DYNAMIC EDITORS FOR FUNCTIONALLY COMPOSED UI

• US 20110119605A1
• Filed: 12/14/2009
• Published: 05/19/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 11/16/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Hackmann, Christopher Donald, Murray, Michael Charles, Kent, Simon David, Jayadevan, Siddharth, Danton, Stephen M.
• Granted Patent: US 8,756,515 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 715/763
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/34 Graphical or visual programming
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 8/38 for implementing user interfaces

Abstract

In an embodiment, a computer system instantiates a real-time incremental editor configured to receive editing inputs that are to be applied to data of a data model, where the data model data declaratively defines a UI model that drives the behavior of a corresponding UI based on the UI model. The computer system receives an editing input from a user indicating one or more desired edits that are to be made to the UI and determines, based on the received editing inputs, which changes are to be made to the data model data to enact the desired changes in the UI. The computer system updates the UI in real-time based on the determined edits to the data model data and presents the updated UI in real-time without losing state information in the resultant UI.

Claims

1. At a computer system including one or more processors and system memory, a method for providing a real-time incremental editor for enacting changes on a user interface (UI), the method comprising:

an act of instantiating a real-time incremental editor configured to receive editing inputs that are to be applied to data of a data model, wherein the data model data declaratively defines a UI model that drives the behavior of a corresponding UI based on the UI model;

an act of receiving an editing input from a user indicating one or more desired edits that are to be made to the UI;

an act of determining, based on the received editing inputs, which changes are to be made to the data model data to enact the desired changes in the UI;

an act of updating the UI in real-time based on the determined edits to the data model data; and

an act of presenting the updated UI in essentially real-time without losing state information in the resultant UI.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein only the minimal set of controls and properties are updated based on determined data dependencies.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the determined data changes are transformed into UI changes using purely functional transformations.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein the determined changes indicating how the data model data is to be transformed into UI changes is itself data.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein the data indicating how the data model data is to be transformed into UI changes is mapped to a structured UI representation including at least one of text, a UI tree and a graphical diagram.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the data model data comprises a schematized XAF application description.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein at least one real-time incremental editor is instantiated based on the XAF application description.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the data model data is divided into chunks based on corresponding portions of a UI tree.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the data model data is divided into one or more text chunks.

10. The method of claim 9, further comprising applying a two-way data binding between a textual editor view and the text chunks of the data model data, such that any edits to the data model data cause the textual editor to update automatically.

11. The method of claim 9, wherein the text chunks are structured such that data model grammar that defines how the data is to be structured is not violated.

12. The method of claim 1, further comprising instantiating a data flow engine to support transformations of collections, records and atoms and track dependencies across data model data items.

13. The method of claim 12, further comprising implementing a UI model interpreter to perform the following in real-time:

receive the declaratively defined UI model, interpret the UI model via functional transformation using the data flow engine and present the resulting UI to the user.

14. The method of claim 12, wherein the instantiated editors are configured to build queries which are processed by the data flow engine.

15. A computer program product for implementing a method for presenting a preview of the potential results of a user edit to data model data, the computer program product comprising one or more computer-readable storage media having stored thereon computer-executable instructions that, when executed by one or more processors of the computing system, cause the computing system to perform the method, the method comprising:

an act of instantiating a real-time incremental editor configured to receive editing inputs that are to be applied to data of a data model, wherein the data model data declaratively defines a UI model that drives the behavior of a corresponding UI based on the UI model;

an act of receiving an input from a user at the instantiated editor, the input indicating one or more edits that are to be applied to a running software application;

an act of determining, based on the received user input, which changes are to be made to the data model data to enact the desired changes in the running software application; and

an act of previewing the determined changes in real-time on the running application.

16. The computer program product of claim 15, further comprising:

an act of the user selecting an element of the data model in the editor; and

an act of displaying, in real-time, a highlight around each corresponding instance of the selected element on the running application.

17. The computer program product of claim 16, further comprising an act of constructing a query that is used to query for each instance of the selected element.

18. The computer program product of claim 16, wherein a host environment is configured to display the highlight around each corresponding instance of the selected element on the running application.

19. The computer program product of claim 15, further comprising:

an act of receiving user inputs at the editor that result in a new feature being added to the running software application; and

an act of dynamically adding the new feature to the running software application in real-time.

20. A computer system comprising the following:

one or more processors;

system memory;

one or more computer-readable storage media having stored thereon computer-executable instructions that, when executed by the one or more processors, causes the computing system to perform a method for providing a real-time incremental editor for enacting changes on a user interface (UI), the method comprising the following;

an act of instantiating a real-time incremental editor configured to receive editing inputs that are to be applied to data of a data model, wherein the data model data declaratively defines a UI model that drives the behavior of a corresponding UI based on the UI model;

an act of receiving an editing input from a user indicating one or more desired edits that are to be made to the UI;

an act of determining, based on the received editing inputs, which changes are to be made to the data model data to enact the desired changes in the UI;

an act of updating the UI in real-time based on the determined edits to the data model data; and

an act of presenting the updated UI in real-time without losing state information in the resultant UI.