Application building

• US 8,930,879 B2
• Filed: 06/03/2009
• Issued: 01/06/2015
• Est. Priority Date: 06/03/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Fernandez, Roland L., Robertson, George G., Fisher, Danyel A., Robbins, Daniel C., Nachmanson, Lev B.
• Primary Examiner(s): Wong, Don
• Assistant Examiner(s): ORTIZ, DERIC OMAR
• Application Number:
  US12/477,154
• Publication Number:
  US 20100313181A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,043 Days
• Field of Search: 717/100
• US Class Current: 717/100
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/20 Software design

Abstract

The described implementations relate to unified application building. In one implementation unified application building tools can include a unifying component model configured to communicate with a set of components that are supported by different frameworks. The unified application building tools can also include a unification engine configured to bind events between individual components in a unified manner that is independent of an individual framework upon which individual components are supported.

Claims

1. A computer-readable storage media having instructions stored thereon that when executed by a computing device cause the computing device to perform acts, the acts comprising:

allowing a user to define a selected domain in which to build an application;

presenting an interface that provides at least two levels of abstraction to the user, wherein the at least two levels of abstraction comprise a designer level of abstraction where components are presented graphically and a developer level of abstraction where the components are presented textually;

receiving, via the interface, a user input identifying an individual level of abstraction selected by the user;

presenting a set of domain-specific components supported by different frameworks having different associated application programming interfaces (APIs), wherein the set of domain-specific components are presented at the individual level of abstraction selected by the user and the user can select individual components from the set to build the application;

receiving a first user selection of a first domain-specific component supported by a first framework having an associated first API and a second user selection of a second domain-specific component supported by a second framework having an associated second API;

building the application and including, in the application, both the first domain-specific component supported by the first framework having the associated first API and the second domain-specific component supported by the second framework having the associated second API; and

executing the application by providing first instructions to the first domain-specific component in accordance with the associated first API and providing second instructions to the second domain-specific component in accordance with the associated second API.

2. The computer-readable storage media of claim 1, wherein the allowing comprises:

displaying a list of domains, the list of domains including the selected domain; and

receiving a further user selection identifying the selected domain from the list.

3. The computer-readable storage media of claim 1, wherein the presenting comprises presenting the domain-specific components in a uniform manner that is independent of the different frameworks.

4. The computer-readable storage media of claim 1, the acts further comprising:

receiving a third user selection of a third domain-specific component supported by a third framework having an associated third API;

including, in the application, the third domain-specific component supported by the third framework having the associated third API with the first domain-specific component supported by the first framework having the associated first API and the second domain-specific component supported by the second framework having the associated second API; and

executing the application by providing third instructions to the third domain-specific component in accordance with the associated third API.

5. The computer-readable storage media of claim 1, wherein the first framework is an internet application framework and the second framework is a video game framework.

6. The computer-readable storage media of claim 1, the acts further comprising:

in a first instance when the individual level of abstraction selected by the user is the designer level of abstraction, displaying graphical representations of the first domain-specific component and the second domain-specific component without displaying first textual code of the first domain-specific component and without displaying second textual code of the second domain-specific component; and

in a second instance when the individual level of abstraction selected by the user is the developer level of abstraction, displaying the first textual code and the second textual code without displaying the graphical representations.

7. A method performed by a computing device, the method comprising:

displaying a user interface to a user, the user interface having a design space and a component space, the component space displaying a library of components that can be utilized to build an application, wherein a first one of the components displayed in the component space relies on a first framework and not a second framework and a second one of the components displayed in the component space relies on the second framework and not the first framework;

receiving user selections in the component space identifying the first component from the library that relies on the first framework and the second component from the library that relies on the second framework;

responsive to the user selections, displaying, in the design space;

a first identifier of the first component from the library that relies on the first framework, and

a second identifier of the second component from the library that relies on the second framework; and

building the application by binding the first component that relies on the first framework to the second component that relies on the second framework.

8. The method of claim 7, further comprising:

receiving user inputs specifying levels of abstraction for displaying individual components in the library; and

displaying the individual components at the specified levels of abstraction.

9. The method of claim 7, further comprising:

persisting the binding of the first component to the second component in a file that is separate from the first component and separate from the second component.

10. The method of claim 9, further comprising:

executing the application by;

reading the file,

identifying the binding in the file, and

communicating data from the first component to the second component by interpreting between a first application programming interface of the first component and a second application programming interface of the second component.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein the executing the application comprises detecting that the first component has triggered an event that is bound to the second component and the interpreting comprises instructing the second component to set a value of the second component to a parameter value of the event triggered by the first component.

12. A system, comprising:

one or more processing devices; and

one or more computer-readable storage media storing computer-readable instructions that, when executed by the one or more processing devices, cause the one or more processing devices to;

receive user inputs specifying a visual design of an application having multiple components, the visual design including a first component that is supported by a first application programming interface (API) and a second component that is supported by a second API that is different than the first API, wherein the first component does not rely on the second API and the second component does not rely on the first API;

display the visual design to the user, including the first component supported by the first API and the second component supported by the second API;

bind an event between the first component that is supported by the first API and the second component that is supported by the second API;

persist the visual design of the application in a file that indicates the event is bound between the first component that is supported by the first API and the second component that is supported by the second API; and

execute the application by running the file and communicating the event from the first component supported by the first API to the second component supported by the second API,

wherein the communicating the event from the first component to the second component comprises interpreting between the first API and the second API as the application is running.

13. The system of claim 12, wherein the computer-readable instructions cause the one or more processing devices to execute the application by running the file without compiling the file into a different language.

14. The system of claim 12, wherein the computer-readable instructions cause the one or more processing devices to execute the application by compiling the file into C++ or C#.

15. The system of claim 12, wherein the computer-readable instructions cause the one or more processing devices to:

receive further user input specifying a third component that is supported by a third API that is different than the first API and the second API to include in the visual design; and

display the visual design to the user, the displayed visual design including the third component supported by the third API shown with the first component supported by the first API and the second component supported by the second API.

16. The system of claim 15, wherein the first component relies on a first object model, the second component relies on a second object model, and the third component relies on a third object model, the first object model, second object model, and third object model comprising three distinct object models.

17. The system of claim 16, wherein the computer-readable instructions cause the one or more processing devices to provide a unified object model and underlying framework that executes the application by interacting with the first component, the first API, the first object model, the second component, the second API, the second object model, the third component, the third API, and the third object model.

18. The system of claim 16, wherein computer-readable instructions cause the one or more processing devices to build the application without receiving additional user inputs that provide code for calling the first API, the second API, or the third API.

19. The system of claim 18, wherein the first component provides color picking functionality that is supported by the first API.

20. The system of claim 12, wherein the computer-readable instructions cause the one or more processing devices to display the first component supported by the first API and the second component supported by the second API in a user interface view of a development environment.