Patent Application
20160379323
The present invention relates generally to a method, system, and computer program product for selectively offering products and services to customers. More particularly, the present invention relates to a method, system, and computer program product for behavioral and exogenous factor analytics based user clustering and migration.
Goods and services are collectively referred to as “product” or “products” unless expressly distinguished where used. A business typically has many products to offer their customers. Presently, businesses decide which products should be offered to a customer depends upon the customer's demographic profile, the business' location, and other regional, demographic, and economic factors. In some cases, a business considers the products that a customer has bought or used previously, and offers a product that matches or complements the previous purchases.
The illustrative embodiments provide a method, system, and computer program product for behavioral and exogenous factor analytics based user clustering and migration. An embodiment includes a method for behavioral and exogenous factor analytics based user clustering and migration. The embodiment determines, using a processor and a memory, a present risk aversion of a customer. The embodiment detects a temporal preference using historical data related to the customer, the temporal preference showing a preference of current utility over a future utility of a product. The embodiment projects, using the temporal preference and a negative transaction risk, a future risk aversion of the customer at a future time. The embodiment identifies a pattern of offer acceptance by the customer in the historical data. The embodiment determines a value of an exogenous factor on which a buying ability of the customer depends. The embodiment classifies the customer in a cluster, wherein all customers in the cluster have the present risk aversion, the temporal preference, the negative transaction risk, the future risk aversion, and the value of the exogenous factor. The embodiment presents an offer for a product to the cluster, wherein the product satisfies the present risk aversion, and wherein a probability of acceptance of the offer exceeds an offer probability threshold.
Another embodiment includes a computer program product for behavioral and exogenous factor analytics based user clustering and migration, the computer program product comprising one or more computer-readable storage devices, and program instructions stored on at least one of the one or more storage devices.
Another embodiment includes a computer system for behavioral and exogenous factor analytics based user clustering and migration, the computer system comprising one or more processors, one or more computer-readable memories, and one or more computer-readable storage devices, and program instructions stored on at least one of the one or more storage devices for execution by at least one of the one or more processors via at least one of the one or more memories.
The novel features believed characteristic of the invention are set forth in the appended claims. The invention itself, however, as well as a preferred mode of use, further objectives and advantages thereof, will best be understood by reference to the following detailed description of the illustrative embodiments when read in conjunction with the accompanying drawings, wherein:
Examples of any particular industry, such as the banking industry, are used only to describe the operations of the various embodiments and not to imply a limitation on the illustrative embodiments. An embodiment can be applied to any business that offers any type of products to a customer. Within the scope of an illustrative embodiment, a customer is a user who may be a human individual or another business.
The illustrative embodiments recognize that customers exhibit certain traits or behaviors that are not presently accounted for in product offers. For example, the illustrative embodiments recognize that a customer is inherently risk averse in the customer's buying behavior, and different customers are risk averse to different degrees towards different types of risks.
As an example, the illustrative embodiments recognize that a customer can be selective about certain products or types of products. By selecting certain products or types of products over others due to perceptions formed from learning about the product performance and other influences, the customer exhibits an aversion to an actual or a perceived risk with the products or types of products that the customer does not select.
Similarly, the illustrative embodiments recognize that a customer's pattern of product selections over time can be indicative of a customer's temporal preferences. One Customer may prefer borrowing money to consume the product today whereas another customer may prefer to wait for the right time for consuming the product. Customers' behaviors vary on the degree or the order of their temporal consumption preferences. Using this quantitative measure about a customer's temporal preferences, a reasonable projection can be made as to what the customer's product choices will be in the future.
The illustrative embodiments further recognize that not only the risk aversion, but many other factors also drive a customer's buying behavior. For example, a customer prefers certain products or types of products for their utility. In other words, a utility of a product to a customer predominantly contributes to the selection of the product by the customer, with secondary consideration or no consideration to the customer's risk aversions.
As another example, a customer's buying behavior is influenced by exogenous factors that apply to the customer. For example, a customer's profession contributes economic exogenous factors with the rise and fall of economic conditions in that profession. Consequently, the customer's buying behavior changes due to such factors. As another example, a customer's social participation contributes a different type of social exogenous factors. For example, the behavior of a social group in which the customer participates may change over a period influenced by a variety of reasons. Consequently, the social behavior of the group contributes social exogenous factors, which affect the customer's buying behavior.
Similarly, cultural, political, and many other aspects of a customer's environment contribute exogenous factors that affect the customer's buying behavior. These examples of exogenous factors are not intended to be limiting. From this disclosure, those of ordinary skill in the art will be able to conceive many other types of exogenous factors and the same are contemplated within the scope of the illustrative embodiments.
The illustrative embodiments recognize that the presently used methods for offering products to customers fail to consider such factors, and therefore fail to achieve optimal levels of offer acceptance by customers. Therefore, a method for behavioral and exogenous factor analytics based user clustering and migration is needed and will be useful in improving the selection of offers, the relevance of the offers to the customers, the offer acceptances, and consequently the profitability of the businesses.
The illustrative embodiments used to describe the invention generally address and solve the above-described problems and other problems related to offering products to customers. The illustrative embodiments provide a method, system, and computer program product for behavioral and exogenous factor analytics based user clustering and migration.
An embodiment defines clusters of customers. The clustering process uses four determining factors to assign a customer to a cluster. One determining factor for the clustering uses the present risk aversions. An embodiment further quantifies the present risk aversions into a present level of risk. The present risk aversions common to several customers form one basis for clustering customers and selecting the products that are offered those customers. The embodiment determines a temporal progression of the customer's present risk aversions and determines the progressed risk aversions at one or more times in the future. One embodiment quantifies the future risk aversions into a future level of risk.
Another determining factor for the clustering uses the temporal preferences. The embodiment determines a relative importance or utility of buying the product today versus postponing the buying decision to a future time period. One embodiment quantifies the temporal preference into a temporal preference metric, e.g., a degree of the temporal preference.
The temporal preference metrics are usable to determine which products to offer to the customer at the present time. For example, a business can determine whether the business can offer a loss-leading or low profitability product to a customer now such that the customer will eventually buy a high-yield product according to the customer's future risk aversions. Thus, the future risk aversions common to several customers form another basis for clustering customers and selecting the products that are offered those customers.
Another determining factor is the transaction volatility. Transaction volatility is measured by the negative transactions by the customer, such as multiple instances of product returns or large amount of withdrawals from a deposit account resulting in losses to the business. One embodiment quantifies the transaction volatility for a customer. The transaction volatility of a customer is also usable for clustering the customer with other customers who have a similar degree of volatility.
A business has to determine the effectiveness of the various offers it makes for various products to various customers. An embodiment uses a probability distribution model to compute a probability of success, to wit, acceptance, for a set of offers. The embodiment selects an offer in accordance with the given probability distribution from among a subset of those offers whose probability exceeds a threshold probability. The embodiment tests or explores the probability of acceptance of different selected offers with different portion of a cluster of customers. Depending upon the acceptance of an offer by a respective portion of a cluster, the embodiment revises a probability of acceptance associates with the offer.
The embodiment computes revised probabilities of success for each selected offer in this manner. The embodiment chooses those offers whose revised probabilities exceed a second threshold. The embodiment offers one or more of the chosen offers to a cluster using this revised probability distribution.
Testing an offer with an entire cluster can be wasteful because the cluster characteristics are expected to be homogeneous. Therefore, testing an offer with a portion of a cluster is representative of how the offer will perform with the cluster as a whole.
Furthermore, an offer for a product may perform differently in different clusters. An offer that is accepted with a probability greater than the second threshold in one cluster may not be accepted as much in a second cluster, and therefore may not be chosen for presenting to the second cluster. Operating in this manner, an embodiment operates to explore the probabilities of success of the various offers within various clusters, and then exploits, or uses, the learned behavior of the cluster towards the exploratory offer to selectively present only those offers whose probability of acceptance exceeds a business' desired threshold acceptance probability. Exploration of the offers in the set of offers helps an embodiment to learn which offers works best for the customer. Judicious selection of offers for exploration avoids wasteful use of a business' resources. An embodiment balances the benefits of the exploration of new offers with productive use of the resource for doing so, such as by selecting offers according to probability thresholds. The embodiment also presents, or exploits, those offers that have previously been learnt to yield the desired results, thereby maximizing the returns to the business and minimizing the cost of the expended resources.
When an offer is presented to a customer, the customer may or may not accept the offer. If the customer accepts the offer, the customer moves to a new cluster after having bought the product because the customer is unlikely to buy another instance of the same product. The customer's behavior may also diverge from the expected behavior of the customer's cluster. When this happens, an embodiment migrates or updates the customer to a different cluster that better matches the actual behavior of the customer or the new realized reality of the offer acceptance by the customer.
For example, the embodiment re-evaluates the present risk aversions based on the customer's actual divergent response to an offer, re-evaluates a future risk aversion, and determines any changes in the customer's exogenous factors reflected in the customer's divergent response to the offer. Based on the revised present risk aversions, future risk aversions, and exogenous factors, the embodiment determines a suitable new cluster for the customer. The new cluster may be different from the cluster to which the customer belonged when the offer was made. The embodiment migrates the customer to the new cluster.
A method of an embodiment described herein, when implemented to execute on a device or data processing system, comprises substantial advancement of the functionality of that device or data processing system in behavioral and exogenous factor analytics based user clustering and migration. For example, prior-art offers products to customer without regard to a customer's risk perceptions the probability of acceptance of an offer given those perceptions and exogenous factors. An embodiment categorizes customers into clusters of customers with similar present and future risk aversions and similar influences of exogenous factors. An embodiment then tests various offers with portions of such clusters to determine their probabilities of acceptance in those clusters. An embodiment selects those offers for presenting in a cluster, which are found to have at least a desired level of probability of success from such testing. Such a manner of behavioral and exogenous factor analytics based user clustering and migration is unavailable in presently available devices or data processing systems. Thus, a substantial advancement of such devices or data processing systems by executing a method of an embodiment improves the effectiveness of the offers, utility of the offered product to a customer, and the profitability of the business that offers the products.
The illustrative embodiments are described with respect to certain industries, products, offers, risks, risk aversions, probabilities, factors, clusters, devices, data processing systems, environments, components, and applications only as examples. Any specific manifestations of these and other similar artifacts are not intended to be limiting to the invention. Any suitable manifestation of these and other similar artifacts can be selected within the scope of the illustrative embodiments.
Furthermore, the illustrative embodiments may be implemented with respect to any type of data, data source, or access to a data source over a data network. Any type of data storage device may provide the data to an embodiment of the invention, either locally at a data processing system or over a data network, within the scope of the invention. Where an embodiment is described using a mobile device, any type of data storage device suitable for use with the mobile device may provide the data to such embodiment, either locally at the mobile device or over a data network, within the scope of the illustrative embodiments.
The illustrative embodiments are described using specific code, designs, architectures, protocols, layouts, schematics, and tools only as examples and are not limiting to the illustrative embodiments. Furthermore, the illustrative embodiments are described in some instances using particular software, tools, and data processing environments only as an example for the clarity of the description. The illustrative embodiments may be used in conjunction with other comparable or similarly purposed structures, systems, applications, or architectures. For example, other comparable mobile devices, structures, systems, applications, or architectures therefore, may be used in conjunction with such embodiment of the invention within the scope of the invention. An illustrative embodiment may be implemented in hardware, software, or a combination thereof.
The examples in this disclosure are used only for the clarity of the description and are not limiting to the illustrative embodiments. Additional data, operations, actions, tasks, activities, and manipulations will be conceivable from this disclosure and the same are contemplated within the scope of the illustrative embodiments.
Any advantages listed herein are only examples and are not intended to be limiting to the illustrative embodiments. Additional or different advantages may be realized by specific illustrative embodiments. Furthermore, a particular illustrative embodiment may have some, all, or none of the advantages listed above.
With reference to the figures and in particular with reference to
Clients or servers are only example roles of certain data processing systems connected to network 102 and are not intended to exclude other configurations or roles for these data processing systems. Server 104 and server 106 couple to network 102 along with storage unit 108. Software applications may execute on any computer in data processing environment 100. Clients 110, 112, and 114 are also coupled to network 102. A data processing system, such as server 104 or 106, or client 110, 112, or 114 may contain data and may have software applications or software tools executing thereon.
Only as an example, and without implying any limitation to such architecture,
Device 132 is an example of a device described herein. For example, device 132 can take the form of a smartphone, a tablet computer, a laptop computer, client 110 in a stationary or a portable form, a wearable computing device, or any other suitable device. Any software application described as executing in another data processing system in
Application 105 implements an embodiment described herein. Customer data 109 includes historical information about customers of a business. As some non-limiting examples, customer data 109 includes data of past purchases or transactions made by a customer; the customer's demographic, economic, professional, and other exogenous factors that can be considered by an embodiment; a previously computed present and/or future risk aversion or a quantified risk level; and the like. When a new customer's behavior has to be analyzed as described herein, and customer data 109 does not include data of the new customer, an embodiment selects the data of one or more existing customers who are similar to the new customer is some respect, and makes the initial behavior determination as described herein.
Servers 104 and 106, storage unit 108, and clients 110, 112, and 114 may couple to network 102 using wired connections, wireless communication protocols, or other suitable data connectivity. Clients 110, 112, and 114 may be, for example, personal computers or network computers.
In the depicted example, server 104 may provide data, such as boot files, operating system images, and applications to clients 110, 112, and 114. Clients 110, 112, and 114 may be clients to server 104 in this example. Clients 110, 112, 114, or some combination thereof, may include their own data, boot files, operating system images, and applications. Data processing environment 100 may include additional servers, clients, and other devices that are not shown.
In the depicted example, data processing environment 100 may be the Internet. Network 102 may represent a collection of networks and gateways that use the Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) and other protocols to communicate with one another. At the heart of the Internet is a backbone of data communication links between major nodes or host computers, including thousands of commercial, governmental, educational, and other computer systems that route data and messages. Of course, data processing environment 100 also may be implemented as a number of different types of networks, such as for example, an intranet, a local area network (LAN), or a wide area network (WAN).
Among other uses, data processing environment 100 may be used for implementing a client-server environment in which the illustrative embodiments may be implemented. A client-server environment enables software applications and data to be distributed across a network such that an application functions by using the interactivity between a client data processing system and a server data processing system. Data processing environment 100 may also employ a service oriented architecture where interoperable software components distributed across a network may be packaged together as coherent business applications.
With reference to
Data processing system 200 is also representative of a data processing system or a configuration therein, such as data processing system 132 in
In the depicted example, data processing system 200 employs a hub architecture including North Bridge and memory controller hub (NB/MCH) 202 and South Bridge and input/output (I/O) controller hub (SB/ICH) 204. Processing unit 206, main memory 208, and graphics processor 210 are coupled to North Bridge and memory controller hub (NB/MCH) 202. Processing unit 206 may contain one or more processors and may be implemented using one or more heterogeneous processor systems. Processing unit 206 may be a multi-core processor. Graphics processor 210 may be coupled to NB/MCH 202 through an accelerated graphics port (AGP) in certain implementations.
In the depicted example, local area network (LAN) adapter 212 is coupled to South Bridge and I/O controller hub (SB/ICH) 204. Audio adapter 216, keyboard and mouse adapter 220, modem 222, read only memory (ROM) 224, universal serial bus (USB) and other ports 232, and PCl/PCIe devices 234 are coupled to South Bridge and I/O controller hub 204 through bus 238. Hard disk drive (HDD) or solid-state drive (SSD) 226 and CD-ROM 230 are coupled to South Bridge and I/O controller hub 204 through bus 240. PCl/PCIe devices 234 may include, for example, Ethernet adapters, add-in cards, and PC cards for notebook computers. PCI uses a card bus controller, while PCIe does not. ROM 224 may be, for example, a flash binary input/output system (BIOS). Hard disk drive 226 and CD-ROM 230 may use, for example, an integrated drive electronics (IDE), serial advanced technology attachment (SATA) interface, or variants such as external-SATA (eSATA) and micro-SATA (mSATA). A super I/O (SIO) device 236 may be coupled to South Bridge and I/O controller hub (SB/ICH) 204 through bus 238.
Memories, such as main memory 208, ROM 224, or flash memory (not shown), are some examples of computer usable storage devices. Hard disk drive or solid state drive 226, CD-ROM 230, and other similarly usable devices are some examples of computer usable storage devices including a computer usable storage medium.
An operating system runs on processing unit 206. The operating system coordinates and provides control of various components within data processing system 200 in
Instructions for the operating system, the object-oriented programming system, and applications or programs, such as application 105 in
The hardware in
In some illustrative examples, data processing system 200 may be a personal digital assistant (PDA), which is generally configured with flash memory to provide non-volatile memory for storing operating system files and/or user-generated data. A bus system may comprise one or more buses, such as a system bus, an I/O bus, and a PCI bus. Of course, the bus system may be implemented using any type of communications fabric or architecture that provides for a transfer of data between different components or devices attached to the fabric or architecture.
A communications unit may include one or more devices used to transmit and receive data, such as a modem or a network adapter. A memory may be, for example, main memory 208 or a cache, such as the cache found in North Bridge and memory controller hub 202. A processing unit may include one or more processors or CPUs.
The depicted examples in
With reference to
Component 304 uses customer data, such as customer data 109 in
Component 306 performs offer optimization. Particularly, component 306 assigns probabilities of success to a set of offers, tests a subset of the offers using different portions of a cluster and similarly in different clusters, and revises the probabilities of acceptance of the tested offers according to actual acceptance in those portions of the clusters. Component 306 produces an offer with a revised probability of acceptance based on the exploratory test. Thus, component 306 optimizes a set of offers into a subset of those offers such that each offer in the subset has a greater-than-a threshold probability of being accepted by a customer in a cluster identified with the offer. Subcomponent 308 assigns probability to each offer for a cluster. The offers are made through probabilistic sampling of an offer from the offer set using the assigned probability distributions where the probability exceeds certain threshold.
Subcomponent 309 adapts these probabilities based on a customer's response to the offer. For example, subcomponent 309 adjusts the probability associated with an offer based on whether the customer accepts the offer. If the customer accepts the offer, subcomponent 309 increases the probability value for the offer. Subcomponent 309 decreases the probability when the customer rejects the offer. In an exploration mode of component 306, subcomponent 309 can also present offers with zero probability or lower-that-a-threshold probability value to learn the customer's response behavior.
Having learned the offer response behavior of a customer for a period of sufficient duration, component 306 switches to an exploitation mode. In the exploitation mode, subcomponent 309 presents those offers to the customers where probabilities of acceptance are above a predetermined threshold.
Subcomponent 310 determines whether a customer's buying behavior is consistent with, or deviant from, an expected behavior in the cluster. Particularly, subcomponent 310 uses the actual acceptance data collected by subcomponent 309 to make this determination. When a customer's actual buying behavior deviates from the expected behavior in the cluster, subcomponent 310 migrates the customer to a new or different cluster as described herein.
With reference to
Subcomponent 404 determines the present risk aversions of a customer. Subcomponent 404 uses customer data 109 in
Subcomponent 406 quantifies the future risk aversions into a risk value, e.g., a risk level projected to be tolerated by the customer at a future time. An output of component 406 helps determine a product that can be presently offered to the customer presently such that the presently offered product and a product offered in the future can together satisfy a business objective, e.g., profitability of the customer to the business.
Subcomponent 406 projects the temporal preferences of a customer over a period. Subcomponent 406 uses customer data 109 in
Subcomponent 408 determines a pattern of behavioral risks of the customer, e.g., the risk of a large negative transaction by the customer. Subcomponent 408 uses customer data 109 in
Subcomponent 410 selects a set of exogenous factors applicable to a customer according to a set of defined rules or business logic. Subcomponent 410 determines or assigns values to each of the exogenous factors in the set of factors of a customer according to the customer's particular profile.
Component 304 in
With reference to
The application analyzes a customer's data of a customer, or the customer data of a similar customer, to determine a present risk aversion (block 502). The application analyzes a temporal information in the customer's data, or in a similar customer's data, to determine the customer's timing preference, e.g., a preference to buy now versus a preference to wait and buy in the future (block 504). In block 504, the application quantifies such temporal preference into a degree of temporal preference according to the preferred time of the consumption.
The application analyzes a pattern of transaction volatility, e.g., negative transactions, in the customer's data, or in a similar customer's data (block 506). In block 506, the application quantifies such transaction volatility into a degree of transaction volatility according to an amount, frequency, or both, of the negative transactions.
The application analyzes a set of exogenous factors that influence the customer's ability in general, the ability to buy a type of product in particular, or both (block 508). Some non-limiting examples of the exogenous factors and their influences are described in this disclosure.
The application classifies the customer into a cluster according to the analyses of blocks 502, 504, 506, and 508 (block 510). The application ends process 500 thereafter.
With reference to
The application assigns an initial probability according to a probability distribution model, to a set of offers (block 602). The application selects a subset of offers whose initial probabilities are greater than a cutoff threshold (block 604).
The application presents an offer from the subset to the customers in a portion of a cluster (block 606). The application measures an actual acceptance rate, i.e., number of acceptance versus non acceptance, of the offer (block 608). The application repeats block 606 and 608 for different offers in the subset, and with different portions in a cluster.
The application adjusts an initial probability of an offer according to the acceptance rate of the offer in a portion of the cluster (block 610). The application selects an offer whose adjusted probability of acceptance is greater than an offer threshold probability (block 612). The application presents the selected offer to a customer in the cluster (block 614). The application ends process 600 thereafter.
Thus, a computer implemented method, system or apparatus, and computer program product are provided in the illustrative embodiments for behavioral and exogenous factor analytics based user clustering and migration. Where an embodiment or a portion thereof is described with respect to a type of device, the computer implemented method, system or apparatus, the computer program product, or a portion thereof, are adapted or configured for use with a suitable and comparable manifestation of that type of device.
The present invention may be a system, a method, and/or a computer program product. The computer program product may include a computer readable storage medium (or media) having computer readable program instructions thereon for causing a processor to carry out aspects of the present invention.
The computer readable storage medium can be a tangible device that can retain and store instructions for use by an instruction execution device. The computer readable storage medium may be, for example, but is not limited to, an electronic storage device, a magnetic storage device, an optical storage device, an electromagnetic storage device, a semiconductor storage device, or any suitable combination of the foregoing. A non-exhaustive list of more specific examples of the computer readable storage medium includes the following: a portable computer diskette, a hard disk, a random access memory (RAM), a read-only memory (ROM), an erasable programmable read-only memory (EPROM or Flash memory), a static random access memory (SRAM), a portable compact disc read-only memory (CD-ROM), a digital versatile disk (DVD), a memory stick, a floppy disk, a mechanically encoded device such as punch-cards or raised structures in a groove having instructions recorded thereon, and any suitable combination of the foregoing. A computer readable storage medium, as used herein, is not to be construed as being transitory signals per se, such as radio waves or other freely propagating electromagnetic waves, electromagnetic waves propagating through a waveguide or other transmission media (e.g., light pulses passing through a fiber-optic cable), or electrical signals transmitted through a wire.
Computer readable program instructions described herein can be downloaded to respective computing/processing devices from a computer readable storage medium or to an external computer or external storage device via a network, for example, the Internet, a local area network, a wide area network and/or a wireless network. The network may comprise copper transmission cables, optical transmission fibers, wireless transmission, routers, firewalls, switches, gateway computers and/or edge servers. A network adapter card or network interface in each computing/processing device receives computer readable program instructions from the network and forwards the computer readable program instructions for storage in a computer readable storage medium within the respective computing/processing device.
Computer readable program instructions for carrying out operations of the present invention may be assembler instructions, instruction-set-architecture (ISA) instructions, machine instructions, machine dependent instructions, microcode, firmware instructions, state-setting data, or either source code or object code written in any combination of one or more programming languages, including an object oriented programming language such as Smalltalk, C++ or the like, and conventional procedural programming languages, such as the “C” programming language or similar programming languages. The computer readable program instructions may execute entirely on the user's computer, partly on the user's computer, as a stand-alone software package, partly on the user's computer and partly on a remote computer or entirely on the remote computer or server. In the latter scenario, the remote computer may be connected to the user's computer through any type of network, including a local area network (LAN) or a wide area network (WAN), or the connection may be made to an external computer (for example, through the Internet using an Internet Service Provider). In some embodiments, electronic circuitry including, for example, programmable logic circuitry, field-programmable gate arrays (FPGA), or programmable logic arrays (PLA) may execute the computer readable program instructions by utilizing state information of the computer readable program instructions to personalize the electronic circuitry, in order to perform aspects of the present invention.
Aspects of the present invention are described herein with reference to flowchart illustrations and/or block diagrams of methods, apparatus (systems), and computer program products according to embodiments of the invention. It will be understood that each block of the flowchart illustrations and/or block diagrams, and combinations of blocks in the flowchart illustrations and/or block diagrams, can be implemented by computer readable program instructions.
These computer readable program instructions may be provided to a processor of a general purpose computer, special purpose computer, or other programmable data processing apparatus to produce a machine, such that the instructions, which execute via the processor of the computer or other programmable data processing apparatus, create means for implementing the functions/acts specified in the flowchart and/or block diagram block or blocks.
These computer readable program instructions may also be stored in a computer readable storage medium that can direct a computer, a programmable data processing apparatus, and/or other devices to function in a particular manner, such that the computer readable storage medium having instructions stored therein comprises an article of manufacture including instructions which implement aspects of the function/act specified in the flowchart and/or block diagram block or blocks.
The computer readable program instructions may also be loaded onto a computer, other programmable data processing apparatus, or other device to cause a series of operational steps to be performed on the computer, other programmable apparatus or other device to produce a computer implemented process, such that the instructions which execute on the computer, other programmable apparatus, or other device implement the functions/acts specified in the flowchart and/or block diagram block or blocks.
The flowchart and block diagrams in the Figures illustrate the architecture, functionality, and operation of possible implementations of systems, methods, and computer program products according to various embodiments of the present invention. In this regard, each block in the flowchart or block diagrams may represent a module, segment, or portion of instructions, which comprises one or more executable instructions for implementing the specified logical function(s). In some alternative implementations, the functions noted in the block may occur out of the order noted in the figures. For example, two blocks shown in succession may, in fact, be executed substantially concurrently, or the blocks may sometimes be executed in the reverse order, depending upon the functionality involved. It will also be noted that each block of the block diagrams and/or flowchart illustration, and combinations of blocks in the block diagrams and/or flowchart illustration, can be implemented by special purpose hardware-based systems that perform the specified functions or acts or carry out combinations of special purpose hardware and computer instructions.
