third article in the system;

establishing a second chemical interaction description that describes a second chemical interaction involving the first article based on the third article sharing the first characteristic.

9. The computer program product of claim 8, wherein the operations further comprise establishing that the first article is new to the system of articles based on the information received from the tag.

10. The computer program product of claim 8, wherein the operations further comprise populating the first description with information received from the tag.

11. The computer program product of claim 8, wherein the first characteristic and the second characteristic are described in a description of a category of the first article.

12. The computer program product of claim 8, wherein the operations further comprise deploying the first article and other articles in the system without retrieving information regarding the first article from a separate database.

13. The computer program product of claim 8, wherein the descriptions that describe articles comprise data objects that represent articles.

14. The computer program product of claim 8, further comprising:

identifying a fourth description in the collection of descriptions, wherein the fourth description describes a fourth article in the system;

establishing an operational compatibility relationship description that describes operational compatibility of the first article based on the fourth article sharing the first characteristic.

15. The computer program product of claim 8, further comprising:

identifying a fourth description in the collection of descriptions, wherein the fourth description describes a fourth article in the system;

establishing a relationship indicating that the first article is a workpiece of the fourth article based on the fourth description.

16. A method for operating a system comprising

a collection of tangible articles each tagged with a machine-readable tag, the machine-readable tags storing machine-readable identification information, the machine-readable identification information identifying the tagged tangible articles,

an interrogation device configured to read machine-readable tags, and

a data storage device storing a collection of data objects, the data objects representing the tangible articles and describing characteristics of the tangible articles and relationships between the tangible articles, the method comprising:

interrogating a first tangible article using the interrogation device, the interrogation yielding information characterizing a first characteristic of the first tangible article;

identifying, in the collection, a data object representing a second tangible article, the data object describing that the second tangible article has the first characteristic and a relationship with a third tangible article in the collection;

identifying, in the collection, a data object representing a fourth tangible article, the data object describing that the fourth tangible article has the first characteristic and a relationship with a fifth tangible article in the collection;

adding a new data object to the collection of data objects to represent the first tangible article, the new data object describing relationships between the new data object and the third tangible article and the fifth tangible article.

17. The method of claim 16, wherein the first characteristic comprises a category of the first tangible article.

18. The method of claim 16, wherein adding the new data object to the collection comprises adding the new data object to describe that the first tangible article interacts chemically with the third tangible article.

19. The method of claim 16, wherein adding the new data object to the collection comprises adding the new data object to describe that the first tangible article is operationally compatible with the third tangible article.

20. The method of claim 16, wherein adding the new data object to the collection comprises adding the new data object to describe that the first tangible article interacts mechanically with the third tangible article.