Item Management with Data Sharing and Synchronization

• US 20080270481A1
• Filed: 04/27/2007
• Published: 10/30/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 04/27/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Augustine, Matthew S.
• Granted Patent: US 7,725,456 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 707/200
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/275 Synchronous replication

Abstract

Systems and method for accessing and providing item management functionality with synchronization relationships that share data using a feed that may itself contain synchronization and item information are disclosed. Such systems and methods may enable an endpoint to use item management functionality provided by an item management module to generate or update a feed.

Claims

1. A method, comprising:

identifying a data set to manage wherein the data set to manage is associated with a synchronization relationship utilizing a feed comprising a sync data element and an item data element and the sync data element and the item data element are related to each other;

identifying an item management action associated with the data set to manage; and

communicating an item management request that comprises the item management action and an identification of the data set to manage.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

obtaining an item management response to the item management request; and

processing the item management response.

3. The method of claim 1 wherein the item management action is one of:

listing a set of items;

retrieving item data for an item;

updating item data for a second item;

deleting a third item; and

creating a new item.

4. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

obtaining an item management response to the item management request wherein the item management response includes a user interface representation associated with the item management action.

5. The method of claim 4 wherein the user interface representation comprises HTML.

6. The method of claim 4 wherein the user interface representation comprises executable code that, when executed, communicates a second item management request.

7. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

obtaining an item management response to the item management request wherein the item management response includes data that is associated with the item management action and the data is not immediately usable to provide a user interface representation.

8. The method of claim 7 wherein the data is represented in one of the formats:

a JSON format and a SOAP format.

9. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

communicating a second item management request when the item management response indicates that the item management request would cause a conflict.

10. A method, comprising:

obtaining an item management request from a client endpoint, wherein the item management request comprises an item management action and an identification of a data set to manage and the data set to manage is associated with a synchronization relationship utilizing a feed comprising a sync data element and an item data element and the sync data element and the item data element are related to each other; and

performing the requested item management action.

11. The method of claim 10, further comprising:

communicating an item management response to the client endpoint.

12. The method of claim 10 wherein the item management action is one of:

listing a set of items;

retrieving item data for an item;

updating item data for a second item;

deleting a third item; and

creating a new item.

13. The method of claim 10, further comprising:

communicating an item management response to the client endpoint that includes one of;

JSON data, SOAP data, and HTML data.

14. The method of claim 10 wherein the requested item management action is to update item data associated with an item and the performing operation further comprises:

modifying the item data associated with the item data element;

incrementing a version value associated with the sync data element;

creating a new update element associated with the sync data element and further associated with at least one of;

a previous most recent modification time and a previous most recent modifying entity; and

updating at least one of;

a most recent modification time history attribute associated with the sync data element and a most recent modifying entity history attribute associated with the sync data element.

15. The method of claim 10 wherein the requested item management action is to delete an item and the performing operation further comprises:

setting a deleted attribute associated with the sync data element to true;

incrementing a version value associated with the sync data element;

creating a new update element associated with the sync data element and further associated with at least one of;

a previous most recent modification time and a previous most recent modifying entity; and

updating at least one of;

a most recent modification time history attribute associated with the sync data element and a most recent modifying entity history attribute associated with the sync data element.

16. The method of claim 10 wherein the requested item management action is to create a new item and the performing operation further comprises:

defining a second item data element in the feed that includes item information associated with the new item; and

defining a second sync data element in the feed that is related to the second item data element and that comprises an initial version value, a unique identifier, and a new update history with at least one of;

a modification time attribute and a modifying entity attribute.

17. The method of claim 10 wherein an endpoint that performs the requested item management action also stores information used to generate the feed in a storage module associated with the endpoint.

18. The method of claim 10 wherein an endpoint performs the requested item management action and information used to generate the feed is stored in a storage module associated with a second endpoint, and the endpoint and the second endpoint are not the same endpoint.

19. The method of claim 10 wherein the data set to manage is associated with schema information that defines characteristics of a property in the data set to manage and wherein the performing operation further comprises:

using the schema information to interpret property information associated with the property.

20. A system, comprising:

an item management module configured to;

obtain an item management request from a client endpoint, wherein the item management request comprises an item management action and an identification of a data set to manage and the data set to manage is associated with a synchronization relationship utilizing a feed comprising a sync data element and an item data element that are related to each other, and the item management action is one of;

listing a set of items;

retrieving item data for an item;

updating item data for a second item;

deleting a third item; and

creating a new item; and

perform the requested item management action; and

a storage module configured to;

store information used to generate the feed.