Sharing data on mobile devices

• US 9,977,819 B2
• Filed: 08/09/2010
• Issued: 05/22/2018
• Est. Priority Date: 08/09/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: iAnywhere Solutions Incorporated (SAP SE)
• Original Assignee: iAnywhere Solutions Incorporated (SAP SE)
• Inventors: Slee, Thomas Stephen, Graham, James David, Hurst, Adam
• Primary Examiner(s): Kerzhner, Aleksandr
• Assistant Examiner(s): Ellis, Matthew J
• Application Number:
  US12/852,948
• Publication Number:
  US 20120036199A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,843 Days
• Field of Search: 707768-772, 709206, 709207
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/00 Information retrieval; Database structures therefor; File system structures therefor
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/27 Replication, distribution or synchronisation of data between databases or within a distributed database system; Distributed database system architectures therefor
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/278 Data partitioning, e.g. horizontal or vertical partitioning

Abstract

System, methods and articles of manufacture for replicating relational data on multiple nodes. An embodiment comprises receiving an update request message from a node, wherein the update request message comprises a node identification and an application identification, accessing an application schema based on the application identification, identifying a partition residing in the application schema based on the node identification, accessing a server schema, identifying a second partition residing in the server schema based on the application identification, determining at least one data change stored in the second partition that changes data associated with the first partition, retrieving at least one data change from the second partition, formatting data change in an update response message, and transmitting the update response message to the node.

Claims

1. A method for retrieving data from a central database for a mobile device, comprising:

receiving, at the central database, an update request message for the data from a user at the mobile device, wherein the update request message comprises a node identification and an application identification, wherein the node identification identifies the mobile device and the application identification identifies a database application hosted by the central database;

accessing an application schema in the central database using the application identification, wherein the application schema defines tables of the database application and relationships between the tables of the database application;

determining a first partition of the application schema based on the user, wherein the first partition includes a set of rows in the application schema that belong to the user;

identifying a set of data changes in a history of operations based on the first partition and a point in time, wherein the history of operations is stored in the central database, and the identified set of data changes describe one or more data changes made to the application schema for the user after the point in time;

determining a second partition of the history of operations based on a data change in the identified set of data changes for the first partition, wherein the second partition identifies a set of nodes affected by the data change;

in response to determining the mobile device is in the set of nodes of the second partition, determining a set of rows in the application schema corresponding to the data change;

identifying a set of operations associated with the determined set of rows in the application schema corresponding to the data change;

determining the set of operations is small enough to be included in an update response message; and

transmitting the update response message to the mobile device to synchronize the data at the central database with the mobile device, wherein the update response message includes the determined set of operations.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

formatting the set of operations associated with the determined set of rows in the application schema corresponding to the data change in the response message.

3. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

identifying the point in time based on when the node sent a previous update request message.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein at least one table in the application schema comprises at least one primary key and at least one foreign key, and the determining the first partition comprises determining if at least one primary key is equal to at least one foreign key.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the set of rows in the first partition includes a row for one user of the node, a group of users, or a subset of a group of users.

6. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

determining a frequency with which data changes post to the central database;

determining a second point in time the node is operable to send a next update request message based on the frequency; and

transmitting the second point in time to the node.

18. The method of claim 1, wherein the application schema is stored in a set of application-independent tables in the central database.

19. The method of claim 1, wherein the application schema is one of a plurality of application schemas stored in a table of the central database.

20. The method of claim 1, wherein the central database stores the application schema and data changes to the application schema without application specific code.

21. The method of claim 1, wherein the first partition of the application schema identifies data belonging to a user.

22. The method of claim 1, wherein the node is a mobile device.

23. The method of claim 1, wherein the application identification also identifies an application stored at the node for which the database application stores the data.

24. The method of claim 1, wherein the determining the first partition of the application schema on the user comprises combining the set of rows in the application schema based on the relationships between the tables of the database application.

25. The method of claim 1, wherein the first partition is shared by a set of nodes associated with the database application.

28. The method of claim 1, wherein the determining the first partition of the application schema based on the user comprises recursively iterating through the application schema.

29. The method of claim 1, further comprising;

determining the update response message is less than a predetermined size.

30. The method of claim 1, wherein the determining the second partition of the row change table based on the row change in the set of identified row changes comprises recursively iterating through the row change table.

31. The method of claim 2, wherein the formatting comprises storing the set of data change operations in a text document.

7. A central server system for replicating data to a mobile device, comprising:

a central database;

a receiver, configured to receive an update request message from a user at the mobile device, wherein the update request message comprises a node identification and an application identification, wherein the node identification identifies the mobile device and the application identification identifies a database application hosted by the central database;

a memory, configured to store an application schema and a history of operations, wherein the application schema defines tables of the database application and relationships between the tables of the database application, and the history of operations describe data changes made to the application schema;

a processor, configured to;

determine a first partition of the application schema based on the user, wherein the first partition includes a set of rows in the application schema that belong to the user;

identifying a set of data changes in the history of operations based on the first partition and a point in time, wherein the identified set of data changes describe one or more data changes made to the application schema for the user after the point in time;

determine a second partition of the history of operations based on a data change in the identified set of data changes for the first partition, wherein the second partition identifies a set of nodes affected by the data change;

in response to determining the mobile device is in the set of nodes of the second partition, determining a set of rows in the application schema corresponding to the data change;

identifying a set of operations associated with the determined set of rows in the application schema corresponding to the data change;

determining the set of operations is small enough to be included in an update response message; and

a transmitter, configured to transmit the update response message to the mobile device to synchronize the data at the central database with the mobile device, wherein the update response message includes the determined set of operations.

8. The system of claim 7, wherein the processor is further configured to format the set of operations associated with the determined set of rows in the application schema corresponding to the data change in the response message.

9. The system of claim 7, wherein at least one table in the application schema further comprises at least one primary key and at least one foreign key, and the processor is further configured to determine the first partition by determining if at least one primary key is equal to at least one foreign key.

10. The system of claim 7, wherein the set of rows in the first partition includes a row for one user of the node, a group of users, or a subset of a group of users.

11. The system of claim 7, wherein the processor is further configured to:

determine a frequency with which data changes post to the central database; and

determine a second point in time the node is operable to send a next update request message based on the frequency; and

wherein the transmitter is further configured to transmit the second point in time to the node.

26. The system of claim 7, wherein the processor is further configured to:

determine the first partition of the application schema based on the user by combining the set of rows in the application schema based on the relationships between the tables of the database application.

27. The system of claim 7, wherein the first partition is shared by a set of nodes associated with the database application.

12. An article of manufacture including a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium having instructions stored thereon that, when executed by a computing device, cause said computing device to perform operations comprising:

receiving an update request message for data from a user at a mobile device, wherein the update request message comprises a node identification and an application identification, wherein the node identification identifies the mobile device and the application identification identifies a database application hosted by a central database;

accessing an application schema in the central database using the application identification, wherein the application schema defines tables of the database application and relationships between the tables of the database application;

determining a first partition of the application schema based on the user, wherein the first partition includes a set of rows in the application schema that belong to the user;

identifying a set of data changes in a history of operations based on the first partition and a point in time, wherein the history of operations is stored in the central database, and the identified set of data changes describe one or more data changes made to the application schema for the user after the point in time;

determining a second partition of the history of operations based on a data change in the identified set of data changes for the first partition, wherein the second partition identifies a set of nodes affected by the data change;

in response to determining the mobile device is in the set of nodes of the second partition, determining a set of rows in the application schema corresponding to the data change;

identifying a set of operations associated with the determined set of rows in the application schema corresponding to the data change;

determining the set of operations is small enough to be included in an update response message; and

transmitting the update response message to the mobile device to synchronize the data at the central database with the mobile device, wherein the update response message includes the determined set of operations.

13. The article of manufacture of claim 12, the operations further comprising:

formatting the set of operations associated with the determined set of rows in the application schema corresponding to the data change in the response message.

14. The article of manufacture of claim 12, the operations further comprising identifying the point in time based on when the node sent a previous update request message.

15. The article of manufacture of claim 12, wherein at least one table in the application schema comprises at least one primary key and at least one foreign key, and the determining the first partition comprises determining if at least one primary key is equal to at least one foreign key.

16. The article of manufacture of claim 12, wherein the set of rows in the first partition includes a row for one user of the node, a group of users, or a subset of a group of users.

17. The article of manufacture of claim 12, further comprising:

determining a frequency with which data changes post to the central database;

determining a second point in time the node is operable to send a next update request message based on the frequency; and

transmitting the second point in time to the node.