Patent Application
20190342185
The present disclosure relates generally to systems and methods for managing and visualizing databases. More specifically, the present disclosure is related to systems and methods that provide interactive generation of visual reports from databases including time series data.
This section is intended to introduce the reader to various aspects of art that may be related to various aspects of the present disclosure, which are described and/or claimed below. This discussion is believed to be helpful in providing the reader with background information to facilitate a better understanding of the various aspects of the present disclosure. Accordingly, it should be understood that these statements are to be read in this light, and not as admissions of prior art.
Computer resources hosted in distributed computing (e.g., cloud-computing) environments may be disparately located with different resources potentially having their own functions, properties, and/or permissions. Such resources may include hardware resources (e.g. computing devices, switches, etc.) and software resources (e.g. database applications). These resources may be used to collect and store data at various times related to a variety of measurable properties, including network, hardware, or database performance properties measured at different times. As systems for collecting data become more readily available and the costs for storage hardware continue to decrease, the amount of data that these computer resources are capable of collecting is increasing. For instance, in addition to collecting raw data more frequently, metadata associated with the time in which the raw data has been generated or acquired may also be stored for a given data set.
Although the capabilities of computer resources for collecting and storing data continue to expand, the vast amount of collected data may be difficult or burdensome analyze and meaningfully evaluate or report on.
A summary of certain embodiments disclosed herein is set forth below. It should be understood that these aspects are presented merely to provide the reader with a brief summary of these certain embodiments and that these aspects are not intended to limit the scope of this disclosure. Indeed, this disclosure may encompass a variety of aspects that may not be set forth below.
Information Technology (IT) networks may include a number of computing devices, server systems, databases, and the like that generate, collect, and store information. As increasing amounts of data representing vast resources become available, it becomes increasingly difficult to analyze the data, interact with the data, and/or provide reports for the data. The current embodiments enable customized widgets to be generated for such data, enabling a visualization of certain indicators for the data for rapid and/or real-time monitoring of the data.
For example, in an embodiment, a system configured to create analytics widgets in a guided widget creation workflow is associated with a computational instance of a remote platform that remotely manages a managed network. The system includes a database containing analytics data associated with the managed network, the analytics data defining indicators or metrics. The remote platform is configured to present a portion of the computational instance on a graphical user interface (GUI) via a display connected to a computing device having access to the computational instance, and the portion of the computational instance displayed via the GUI includes a widget creation process configured to create the analytics widgets each having a data visualization. To accomplish this, the widget creation process uses the analytics data and the indicators or metrics from the database, and causes a first section of the GUI rendered on the display to include a plurality of buttons coupled with one another to define the guided widget creation workflow. Each button of the plurality of buttons is configured to cause a respective set of attribute input fields to be displayed in response to a selection input, the respective set of attribute input fields being configured to receive user inputs to specify attributes associated with the data visualization. The widget creation process also causes a second section of the GUI rendered on the display proximate to the first section to present the data visualization in response to inputs received via the guided widget creation workflow.
Various refinements of the features noted above may exist in relation to various aspects of the present disclosure. Further features may also be incorporated in these various aspects as well. These refinements and additional features may exist individually or in any combination. For instance, various features discussed below in relation to one or more of the illustrated embodiments may be incorporated into any of the above-described aspects of the present disclosure alone or in any combination. The brief summary presented above is intended only to familiarize the reader with certain aspects and contexts of embodiments of the present disclosure without limitation to the claimed subject matter.
Various aspects of this disclosure may be better understood upon reading the following detailed description and upon reference to the drawings in which:
One or more specific embodiments will be described below. In an effort to provide a concise description of these embodiments, not all features of an actual implementation are described in the specification. It should be appreciated that in the development of any such actual implementation, as in any engineering or design project, numerous implementation-specific decisions must be made to achieve the developers' specific goals, such as compliance with system-related and enterprise-related constraints, which may vary from one implementation to another. Moreover, it should be appreciated that such a development effort might be complex and time consuming, but would nevertheless be a routine undertaking of design, fabrication, and manufacture for those of ordinary skill having the benefit of this disclosure.
The following discussion relates to analysis, forecasting, and reporting systems for Information Technology (IT) systems. However, this is not meant to limit the current techniques to IT systems. Indeed, the current techniques may be useful in a number of different contexts. For example the current techniques may be applied to Human Resources (HR) systems, enterprise systems, or any system that may benefit from the analysis, forecasting, and reporting of data.
Keeping this in mind, the discussion now turns to an Information Technology (IT)-centered example. IT devices are increasingly important in a world in which various electronics devices are interconnected within a distributed context. As more functions are performed by services using some form of distributed computing, the complexity of IT network management increases. As management complexities increase, data analysis, forecasting, and reporting may become more complex.
By way of introduction to the present concepts and to provide context for the examples discussed herein,
The platform 104 may include any suitable number of configurable items (e.g., computers, applications, physical and/or virtual servers) in one or more locations that are connected together using one or more networks. For instance, the platform 104 may include various computers acting as servers in datacenters at one or more geographic locations where the computers communicate using network and/or Internet connections. The communication channel 106 may include any suitable communication mechanism for electronic communication between the client 102 and the platform 104. The communication channel 106 may incorporate local area networks (LANs), wide area networks (WANs), virtual private networks (VPNs), cellular networks (e.g., long term evolution networks), and/or other network types for transferring data between the client 102 and the platform 104. For example, the communication channel 106 may include an Internet connection when the client 102 is not on a local network common with the platform 104. Additionally or alternatively, the communication channel 106 may include network connection sections when the client and the platform 104 are on different networks or entirely using network connections when the client 102 and the platform 104 share a common network. Although only a single client 102 is shown connected to the platform 104, it should be noted that the platform 104 may connect to multiple clients (e.g., tens, hundreds, or thousands of clients).
Through the platform 104, here a cloud service type platform, the client 102 may connect to various devices with various functionality, such as gateways, routers, load balancers, databases, application servers running application programs on one or more nodes, or other devices that may be accessed via the platform 104. For example, the client 102 may connect to an application server 108 and/or one or more databases 112 via the platform 104. The application server 108 may include any computing system, such as a desktop computer, laptop computer, server computer, and/or any other computing device capable of providing functionality from an application program to the client 102. The application server 108 may include one or more application nodes running application programs whose functionality is provided to the client 102 via the platform 104. The application nodes may be implemented using processing threads, virtual machine instantiations, or other computing features of the application server 108. Moreover, the application nodes may store, evaluate, or retrieve data from the databases 112 and/or a database server. Indeed, certain embodiments of the platform 104 may run a multi-instance architecture in which a computational instance 110 (referred to for simplicity as an “instance”) runs its own application logic and database processes for each client 102.
The databases 112 may contain a series of tables containing information about assets and enterprise services controlled by a client 102 and the configurations of these assets and services. The assets and services include configuration items (CIs) 114 that may be computers, other devices on a network 116 (or group of networks), software contracts and/or licenses, or enterprise services. In certain embodiments, the network 116 may be a managed network, which is managed by the platform 104. The CIs 114 may include hardware resources (such as server computing devices, client computing devices, processors, memory, storage devices, networking devices, or power supplies); software resources (such as instructions executable by the hardware resources including application software or firmware); virtual resources (such as virtual machines or virtual storage devices); and/or storage constructs (such as data files, data directories, or storage models). As such, the CIs 114 may include a combination of physical resources or virtual resources. For example, the illustrated embodiment of the CIs 114 includes printers 118, routers/switches 120, load balancers 122, virtual systems 124, storage devices 126, and/or other connected devices 130. The other connected devices 130 may include clusters of connected computing devices or functions such as data centers, computer rooms, databases, or other suitable devices. The databases 112 may include information related to CIs 114, attributes (e.g., roles, characteristics of elements, etc.) associated with the CIs 114, and/or relationships between the CIs 114.
In some embodiments, the databases 112 may include a configuration management database (CMDB) that may store the data concerning CIs 114 mentioned above along with data related to various IT assets that may be present within the network 112. In addition to the databases 112, the platform 104 may include one or more other database servers. The database servers are configured to store, manage, or otherwise provide data for delivering services to the client 102 over the communication channel 106. The database server may include one or more additional databases that are accessible by the application server 108, the client 102, and/or other devices external to the additional databases. By way of example, the additional databases may include a relational database and/or a time series database. The additional databases may be implemented and/or managed using any suitable implementations, such as a relational database management system (RDBMS), a time series database management system, an object database, an extensible markup language (XML) database, a configuration management database (CMDB), a management information base (MIB), one or more flat files, and/or or other suitable non-transient storage structures. In some embodiments, more than a single database server may be utilized. Furthermore, in some embodiments, the platform 104 may have access to one or more databases external to the platform 104 entirely.
In the depicted topology, access to the CIs 114 from the platform 104 is enabled via a management, instrumentation, and discovery (MID) server 130 via a communication queue 132 (e.g., an External Communications Channel (ECC) queue). The MID server 130 may include an application program (e.g., Java application) that runs as a service (e.g., Windows service or UNIX daemon) that facilitates communication and movement of data between the platform 104 and external applications, data sources, and/or services. The MID service 126 may be executed using a computing device (e.g., server or computer) on the network 112 that communicates with the platform 104. As discussed below, the MID server 130 may periodically or intermittently use discovery probes to determine information on devices connected to the network 112 and return the probe results back to the platform 104. In the illustrated embodiment, the MID server 130 is located inside the network 112 thereby alleviating the use of a firewall in communication between the CIs 114 and the MID server 130. However, in some embodiments, a secure tunnel may be generated between an embodiment of the MID server 130 running in the platform 104 that communicates with a border gateway device of the network 112.
The communication queue 132 may be a database table that is typically queried, updated, and inserted into by other systems. Each record in the ECC queue 132 is a message from one of the instances 130 in the platform 104 to a system (e.g., MID server 130) external to the platform 104 that connects to the platform 104 (or a specific instance 130 running in the platform 104), or a message to the instance 130 from the external system. The fields of an ECC queue 132 record include various data about the external system or the message in the record.
Although the system 100 is described as having the application servers 108, the databases 112, the ECC queue 132, the MID server 130, and the like, it should be noted that the embodiments disclosed herein are not limited to the components described as being part of the system 100. Indeed, the components depicted in
Further, it should be noted that server systems described herein may communicate with each other via a number of suitable communication protocols, such as via wired communication networks, wireless communication networks, and the like. In the same manner, the client 102 may communicate with a number of server systems via a suitable communication network without interfacing its communication via the platform 104.
In addition, other methods for populating the databases 112 may include directly importing the CIs or other entries from an external source, manual import by users entering CIs or other entries via a user interface, and the like. Moreover, although the details discussed above are provided with reference to the CMDB, it should be understood that the embodiments described herein should not be limited to being performed with the CMDB. Instead, the present systems and techniques described herein may be implemented with any suitable database.
To perform one or more of the operations described herein, the client 102, the application server 108, the MID server 130, and other server or computing system described herein may include one or more of the computer components depicted in
As illustrated, the computing device 140 may include various hardware components. For example, the device includes one or more processors 142, one or more busses 144, memory 146, input structures 148, a power source 150, a network interface 152, a user interface 154, and/or other computer components useful in performing the functions described herein.
The one or more processors 142 may include processors capable of performing instructions stored in the memory 146. For example, the one or more processors may include microprocessors, system on a chips (SoCs), or any other suitable circuitry for performing functions by executing instructions stored in the memory 146. Additionally or alternatively, the one or more processors 142 may include application-specific integrated circuits (ASICs), field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs), and/or other devices designed to perform some or all of the functions discussed herein without calling instructions from the memory 146. Moreover, the functions of the one or more processors 142 may be distributed across multiple processors in a single physical device or in multiple processors in more than one physical device. The one or more processors 142 may also include specialized processors, such as a graphics processing unit (GPU).
The one or more busses 144 includes suitable electrical channels to provide data and/or power between the various components of the computing device. For example, the one or more busses 144 may include a power bus from the power source 150 to the various components of the computing device. Additionally, in some embodiments, the one or more busses 144 may include a dedicated bus among the one or more processors 142 and/or the memory 146.
The memory 146 may include any tangible, non-transitory, and computer-readable storage media. For example, the memory 146 may include volatile memory, non-volatile memory, or any combination thereof. For instance, the memory 206 may include read-only memory (ROM), randomly accessible memory (RAM), disk drives, solid state drives, external flash memory, or any combination thereof. Although shown as a single block in
The input structures 148 provide structures to input data and/or commands to the one or more processor 142. For example, the input structures 148 include a positional input device, such as a mouse, touchpad, touchscreen, and/or the like. The input structures 148 may also include a manual input, such as a keyboard and the like. These input structures 148 may be used to input data and/or commands to the one or more processors 142 via the one or more busses 144. The input structures 148 may alternative or additionally include other input devices. For example, the input structures 148 may include sensors or detectors that monitor the computing device 140 or an environment around the computing device 140. For example, a computing device 140 can contain a geospatial device, such as a global positioning system (GPS) location unit. The input structures 148 may also monitor operating conditions (e.g., temperatures) of various components of the computing device 140, such as the one or more processors 142.
The power source 150 can be any suitable source for power of the various components of the computing device 140. For example, the power source 150 may include line power and/or a battery source to provide power to the various components of the computing device 140 via the one or more busses 144.
The network interface 152 is also coupled to the processor 142 via the one or more busses 144. The network interface 152 includes one or more transceivers capable of communicating with other devices over one or more networks (e.g., the communication channel 106). The network interface may provide a wired network interface, such as Ethernet, or a wireless network interface, such an 802.11, Bluetooth, cellular (e.g., LTE), or other wireless connections. Moreover, the computing device 140 may communicate with other devices via the network interface 152 using one or more network protocols, such as Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP), power line communication (PLC), Wi-Fi, infrared, and/or other suitable protocols.
A user interface 154 may include a display that is configured to display images transferred to it from the one or more processors 142. In addition and/or alternative to the display, the user interface 154 may include other devices for interfacing with a user. For example, the user interface 154 may include lights (e.g., LEDs), speakers, and the like.
The discussion now turns to a mechanism for displaying system data, enabling interactivity with the system data, and reporting on the system data.
In some embodiments, it may be desirable to enable customized positioning and/or sizing of widgets 174. Accordingly, the dashboard 172 may be used to provide such features. As used herein, the term “dashboard” refers to a graphical-user-interface (GUI) screen where data-driven widgets 174 may be placed on the screen without being constrained to pre-defined containers 176 and/or static placement and/or size. In other words, for the dashboard 172, the widgets 174 may be dynamically moved to any location on the dashboard 172 without being constrained to pre-defined locations, as indicated by arrows 178. Further, the size of the widgets 174 may be dynamically altered in the dashboard 172, as indicated by sizing indicators 180 and arrows 182.
As there may be more flexibility in configuring a dashboard 172 over a homepage 170, it may be desirable in certain situations to convert a homepage 170 to a dashboard 172. Indeed, it may be burdensome to generate dashboards 172 from scratch after time and effort may have already been afforded to creating a homepage 170. Accordingly, in some embodiments, a conversion process 190 may be implemented to convert a homepage 170 to a dashboard 172.
The conversion process 190 may identify the widgets 174 found on the homepage 170 (block 192). For example, a computer-readable representation of the homepage 170 (e.g., a homepage object) may be traversed to identify each of the widgets 174 on the homepage 170.
Further, the conversion process 190 may identify the containers 176 and their associated sizes and placements for the identified widgets 174 found on the homepage 170 (block 194). For example, the computer-readable representation of the homepage 170 (e.g., a homepage object) may be traversed to identify each of containers 176 containing the widgets 174 on the homepage 170. Position and/or size attributes of the containers 176 may be identified by accessing object attributes of the computer-readable representation of the homepage 170.
Once the widgets 174 and the containers 176 and their attributes are identified. A corresponding dashboard 172 may be generated (block 196). For example, computer instructions may generate a computer-readable representation of the homepage 170, inserting the widgets 174 at the position and/or size identified by the container 176 attributes. Once the dashboard 172 is generated, it may be accessed and the size and position of the widgets 174 may be modified dynamically.
The widgets 174 may be independent data-driven software that perform particular tasks. For example, the widgets 174 may provide visualizations generated based upon datasets of the system, such as those present within database 112. In accordance with certain aspects of the present disclosure, the widgets 174 are generated according to a guided workflow presented as a part of a graphical user interface (GUI) 200, an example of which is illustrated in
The homepage 170 and/or dashboard 172 may, in certain embodiments, be displayed in a browser window of a browser application running on a particular computing device, such as a client device 102. The client device 102 may run the browser application for interaction with and display of the GUI 200, which is generated at the platform 104 side (e.g., by one or more of the instances 130 in the platform 104) of the system 100. However, the present techniques are not limited to such a configuration.
The GUI 200 includes various selectable inputs that cause the instance 130 to initiate the generation of certain types of reports, initiate analyses, perform diagnostics, and so forth. Among the selectable inputs is an action menu 202, which is divided into a plurality of categories including a “Reports” category having a “Create New” button 204 for creating a new report.
As illustrated in
A plurality of attribute buttons 216 are rendered within the configuration section 212 of the GUI 200, and are coupled with one another to define a guided widget creation workflow 218. In the illustrated embodiment, the plurality of attribute buttons 216 are presented in a horizontal arrangement in a manner that visually encourages a process flow. For example, the plurality of attribute buttons 216 are separated by arrows 220, which acts as a visual indication that one of the attribute buttons 216 should be addressed before another. However, in other embodiments, the plurality of attribute buttons 216 may be presented in other suitable arrangements, such as vertical, diagonal, circular, and so forth. Generally, the plurality of attribute buttons 216 are arranged such that more fundamental aspects of the widget 174 are defined first, followed by refinements of the widget 174. In accordance with certain embodiments, this layout is merely a guide—that is, the plurality of attribute buttons 216 may be addressed out of the presented order without disrupting the widget creation process. However, as shown, none of the attribute buttons 216 are available for selection other than “Data” button 216A. Thus, attributes associated with the data to be used for data visualization, in this embodiment, must first be defined before other attributes of the visualization may be manipulated or configured.
In the illustrated embodiment of the guided widget creation workflow 218, the plurality of attribute buttons 216 include, but are not necessarily limited to, a “Data” button 216A, a “Type” button 216B, a “Configure” button 216C, and a “Style” button 216D. Each of these buttons is described in further detail below in conjunction with a description of the guided widget creation workflow 218.
In accordance with present embodiments, the configuration section 212 also includes attribute input fields 220, with each of the attribute buttons 216 being associated with a particular set of attribute input fields 220. In the illustrated example, the “Data” button 216A is selected, and the platform 104 has caused the GUI 200 to display a particular set of attribute input fields 220 that are relevant to the data to be used in generating the widget 174. The attribute input fields 220 described herein may include any one or a combination of freeform text fields, drop-down menus, search-based entry fields, checkboxes, or any other suitable type of field for selection or entry of an attribute of the widget 174.
By way of non-limiting example, the attribute input fields 220 associated with the “Data” button 216A include a “Report name” field 222, which is a freeform field where a name of the widget can be specified (e.g., entered by typing). The attribute input fields 220 also include a “Source type” field 224, which is implemented as a drop-down menu. The Source type field 224 allows selection of the type of data to be accessed at the database 112 for generation of the data visualization. In this embodiment, the source types available for selection include “data source,” “table,” or “external import.”
The attribute input fields 220 may be dynamically generated within the GUI 200. For example, moving from
As shown, the selections being provided in the attribute input fields 220 results in a “Next” button 228 being selectable. This means that the guided widget creation workflow 218 allows additional elements of the widget 174 to now be adjusted. For example, selection of the Next button 228 causes the GUI 200 to display the next step in the guided widget creation workflow 218. In the illustrated embodiment, this next step corresponds to the “Type” button 216B. However, it should also be noted that, having selected the source data to be used in rendering the visualization, the “Type” button 216B and the “Configure” button 216C are both selectable indicating that the type and configuration of the data visualization to be rendered can be manipulated once the source of the data has been selected.
Moving now to
In the configuration section 212 of the GUI 200, the attribute input fields 220 now include different chart type buttons 250. The GUI 200 displays the different chart types using the data set in the table 240 within the data visualization section 214 in response to a particular chart type button 250 being selected. By way of non-limiting example, the GUI 200 in
In the embodiment illustrated in
In
As also shown in
As noted above, the attribute input fields 220 may include different chart type buttons 250 being associated with the different chart types 252.
Various attributes of the data visualization (chart 260) are further manipulable via the attribute input fields 220 associated with the “Configure” button 216C, which is displayed as the step following the “Type” button 216B in the guided widget creation workflow 218.
The chart 260 can also be associated with a trend, which may be initiated in the GUI 200 via a “Trend by” field 294, implemented here as a drop down menu. Specifically, the chart 260 may be associated with a trend according to aspects of the data set that are selectable via a drop-down menu.
Because the data points 262 are depicted as a function of a variable associated with the data set of the table 240, the data points 262 may be visualized according to particular aspects of the variable (e.g., time). A “per” field 296 causes the data points 262 to be constructed by separating the data from the data set of the table 240 into groups according to some shared aspect of the data, such as common times or time periods (e.g., dates, weeks, months, and so forth).
The data points 262 may be further constructed by aggregating the data from the data set in the table 240. Thus, the attribute input fields 220 also include an “Aggregation” field 298, which causes the data to be aggregated according to a parameter relating, at least in part, to the “per” field 296 entry. For example, “Count” is shown as being entered into the aggregation field 298 (e.g., via a drop-down menu), meaning that the data is visualized by a “count” of the incidents per “date,” as entered in the “per” field 296.
Another embodiment of the GUI 200 corresponding to a selection of the “Configure” button 216C is depicted in
The next portion of the guided widget creation workflow 218 corresponds to the “Style” button 216D, which is shown in the GUI 200 of
Example attribute input fields corresponding to the “General” button 320A include chart color, color scheme, a toggle to display data labels, a toggle to display a target, a toggle to display a threshold, a toggle to display a trend (e.g., the trend set forth in the “Configure” button 216C), a toggle to display confidence bands, a toggle to display a data forecast, and a toggle to display comments on the data. Other attribute input fields may include, by way of non-limiting example, an entry field for a custom chart size, a selectable menu for a preconfigured chart size (e.g., small, medium, large), a drilldown view field, and a decimal precision field.
Selection of the “Title” button 320B, as in
Moving now to selection of the “Axis” button 320D,
Once the data visualization (e.g., chart 260) is completed, various actions may be performed to finalize, create, and perform other actions with the widget 174. For example, as shown in
As shown in
In the embodiment illustrated in
The dialog box 400 also includes a layout representation 408 that represents the layout of the selected homepage 170 (or dashboard 172). The layout representation 408 is used as an indication for the location at the widget 174 should be added to the homepage 170 (or dashboard 172). For example, the location for adding the widget 174 may be defined via one of the illustrated positional “Add here” buttons 410A, B, C, or D). The addition is finalized via selection of the “Add” button 412 or is canceled via selection of the “Cancel” button 414.
As set forth above, the dashboard 172 may be more flexible in its layout, sizing, and so forth, compared to the homepage 170. Accordingly, in certain embodiments, adding the widget 174 may be different than adding the widget 174 to the homepage 170, as shown in
In
An embodiment of the dashboard 172 is depicted in
The time-series widgets 174 also include a time series area widget 174B, which depicts an area chart 260B of a number of closed incidents as a function of date. A time series step line widget 174C depicts a number of closed incidents as a function of date in a step line chart 260C. A time series stacked column widget 174D depicts a stacked column chart 260D of a number of closed incidents as a function of date. The columns in the stacked column chart 260D may be stacked to display, for example, a change in the number of closed incidents for a particular date.
A time series column widget 174E is also shown as including several features that can be incorporated into the widgets 174 described herein, including features that facilitate visualization of metrics and/or KPIs. Specifically, the time series column widget 174E includes a time series column chart 260E of closed incidents as a function of date. The time series column widget 174E also includes a target band 432, which provides a visualization of a target number of closed incidents as a function of date. The target band 432 may be user-defined, or may be user-defined as a function of the number of open incidents at a given date.
The time series column widget 174E further includes a trend line 434 to demonstrate the manner in which the data (e.g., closed incidents) trends over the range of dates (e.g., over time). A forecast line 436 depicts how the closed incidents are forecast to show in the chart 260E at future dates. A threshold line 438 provides a performance indicator visualization relating to the management of the managed network. A prediction band 440 provides another performance indicator visualization as to how the number of closed incidents was predicted to trend at a particular date.
The specific embodiments described above have been shown by way of example, and it should be understood that these embodiments may be susceptible to various modifications and alternative forms. It should be further understood that the claims are not intended to be limited to the particular forms disclosed, but rather to cover all modifications, equivalents, and alternatives falling within the spirit and scope of this disclosure.
The techniques presented and claimed herein are referenced and applied to material objects and concrete examples of a practical nature that demonstrably improve the present technical field and, as such, are not abstract, intangible or purely theoretical. Further, if any claims appended to the end of this specification contain one or more elements designated as “means for [perform]ing [a function] . . . ” or “step for [perform]ing [a function] . . . ”, it is intended that such elements are to be interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f). However, for any claims containing elements designated in any other manner, it is intended that such elements are not to be interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f).
