System and method for high performance template driven metadata schema mapping and data storage for surveillance and sensor devices

• US 20070192351A1
• Filed: 02/15/2006
• Published: 08/16/2007
• Est. Priority Date: 02/15/2006
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Panasonic Corporation (Panasonic Holdings Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Matsushita Electric Industrial Company Limited (Panasonic Holdings Corporation)
• Inventors: Yu, Juan, Liu, Lipin, Lee, Kou
• Granted Patent: US 7,599,957 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/86 Mapping to a database
• CPC Class Codes: G08B 13/1968 Interfaces for setting up or customising the system
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99944 Object-oriented database structure

Abstract

A metadata database adaptor for use with a surveillance and/or sensor system is capable of adapting metadata messages of varying formats according to needs of metadata databases. In other aspects, a metadata data model template can allow a user to define a data definition that is used to map user defined data with the metadata data model template to form XML data schema. Template mapping knowledge can then be applied for fast XML data schema to non-XML database schema generation without translation processing. In yet other aspects, an application domain template can allow a user to define a query definition that can then be processed with a mapping of the application domain template to translate Xpath, Xquery, or others to a database query.

Claims

1. A metadata database adaptor for use with a surveillance and/or sensor system, comprising:

an adaptor interface connecting with one or more applications and receiving metadata messages from the applications;

a metadata database interface connecting with a metadata database; and

one or more functional modules adapting metadata messages of varying formats according to needs of the metadata database,

wherein at least one of the modules employs a metadata data model template that allows a user to define a data definition that is used to map user defined data with the metadata data model template and form XML data schema so that template mapping knowledge can then be applied for fast XML data schema to non-XML database schema generation without translation processing, and

wherein at least one of the modules employs an application domain template to allow a user to define a query definition that can then be processed with a mapping of the application domain template to translate a query of a first query language to a database query of a second query language.

2. A surveillance and sensor application system, comprising:

at least two devices including at least one of video surveillance devices or sensor devices;

at least two applications including at least one of a surveillance application or a sensor network application, wherein the applications produce metadata messages of varying formats;

at least two metadata databases storing the metadata messages of varying formats; and

at least two metadata database adaptors associated with the metadata databases and adapting the metadata messages of varying formats according to the needs of their respective databases.

3. The system of claim 2, wherein the adaptors include a regular metadata database adaptor and a master metadata database adaptor, wherein the regular database adaptor contains a collection template manager module that manages collection creation, modification, and deletion in its respective metadata database, and posts collection registration to the master metadata database adaptor.

4. The system of claim 2, wherein the database adaptors contain interfaces, service managers, functional modules, database managers, and database connection pools.

5. The system of claim 2, wherein at least one of the adaptors includes a schema mapping manager module that can handle mapping, translation, and generation of data definition schema to XML schema and to database data schema, wherein the schema mapping manager can dynamically select multiple mapping and transformation engines based on a template definition in order to take advantage of multi-modal mapping and transformation engines.

6. The system of claim 5, wherein the schema mapping manager module has a shared memory module to store active schema mapping metadata for other operation modules to use.

7. The system of claim 2, wherein at least one of the adaptors includes an index manager module that provides metadata database table index creation and deletion management.

8. The system of claim 7, wherein the index manager module has an intelligent mining feature to look into query operation historical data and learn from query pattern data and search operation time.

9. The system of claim 8, wherein the index manager module determines if a new index needs to be created for enhancing search performance when the historical data of search operation time is over a pre-defined threshold.

10. The system of claim 2, wherein the adaptors include a query mapping manager that handles mapping, translation, and generation of query criteria to the first query language and the second query language.

11. The system of claim 10, wherein the query mapping manager module has an intelligent mining feature to look into query operation historical data and learn from query pattern data to determine if a new query template is needed to generate query criteria.

12. The system of claim 2, wherein at least one of the adaptors includes one or more directory services, including at least one of an adaptor directory, a collection template directory, a schema directory, or a query template directory.

13. A method for collection creation, comprising:

obtaining an XML data schema;

registering a collection; and

using the XML data schema to populate the collection with metadata in a database.

14. The method of claim 13, further comprising attempting to search for and select a proper predefined template.

15. The method of claim 14, further comprising:

if there is no proper predefined template, then permitting a user to create a new Surveillance/Sensor data definition XML schema; and

performing a dynamic schema translation and generation process to produce template mapping and data rules.

16. The method of claim 14, further comprising:

if there is a proper template, then permitting a user to define a data definition via a graphic user interface of the proper template;

populating a user-defined data definition;

using the data definition to map user defined data with the proper template to form the XML data schema; and

applying template mapping knowledge for fast XML data schema to non-XML database schema generation without translation processing.

17. A method of query criteria generation, comprising:

processing a query definition with a query template mapping to generate a query according to a first query language;

applying template mapping knowledge, including template mapping data and rules, for fast generation, based on the query, of a database query according to a second query language; and

saving the database query into collection query metadata in a database.

18. The method of claim 17, further comprising loading an existing collection of an application system.

19. The method of claim 18, further comprising:

searching for and selecting a predefined query template; and

allowing a user to define the query definition via a graphic user interface of the template.

20. The method of claim 17, wherein the first query language is at least one of Xpath or Xquery, and the second query language is SQL.