Techniques For Specifying And Collecting Data Aggregations

• US 20100185618A1
• Filed: 03/29/2010
• Published: 07/22/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 04/15/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Peterson, Glenn R.
• Granted Patent: US 8,108,396 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 707/737
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/24556 Aggregation; Duplicate elimination
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99936 Pattern matching access

Abstract

Data records containing one or more fields, which can be considered keys and/or values, are received, and processed such that data values of records that contain key values of interest are aggregated together. The keys of the resultant aggregations or “resultant keys” are created under the control of simple parameters to an aggregation framework. Similarly, the particular aggregations performed are also under the control of a similar set of simple parameters to the aggregation framework. Mapping of keys to reduce originality is one of the important features of resultant key creation. Finally, the structure of the parameters used to control aggregation is simple, flexible, and powerful.

Claims

1. A method of controlling data aggregation implemented on a computing device comprising:

receiving an individual data record that includes multiple input fields,

upon receiving the individual data record, selecting a subset of the multiple input fields within the individual data record as a resultant key according to a user defined aggregation parameter set, the user defined aggregation parameter set including;

(i) a key control previously defined by the user to specify one or more of the multiple input fields as key components within the individual data record; and

(ii) an aggregation control previously defined by the user to specify a function or an action to be applied to the specified one or more multiple input fields,

the resultant key being specified by the user defined aggregation parameter set; and

producing collections of aggregations populated as specified by the aggregation parameter set defined by the user.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the selecting comprises mapping the keys.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the selecting comprises dynamically selecting the subset of the multiple input fields within the individual data record as a resultant key.

4. The method of claim 1, further comprising presenting the collections of aggregations to the user.

5. The method of claim 1, further comprising implementing the user defined aggregation parameter set in a two-dimensional array of Booleans.

6. The method of claim 5, further comprising determining aggregation control subsets by Boolean operations.

7. The method of claim 1, further comprising computing data aggregations of the multiple input fields according to the resultant key specified by the user defined aggregation parameter set, wherein the computing is based on a record control limit.

8. The method of claim 1, further comprising searching the user defined aggregation parameter set for subsets, marking the subsets, and deferring the marked subsets for processing.

9. The method of claim 8, further comprising computing subsets from the marked subsets.

10. A system comprising:

a processor;

a memory accessible to and operable by the processor; and

an aggregator framework component accessible to and operable by the processor to receive data records that include multiple input fields and aggregate data in the data records with the multiple input fields using a resultant key in the data records,

wherein the resultant key is based on a user defined aggregation parameter set, the user defined aggregation parameter set being provided to the aggregation framework component and including;

(i) a key control previously defined by the user to specify one or more of the multiple input fields as key components within the individual data record; and

(ii) an aggregation control previously defined by the user to specify a function or an action to be applied to the specified one or more multiple input fields,

wherein the aggregator framework component is configured to produce collections of aggregations populated as specified by the aggregation parameter set defined by the user.

11. The system of claim 10, wherein the aggregator framework component is configured to present the collections of aggregations to the user.

12. The system of claim 10, wherein the aggregator framework component is configured to compute data aggregations of the multiple input fields based on the resultant key.

13. The system of claim 10, further comprising a data streamer configured to stream the data records such that the data records are processed individually.

14. The system of claim 10, further comprising one or more aggregation collection parameter sets that are provided to the aggregation framework component to aggregate data in the data records.

15. The system of claim 10, further comprising aggregation collections wherein aggregated data is placed.

16. A computer-readable storage media comprising computer-executable instructions that, when executed by a processor, perform acts comprising:

receiving an individual data record that includes multiple input fields comprising key values and data values according to one or more aggregation parameter sets defined by a user, the one or more aggregation parameter sets defined by the user including;

(i) a key control previously defined by the user to specify one or more of the multiple input fields as key components within the individual data record; and

(ii) an aggregation control previously defined by the user to specify a function or an action to be applied to the specified one or more multiple input fields, the key values including a resultant key; and

producing collections of aggregations populated as specified by the one or more aggregation parameter sets defined by the user.

17. The computer-readable storage media of claim 16, wherein the resultant key includes (i) a concatenation of unmapped, mapped, and composite keys, and (ii) an identifier of a unique record to which the individual data record contributes data.

18. The computer-readable storage media of claim 16, the acts further comprising presenting the collections of aggregations to the user.

19. The computer-readable storage media of claim 16, the acts further comprising:

processing the individual data record through its key values; and

identifying key values of the processed individual data record to a particular aggregation collection which may be made available to the user.

20. The computer-readable storage media of claim 16, the acts further comprising computing data aggregations of the multiple input fields based on the resultant key.