Reformatting legacy system work orders with highlighted process compliance

• US 9,672,521 B1
• Filed: 12/07/2012
• Issued: 06/06/2017
• Est. Priority Date: 12/07/2012
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: The Boeing Co.
• Original Assignee: The Boeing Co.
• Inventors: Stevens, Andrew P.
• Primary Examiner(s): Paula, Cesar
• Assistant Examiner(s): NGUYEN, LUU-PHUONG T
• Application Number:
  US13/708,920
• Time in Patent Office: 1,642 Days
• Field of Search: 715200
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/0727 in a storage system, e.g. in a DASD or network based storage system drivers for digital recording or reproducing units G06F3/06; circuits for error detection or correction within digital recording or reproducing units G11B20/18; for distributed storage of data in networks, e.g. transport arrangements for network file system [NFS], storage area networks [SAN] or network attached storage [NAS], H04L67/1097
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/00 Information retrieval; Database structures therefor; File system structures therefor
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/93 Document management systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/972 Access to data in other repository systems, e.g. legacy data or dynamic Web page generation
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 17/40 Data acquisition and logging for input to computer G06F3/00
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/00 Input arrangements for transferring data to be processed into a form capable of being handled by the computer; Output arrangements for transferring data from processing unit to output unit, e.g. interface arrangements
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/00 Handling natural language data speech analysis or synthesis, speech recognition G10L
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/103 Formatting, i.e. changing of presentation of documents automatic justification G06F40/189; automatic line break hyphenation G06F40/191
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/134 Hyperlinking
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 5/00 Methods or arrangements for data conversion without changing the order or content of the data handled
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/06 Resources, workflows, human or project management; Enterprise or organisation planning; Enterprise or organisation modelling
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/06311 Scheduling, planning or task assignment for a person or group
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/10 Office automation; Time management
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/018 Certifying business or products

Abstract

A data system comprises a legacy system for storing work orders and process data; and a computer-based interface module for retrieving the work orders from the legacy system, reformatting the retrieved work orders to highlight words corresponding to process compliance and insert hyperlinks to process data referenced by the work orders, and presenting the reformatted work orders with the highlighted words and the hyperlinks.

Claims

1. A data system comprising:

a legacy system for storing work orders and process data; and

a computer-based interface module for retrieving the work orders from the legacy system;

reformatting the retrieved work orders to highlight words corresponding to process compliance and insert hyperlinks to process data referenced by the work orders; and

presenting the reformatted work orders with the highlighted words and the hyperlinks.

2. The data system of claim 1, wherein the interface module highlights words to increase noticeability of the words to ensure at least one of production conformance and safety compliance.

3. The data system of claim 2, wherein the interface module highlights words including cautions, notes and requirements.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein the interface module retrieves, formats, and presents in real time.

5. The system of claim 1, wherein the interface module reformats the work orders without modifying the work orders and process data stored in the legacy system.

6. The system of claim 1, wherein the interface module prompts a user to identify a work order, retrieves the identified work order from the legacy system, and reformats the retrieved work order.

7. The system of claim 1, wherein the legacy system does not provide a windows-based graphical user interface (GUI), and wherein the interface module provides a windows-based/web-based GUI to identify work orders for retrieval and to display the reformatted work orders.

8. The system of claim 1, wherein the interface module informs the legacy system as to when a work order has been completed.

9. The system of claim 1, wherein the interface module parses text in the retrieved work orders, and compares the parsed text to a list of words and codes to identify words to be highlighted and hyperlinked in the reformatted work orders.

10. The system of claim 1, wherein the work orders include aircraft installation plans, and wherein the interface module searches the retrieved installation plans for words identifying drawings, specifications and standards, canned notes, certification requirements, and business policies, procedures and processes.

11. An aircraft facility comprising aircraft tooling and the data system of claim 1.

12. A method of using work orders and process data stored in a legacy storage system, the method comprising using a computer to retrieve the work orders from the legacy system;

reformat the retrieved work orders to highlight words corresponding to process compliance and insert hyperlinks to process data referenced by the work orders; and

present the reformatted work orders with the highlighted words and the hyperlinks.

13. The method of claim 12, wherein the reformatted work orders are used to perform tasks in a commercial aircraft factory or depot.

14. The method of claim 13, wherein the reformatted work orders are used to operate tooling in the factory or depot.

15. The method of claim 12, wherein the computer highlights words to ensure at least one of production conformance and safety compliance with respect to a commercial aircraft.

16. An article comprising computer memory encoded with non-transitory data for instructing a processor to retrieve work orders from a legacy database system;

reformat the retrieved work orders to highlight words corresponding to process compliance and insert hyperlinks to process data stored in the legacy system and referenced by the work orders; and

present the reformatted work orders with the highlighted words and the hyperlinks.

17. The article of claim 16, wherein the data includes a parse engine for parsing text in the retrieved work orders, and a reformat engine for comparing the parsed text to a list of key words and codes to identify words to be highlighted and hyperlinked in the reformatted work orders.

18. The article of claim 17, wherein the data further includes an interface engine for retrieving the identified work order from the legacy system;

and a presentation engine for presenting the reformatted work order.

19. The article of claim 17, wherein the reformat engine highlights words to ensure at least one of production conformance and safety compliance.

20. The article of claim 16, wherein the data causes the computer to retrieve a work order, reformat the retrieved work order, and present the reformatted work order in real time.