Patent Application
20100153468
Configuring software applications can be a difficult task. The difficulty in configuring such systems grows in complexity as the size of the software application increases. An example of a complex software application to configure is an enterprise resource planning (“ERP”) application. Efforts to configure such applications often involve a large number of employees and even consultants. These efforts may string out over many months, and even multiple years. Further, modifying a large software application configuration or upgrading such an application can, depending on the size of the configuration modification project or scope of the application upgrade, may involve equal amounts of time and cost as an initial implementation.
A major cause for the complexity of modifying and upgrading such software applications is that configuration settings are often stored in configuration tables. The configurations settings in these tables typically do not provide any context of what the configuration settings are for, other than by reference to a manual or from the experience of person modifying the setting. Further, when modifying an existing configuration, care must be taken not to disrupt incomplete processes, such as unfulfilled product orders that include contractual terms that cannot be violated. Removing a configuration from a productive environment often causes such issues. As a result, processes may break and not be able to complete or, worse yet, cause an organization to incur legal liability. Thus, modifying application configurations is time consuming and expensive and data fixes to existing processes are often needed after a configuration change.
Many software solutions, such as Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) software applications, are difficult to adapt to new business requirements once implemented. Adaptation can be very expensive and time consuming typically because it requires consultants to change configuration settings in the system and to migrate data to the new settings. System down time is often required. In some instances adaptation is nearly impossible.
Various embodiments include one or more of systems, methods, software, and data structures to provide great flexibility when adapting software applications, such as ERP applications, to new or different processes. Such embodiments allow instances of software applications to be quickly and easily adapted to meet rapidly changing technological and business needs while handling continuing and previously completed processes without disruption. These and other embodiments are described below with reference to the figures.
In the following detailed description, reference is made to the accompanying drawings that form a part hereof, and in which is shown by way of illustration specific embodiments in which the inventive subject matter may be practiced. These embodiments are described in sufficient detail to enable those skilled in the art to practice them, and it is to be understood that other embodiments may be utilized and that structural, logical, and electrical changes may be made without departing from the scope of the inventive subject matter. Such embodiments of the inventive subject matter may be referred to, individually and/or collectively, herein by the term “invention” merely for convenience and without intending to voluntarily limit the scope of this application to any single invention or inventive concept if more than one is in fact disclosed.
The following description is, therefore, not to be taken in a limited sense, and the scope of the inventive subject matter is defined by the appended claims.
The functions or algorithms described herein are implemented in hardware, software or a combination of software and hardware in one embodiment. The software comprises computer executable instructions stored on computer readable media such as memory or other type of storage devices. Further, described functions may correspond to modules, which may be software, hardware, firmware, or any combination thereof. Multiple functions are performed in one or more modules as desired, and the embodiments described are merely examples. The software is executed on a digital signal processor, ASIC, microprocessor, or other type of processor operating on a system, such as a personal computer, server, a router, or other device capable of processing data including network interconnection devices.
Some embodiments implement the functions in two or more specific interconnected hardware modules or devices with related control and data signals communicated between and through the modules, or as portions of an application-specific integrated circuit. Thus, the exemplary process flow is applicable to software, firmware, and hardware implementations.
The application configuration environment 102 is a system 100 environment within which an application can be configured. However, the application will, or does, execute within the application execution environment 104. In some embodiments, this arrangement of the application configuration environment 102 and the application execution environment 104 separates the configuration of an application from the environment within which it executes. When an application configuration has been established, all or part of the configuration can then be deployed to the application execution environment 104. This deployment can occur to one or more separate instance of the application in the application execution environment 104. Although only a single application execution environment 104 is illustrated, multiple application execution environments 104 can exist, and the deployment can be made to one or more of the multiple application execution environments 104. Further, although this embodiment includes the application execution environment 102 as a distinct environment within which applications may be configured, other embodiments may be implemented where the configuring occurs in the same environment within which an application being configured is configured, such as the application execution environment 104.
The configuration scoping application 202 typically is a software tool that executes on a computing device, such as a portable computer, on a same computing device within which the application configuration environment 102 exists and may execute, or on another computing device that can be communicatively coupled to the application configuration environment 102. For example, a a web enabled interface may be included in some embodiments that is accessible over the Internet, an Intranet, or other similar public or private network, for configuring a software application.
The configuration scoping application 202, when executed, typically presents a set of scoping questions to a user. The scoping questions are linked to one of many adaptation catalog entries. The adaptation catalog entries include a representation of all of the solution capabilities of an application to be configured, and eventually executed. In some embodiments, the solution capabilities are hierarchically divided into areas, packages, topics, and options. There may be multiple areas and each area may have multiple packages. Each package may have multiple topics and each topic may have multiple options.
In some embodiments, such as in an example embodiment where the application to be configured is an ERP application, the adaptation catalog may provide in the area Sales, a package Customer Order Management that contains the topics Sales Order Quote, Sales Order, Sales Order Analysis, and others. On that level, one or more options typically exist such as Approval Processing.
In the configuration scoping application 202, as stated above, each scoping question may be linked to an adaptation catalog entry. An adaptation catalog entry further includes a rule. These rules typically model dependencies between the areas, packages, topics, and options and corresponding solution capabilities of the application. A rule may specify required inclusion or exclusion of other areas, packages, topics, or options, or may require specification of further areas, packages, topics, or options. A rule may also specify a recommendation or default area, package, topic, or option.
For example, a first example scoping question, “What is the primary focus of your business?” may have three possible answers including “Sales,” “Service,” and “Logistics.” Such a first scoping question typically is aimed at identifying an area of business in which the application is going to be used. Answering “Sales” typically tells the configuration scoping application 202 that the area is “Sales” and a rule tied to the adaptation catalog entry for “Sales” specifies dependencies with packages, topics, and options and the corresponding solution capabilities of the application necessary or optional in using the application in a sales business. Such a rule can also specify that other packages, topics, and options and the corresponding solution capabilities are excluded.
Thus, when a user answers, or modifies answers to, scoping questions, the application is being configured. Further, when a question is answered, or a modification is made to an answer, that is associated with an adaptation catalog entry having a rule that excludes another area, package, topic, or option, that rule may be applied to eliminate questions from consideration or require, or otherwise request, an answer to another question. Conversely, when a question is answered that is associated with an adaptation catalog entry having a rule that requires another area, package, topic, or option, that same rule may be applied to determine a next question, or group of questions, to ask a user. However, in the event that a question is not answered that is linked to a rule providing defaults, the question may be skipped without adversely affecting the application configuration.
The configuration application 236, in some embodiments, provides a set of tools via user interfaces to a user. The tools of the configuration application 236 may allow the user to modify answers to scoping question answers stored in an input cache 220 of the configuration scoping application 202, the application configuration dataset 234, and the application transaction dataset 238. The application configuration dataset 234 may be populated with data copied from a configuration repository 242 stored within a configuration workspace 228 of the application configuration environment 102. The application transaction dataset 238 may be populated with data copied either from a demonstration dataset stored in data repository 244 of the configuration workspace 228 or from the content repository 222. The application transaction dataset 238 may include actual transaction data from an application instance in the application configuration environment 102. The user interfaces that allow modification of the application configuration dataset 234 may allow a user to fine-tune configuration settings, set and modify master data, such as addresses, customer contacts, organizational graphics for printing on documents and display within the computer application, and similar data.
Although the input cache 220 is illustrated within the configuration scoping application 202, the input cache 220 may exist separate from the configuration scoping application 202 within a memory of the portable computing device 232. In such embodiments, the input cache 220 may be populated with data copied from the scoping input database 226. As answers to scoping questions are received, the answers and associated configuration settings based on application of rules of the adaptation catalog 214, discussed below, are stored in the input cache 220. When a scoping question answer is modified, the new answer is stored and the previous answer is also stored to keep a historical record of previous answers. The new and previous configuration settings are also stored in the input cache. One purpose of storing the historical record of scoping question answers and associated configuration settings is that when making configuration changes to the computer application being configured, care must be taken not to disrupt processes that are already in progress. When these configuration settings are eventually deployed to the computer application, the historic configuration settings are maintained in the productive system to ensure that such processes may continue to completion with the configuration that they were initiated with. There may be caveats to use of the historic configuration settings, but such caveats are typically set as exceptions to this general rule, such as through fine-tuning the historic settings or making data changes to specific transactions.
For the sake of understandability regarding several portions of the configuration scoping application 202 and the application configuration environment 102, these portions of the system 210 will be discussed followed by a more detailed discussion of the configuration application 236.
The configuration scoping application 202, in some embodiments, includes a deduction engine 212 and an adaptation catalog 214′. In this embodiment, the configuration scoping application 202 further typically includes a data migration planner 218 and the input cache 220.
The application configuration environment 102, in some embodiments, includes an adaptation catalog 214, a content repository 222, and a configuration package repository 224. In some such embodiments, the application configuration environment 102 further includes a scoping input database 226, a configuration workspace 228, a deployment module 230, and a deployment datastore 240.
The adaptation catalog 214 may include a representation of some or all of the solution capabilities of an application to be configured, and eventually executed. Capabilities of an application to be configured are identified in adaptation catalog 214 entries. The adaptation catalog 214 entries each may be identified as an area, package, topic, or option and may be organized in a hierarchy with a child identifying the parent. An example hierarchy is a “General Ledger” capability, which in some embodiments typically is a package having two topics, “cash based” and “accrual based” which are two application capabilities within the “General Ledger” capability.
The adaptation catalog 214 entries may further include scoping questions directed toward obtaining scoping information (i.e., scoping question answers) to determine what areas, packages, topics, and options are relevant to the user's needs. Additionally, the adaptation catalog 214 entries typically include rules, the application of which can require inclusion or exclusion, or specify default inclusion or exclusion, of certain other areas, packages, topics, and options. Thus, because the areas, packages, topics, and options correlate to application capabilities, the inclusion, exclusion, and defaulting specifies what capabilities will be enabled and disabled in the application when deployed or redeployed by the deployment module 230.
In some embodiments, rules and entries in the adaptation catalog can be linked to a configuration package that exists in the configuration package repository 224. A configuration package includes one or more configuration settings that enable or disable functionality of the application when deployed by the deployment module 230 or by a configuration process within the application configuration environment 102 when configuring the application within the configuration workspace 228. A configuration package can further be linked to one or more content items or content item definitions stored in the content repository 222. Some such content types include report layouts, forms, user interfaces, communication specifications, documentation, and other content that can be used in an application when deployed. A communication specification can include an XML schema, an EDI schema and connectivity information, mappings between file layouts and application data storage mechanisms, such as databases, and other similar communication specifications.
The rules of adaptation catalog 214 entries may also be used by the deduction engine 212 of the configuration scoping application 202. The configuration scoping application 202 typically presents a user interface to a user that requests answers to questions. Previous answers to questions may be presented when a user is modifying an existing configuration. The previous answers may be modified and further questions may be asked and answers to other questions may be automatically modified based on newly received answers. The questions to be asked via the user interface may be identified by the deduction engine 212 based on the adaptation catalog 214′. The deduction engine 212 may also cause previously received answers to be modified based on newly received answers. For example, when a newly received answer modifies a previously provided answer, the deduction engine 212 may apply rules of the adaptation catalog 214′ which requires or excludes areas, packages, topics or options that were previously included or excluded. The adaptation catalog 214′ is typically a copy of the adaptation catalog 214 from the application configuration environment 102. When an answer is received by the configuration scoping application 202 through the user interface, the answer may be stored in the input cache 220 of the configuration scoping application 202. The deduction engine 212 may then apply the rule associated with the adaptation catalog 214′ entry of the question asked to the received answer. Through the application of the rule, in view of answers already received, newly received answers, and rules already applied, the deduction engine 212 typically identifies a next question to ask. The identified question is then presented to the user through the user interface. This process typically continues until either all of the questions have been asked, the user is out of time, all changes to previously provided answers have been made, or the user otherwise chooses to stop. If questions remain that have not been answered, the process may be continued at a later time or rules specifying default areas, packages, topics, and options typically supply enough information to allow deployment of the application in a functional form.
In some embodiments, the configuration scoping application 218 may further include a data migration planner 218. In such embodiments, one or more additional scoping questions may be asked. These additional scoping questions are typically directed toward obtaining information from the user about legacy systems and how data is stored within them. In some embodiments, the questions simply may ask what systems are currently in use. In other embodiments, the questions may be more detailed to obtain information such as what type of database an application is utilizing and what type of customization has been made or custom applications developed. The data migration planner 218 may also be used to gather information about a data storage environment to which data is to be migrated to from an existing data storage environment in production. The data migration planner 218 may then use the answers to these additional questions to propose a data migration plan to the new application or new data storage environment.
After the scoping question have been answered, the answers, and any other information obtained from a user of the configuration scoping application 202, the information typically is uploaded to the application configuration environment 102. However, in embodiments, where the configuration scoping application 202 executes on the same computing device as the application configuration environment 202, the scoping question answers and other information may be stored directly to the application configuration environment 102.
When the configuration question answers and other information are uploaded, or otherwise stored to the application environment 102, the scoping question answers are stored to the scoping input database 226. The information stored to the scoping input database 226 may also include historic answers to scoping questions and current and historic configuration settings copied from the input cache 220. The scoping question answers, in some instances, are referred to interchangeably as the “scoping information.”
After the current and historic scoping information is within the scoping input database 226, a process within the application configuration environment 102 typically executes to begin configuring an application in the configuration repository 242 of the configuration workspace 228. The configuration repository 242 may include a set of configuration tables that mirrors, at least in part, the configuration tables of the application. The configuration repository 242 may include a set of configuration tables for each of multiple instances of the application to allow use of the application configuration environment 102 to configure multiple application instances. The configuration tables of at least one of the multiple instances of the application may include two sets of tables for each of a current and a historic configuration. In some other embodiments, the configuration tables of one or more of the application instances may include a configuration table schema that tracks current and historic configurations in a single set of configuration tables through use of identifiers of current configurations. Some such embodiments may use a date/time stamp indicia of when certain configuration settings are, were, or will be current. Other indicia and table schemas may be used depending on the requirements of the particular embodiment.
In these embodiments that maintain historic configurations, configuration settings that are no longer current and content that is no longer used in new transactions are typically not deleted. Rather, these configuration settings and content are removed from use in new transactions but remain on the system for use in completing previously initiated transactions. Once the historic configuration settings and historic content are no longer needed, an administrator may remove the historic configuration settings and content from the system manually or through use of a dedicated process, depending on the preference of the administrator and policies of the particular organization.
The process that configures the application may be configured to determine one or more configuration packages to instantiate in the configuration repository 242. Configuration packages, in some embodiments, may include one or a set of configuration settings to enable or disable certain capabilities of the application. Configuration packages, as mentioned above, may be linked to adaptation catalog 214 entries and rules associated with adaptation catalog entries. Thus, the process that configures the application in the configuration repository 242 may be configured to query the scoping information in the scoping input database 226 to identify configuration packages to instantiate.
In some embodiments, demonstration data may exist to facilitate instantiation of a demonstration instance of the application, or a portion thereof, for a sales lead, training session, or other purpose. The demonstration data, in some embodiments, is linked to one or more configuration packages from the configuration package repository 224. The demonstration data typically exists in the content repository 222 so that it can be copied into a set of application tables in the data repository 244 of the configuration workspace 228. These tables may hold such data as transactional data, operational data, master data, or other data that can exist in the application when the application is ready for execution or is executed.
Once the demonstration data is copied to the data repository 244, that data may be fine-tuned to more closely match the intended use of the demonstration data. For example, the system may be configured so that a sales person, or other individual, can fine-tune demonstration data values to more closely match a sales lead's expectations of the application. Such fine tuning may include modifying sales order documents in the demonstration data to include a name, address, and logo of the sales lead's enterprise, or other similar modifications to the demonstration data.
Some embodiments of the application configuration environment 102 may further include the deployment datastore 240. The deployment datastore 240 typically stores a representation of one or more application configurations of applications that have been deployed. The representations of the one or more application configuration may be stored or updated in the deployment datastore 240 by the deployment module 230 upon successful deployment of an application.
A representation of an application configuration typically includes data representative of the application configuration settings. In some embodiments, the representation may further include data representative of content deployed to the application.
The deployment datastore 240, in some embodiments, may be updated upon each configuration or content modification of a deployed system. In some embodiments, the deployment datastore may further include a versioning mechanism that maintains not only a current configuration representation, but also historical representations.
In some embodiments, the deployment datastore 240, or a current copy thereof, may be maintained by an entity that developed, or otherwise offers for sale, the application. The deployment datastore 240 may be used by the entity to monitor current application usage, perform billing processes as a function of a current application configuration, provide application upgrade information based on portions of the application or content utilized, and for other purposes. In some embodiments, the entity may provide application updates, bug fixes, or other upgrades directly to a deployed application instance. Such updates, bug fixes, or other upgrades may be identified as relevant to a particular application instance as a function of the configuration representation in view of adaptation catalog 214 entries.
As described above, the configuration application 236, in some embodiments, may provide a set of tools via user interfaces to a user. The tools of the configuration application 236 typically allow the user to modify answers to scoping question answers stored in an input cache 220, the application configuration dataset 234, and the application transaction dataset 238. The application configuration dataset 234 may be populated with data copied from the configuration repository 242. The application transaction dataset 238 may be populated with data copied from either a demonstration dataset stored in the data repository 244 or from the content repository 222. The input cache 220, if separate from the configuration scoping application 202, may be populated with scoping information copied from the scoping input database 226.
Through use of the configuration application 236 user interfaces, a user may modify data within the application transaction dataset 238 to customize the data used of a demonstration application to more closely reflect how a sales lead's enterprise will use the application. For example, through modifying the transaction data, data displayed within the demonstration may include orders with products, customers, addresses, countries, and other details that truly reflect those of the sales lead's enterprise or may be modified to meet the changing needs of the enterprise in a productive computing environment.
Further, use of the configuration application 236 user interfaces may also allow a user to further refine an application configuration to meet the changing needs of the enterprise. This can include a user taking a copy of an application configuration to work on while away from a connection to the application to be configured or application configuration environment 102, such as when traveling.
After the application has been configured in the configuration workspace 228 and the demonstration data, if any, is ready, the configuration can be deployed by the deployment module 230. Detail of the deployment module 230 is provided in
The deployment module 230 may include a configuration setting deployment process 304, an activation process 306, and a data deployment process 308. Some embodiments of the deployment module may further include a delta deployment process 310.
The application execution environment 104 includes an application 314. The application 314 is an application that has been instantiated and most often is already configured. The application 314 may include a set of configuration tables 316 that will be populated and modified by the deployment module 230. The application 314 may further include other tables, data structures, and storage locations that may be populated by the deployment module 230 with one or more of demonstration data, application data, content, or other data.
The deployment module 230, when executed, typically operates to deploy a configuration to the application 314 configured in the application configuration environment. Deployment is typically performed by one or more of the processes of the deployment module 310. These processes may include the configuration setting deployment process 304, the data deployment process 208, the activation process 306, and the delta deployment process 310. Some embodiments of the deployment module 230 may include one or more of these processes.
The configuration setting deployment process 304 typically deploys configuration settings to the configuration tables 326 of the application 314. If the application 314 has already been configure, which is most often the case, configuration settings in the configuration tables 316 that are modified are stored in a manner so as to allow incomplete transactions and processes to complete with the configuration under which they were initiated. However, in some embodiments, if the application 314 has not been instantiated, the configuration setting deployment process 304, or other process of the deployment module may instantiate the application 314 or call another process that will instantiate the application 314. The deployment of the configuration settings may include a copying of configuration settings from the configuration tables of the configuration repository 242, as shown and described with reference to
In some embodiments, a configuration setting that is copied to the application 314 may refer to an item of content or data stored in the data repository 244, of
The data deployment process 308 may be executed if there is demonstration data, modified master data, or other data in the configuration workspace 228 or if there is content to deploy from the data repository 244 of
Some embodiments of the deployment module 230 may further include the activation process 306. The activation process, in some embodiments, is configured to execute to activate the application 314 after it has been successfully deployed or redeployed. In some instances, the activation process 314 may require an activation key, message, code, or other authorization from an activation authority to activate the configured application 314. The activation authority may include one or more of a number of individuals or entities. An example of an activation authority may include an entity that developed or is selling the application 314.
In some embodiments, the deployment module 230 may further include the delta deployment process 310. The delta deployment process is typically only relevant after an application has already been deployed. When an application is deployed, or subsequently modified, a representation of the application configuration may be stored or updated in the deployment datastore 240 as described and illustrated with reference to
The application execution environment 104 is a data processing environment within which an application, or an application to be deployed, may execute. When deploying an application, the deployment module 230 typically needs to know what application execution environment 104 and the application instance within that environment to which the deployment is to be made. In embodiments including only one application execution environment 104, the application execution environment 104 may already be known. Similarly, in an application execution environment including only a single application instance, the instance may already be known. However further information may be needed in other embodiments, such as when the application instances are instances of different computer applications from the same or different software development organizations.
Each instance of the application (i.e., application instances A, B, . . . X) typically includes a set of configuration tables which may include distinct configuration settings from one another. In some embodiments, multiple instances of the application may exist such as to provide a development instance, a test instance, and a production instance. In such embodiments where there are multiple application instances of the same application, the deployment module 230 may deploy the configuration settings from one of the application instances in the application execution environment 104 to another application in the same or another application execution environment 104. Although the deployment module 230 is illustrated as being a part of the application configuration environment 102, the deployment module 230, in other embodiments, may be a standalone application or a part of another application or process.
In some embodiments of the method 700, the historical configuration storage location and the current configuration storage location are both the same database table that includes a termination column for each configuration setting stored in the table. The termination column in such embodiments may be populated with data indicating when the respective configuration setting is not a current configuration setting. The data indicating when the respective configuration setting is not a current configuration setting may include data such as a date, a flag value indicating if the respective configuration is current or historical, a value essentially representative of a configuration version number, and other data.
In further embodiments, current and historical configuration settings may each be stored with a configuration setting identifier. In such embodiments, processes initiated according to a set of configuration settings are stored with a reference to the set of configuration settings based on the configuration setting identifier. The configuration setting identifier may be a date-time-stamp of when a respective process was initiated. The configuration of the process may then be retrieved from one or both of the current and historical configuration setting storage locations by a date-time-stamp of an initiated process.
In some embodiments, receiving 702 input representative of a configuration change to the at least one configuration setting may include receiving input specifying that the configuration change is to modify all processes including previously initiated processes. This input may include a configuration change to master data, such as a shipping address when a customer moves to a new location or a person in a position relevant to a process is filled by another individual.
In the method 800 the representation of the at least one configuration setting current when the process is initiated may be a data item for use as a retrieval argument to retrieve the at least one configuration setting from a configuration setting repository. The data item, in some such embodiments, may be a date time stamp of when the process was initiated. This date time stamp may be a retrieval argument for a process configuration retrieval method that is operable to retrieve process configurations. The process configuration retrieval method may be a method of an object tasked with providing configuration data to other requesting objects and may retrieve data representative of one or both of current and historical configurations. The configuration setting repository discussed above may be local or remote to a system performing the method 800. In some embodiments, the configuration setting repository is a remote database on a server accessible over a computer network.
In some instances, an administrator or a configuration process may need to retrieve certain configuration settings. To facilitate such retrievals, some embodiments are further operable to provide one or both of system and user interfaces to receive a configuration setting query from a requestor, perform the query against both current and historical configuration settings, and provide a result set of from the query to the requester. The system interfaces are typically methods exposed by objects that may be called by logical, non-human users, or from user interfaces that receive queries from human users.
Computer-readable instructions stored on a computer-readable medium are executable by the processing unit 902 of the computer 910. A hard drive, CD-ROM, and RAM are some examples of articles including a computer-readable medium. For example, a computer program 925 capable of providing a generic technique to perform access control check for data access and/or for doing an operation on one of the servers in a component object model (COM) based system according to the teachings of the present invention may be included on a CD-ROM and loaded from the CD-ROM to a hard drive. The computer-readable instructions allow computer 910 to provide generic access controls in a COM based computer network system having multiple users and servers. In some embodiments, the various methods described herein may be encoded into computer executable code and the code may be stored on a computer readable medium. Example of the such computer executable code may be the configuration scoping application 202 and the various elements described above as being included in the application configuration environment 102 and application execution environment 104.
The various operations of example methods and processes described herein may be performed, at least partially, by one or more processors that are temporarily configured (e.g., by software) or permanently configured to perform the relevant operations. Whether temporarily or permanently configured, such processors may constitute processor-implemented modules that operate to perform one or more operations or functions. The modules referred to herein may, in some example embodiments, comprise processor-implemented modules.
Similarly, the methods and processes described herein may be at least partially processor-implemented. For example, at least some of the operations of a method may be performed by one or more processors or processor-implemented modules. The performance of certain of the operations may be distributed among the one or more processors, not only residing within a single machine, but deployed across a number of machines. In some example embodiments, the processor or processors may be located in a single location (e.g., within a home environment, an office environment or as a server farm), while in other embodiments the processors may be distributed across a number of locations.
The one or more processors may also operate to support performance of the relevant operations in a “cloud computing” environment or as a “software as a service” (SaaS). For example, at least some of the operations may be performed by a group of computers (as examples of machines including processors), these operations being accessible via a network (e.g., the Internet) and via one or more appropriate interfaces (e.g., Application Program Interfaces (APIs)).
It is emphasized that the Abstract is provided to comply with 37 C.F.R. §1.72(b) requiring an Abstract that will allow the reader to quickly ascertain the nature and gist of the technical disclosure. It is submitted with the understanding that it will not be used to interpret or limit the scope or meaning of the claims.
In the foregoing Detailed Description, various features are grouped together in a single embodiment to streamline the disclosure. This method of disclosure is not to be interpreted as reflecting an intention that the claimed embodiments of the inventive subject matter require more features than are expressly recited in each claim. Rather, as the following claims reflect, inventive subject matter lies in less than all features of a single disclosed embodiment. Thus, the following claims are hereby incorporated into the Detailed Description, with each claim standing on its own as a separate embodiment.
It will be readily understood to those skilled in the art that various other changes in the details, material, and arrangements of the parts and method stages which have been described and illustrated in order to explain the nature of the inventive subject matter may be made without departing from the principles and scope of the inventive subject matter as expressed in the subjoined claims.
