Isolation of user-interactive components

• US 8,220,002 B2
• Filed: 01/25/2008
• Issued: 07/10/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 01/25/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Rivard, John J, Hill, David Paul, Gustafsson, Niklas
• Primary Examiner(s): Truong, Lechi
• Application Number:
  US12/020,344
• Publication Number:
  US 20090193434A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,628 Days
• Field of Search: 719/310, 715/700, 707/792
• US Class Current: 719/310
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/451 Execution arrangements for user interfaces

Abstract

The isolation of user-interactive components form the logical components of an exemplary computing application environment is provided. In an illustrative implementation, an exemplary computing application environment comprises one or more user interface (UI) elements that run on an exemplary user-interface processing thread and application logic that illustratively operatively runs asynchronously on at least one other processing thread. In an illustrative implementation an isolation boundary is provided between an exemplary user interface and the application logic of the exemplary computing application environment. In the illustrative implementation, the isolation boundary can comprise an asynchronous view contract comprising a channel between an exemplary view layer of an exemplary user interface (e.g., one or more user-interactive components) and application logic.

Claims

1. In a multi-threaded architecture implemented at a computing system having one or more processors, a method for processing requests for application logic processing originating from user-interactive components in the multi-threaded architecture, the method comprising:

the computer system executing a first thread, the first thread comprising a user-interface thread that executes one or more user-interactive components;

the computer system executing a second thread, the second thread comprising a non-user-interface thread that asynchronously executes one or more application logic processes for the one or more user-interactive components;

the computer system providing an isolation boundary between the user-interface thread and the non-user-interface thread, the isolation boundary comprising an asynchronous view contract, the asynchronous view contract being configured to provide one or more request objects that facilitate communications between the one or more user-interactive components executing on the user-interface thread and the one or more application logic processes executing on the non-user-interface thread;

receiving, at the isolation boundary, a request from the one or more user-interactive components executing on the user-interface thread, the request expressed through the one or more request objects;

based on receiving the request, updating control data at the isolation boundary to facilitate asynchronous processing of the request by the one or more application logic processes executing on the non-user-interface thread;

detecting, at the non-user-interface thread, a condition of the control data to generate application logic processing state data;

providing the application logic processing state data to the one or more user-interactive components as expressed by the one or more request objects; and

correlating messages by the view contract sent by the one or more user-interactive components.

2. The method as recited in claim 1, further comprising:

synchronizing the data between both sides of the view contract.

3. The method as recited in claim 1 further comprising:

asynchronous invocation of the one or more application logic processes by the one or more user-interactive components.

4. A computer-readable storage device having stored thereon computer executable instructions which when executed by one or more processors of a computer system, cause the computer system to implement a method for processing requests for application logic processing originating from user-interactive components in a multi-threaded architecture, the method comprising:

executing a first thread at the computer system, the first thread comprising a user-interface thread that executes one or more user-interactive components;

executing a second thread at the computer system, the second thread comprising a non-user-interface thread that asynchronously executes one or more application logic processes for the one or more user-interactive components;

providing an isolation boundary between the user-interface thread and the non-user-interface thread at the computer system, the isolation boundary comprising an asynchronous view contract, the asynchronous view contract being configured to provide one or more request objects that facilitate communications between the one or more user-interactive components executing on the user-interface thread and the one or more application logic processes executing on the non-user-interface thread;

receiving, at the isolation boundary, a request from the one or more user-interactive components executing on the user-interface thread, the request expressed through the one or more request objects and, based on the request, updating control data at the isolation boundary to facilitate asynchronous processing of the request by the one or more application logic processes executing on the non-user-interface thread;

detecting, at the non-user-interface thread, a condition of the control data to generate application logic processing state data; and

providing the application logic processing state data to the one or more user-interactive components as expressed by the one or more request objects; and

correlating messages by the view contract sent by the one or more user-interactive components.

5. A computer system, comprising:

one or more processors;

one or more computer computer-readable storage media storing computer-executable instructions which, when executed by the one or more processors, are configured to implement a method for processing requests for application logic processing originating from user-interactive components in a multi-threaded architecture, including the following;

instantiating a first thread at the computer system, the first thread comprising a user-interface thread that executes one or more user-interactive components;

instantiating a second thread at the computer system, the second thread comprising a non-user-interface thread that asynchronously executes one or more application logic processes for the one or more user-interactive components;

enforcing an isolation boundary between the user-interface thread and the non-user-interface thread at the computer system, the isolation boundary comprising an asynchronous view contract, the asynchronous view contract being configured to provide one or more request objects that facilitate communications between the one or more user-interactive components executing on the user-interface thread and the one or more application logic processes executing on the non-user-interface thread;

receiving, at the isolation boundary, a request from the one or more user-interactive components executing on the user-interface thread, the request expressed through the one or more request objects and, based on the request, updating control data at the isolation boundary to facilitate asynchronous processing of the request by the one or more application logic processes executing on the non-user-interface thread;

detecting, at the non-user-interface thread, a condition of the control data to generate application logic processing state data;

providing the application logic processing state data to the one or more user-interactive components as expressed by the one or more request objects; and

correlating messages by the view contract sent by the one or more user-interactive components.