Electrical computers and digital processing systems: multicomput – Computer network managing
Reexamination Certificate
1998-10-16
2001-05-01
Coulter, Kenneth R. (Department: 2154)
Electrical computers and digital processing systems: multicomput
Computer network managing
C707S793000, C705S026640, C709S230000, C370S466000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06226675
ABSTRACT:
COPYRIGHT NOTICE
A portion of the disclosure of this patent document contains material which is subject to copyright protection. The copyright owner has no objection to the facsimile reproduction by anyone of the patent document or the patent disclosure as it appears in the Patent and Trademark Office patent file or records, but otherwise reserves all copyright rights whatsoever.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to systems and protocols supporting transactions among diverse clients coupled to a network; and more particularly to systems and protocols supporting commercial transactions among platforms having variant architectures.
2. Description of Related Art
The Internet and other communications networks provide avenues for communication among people and computer platforms which are being used for a wide variety of transactions, including commercial transactions in which participants buy and sell goods and services. Many efforts are underway to facilitate commercial transactions on the Internet. However, with many competing standards, in order to execute a transaction, the parties to the transaction must agree in advance on the protocols to be utilized, and often require custom integration of the platform architectures to support such transactions. Commercial processes internal to a particular node not compatible with agreed upon standards, may require substantial rework for integration with other nodes. Furthermore, as a company commits to one standard or the other, the company becomes locked-in to a given standardized group of transacting parties, to the exclusion of others.
A good overview of the challenges met by Internet commerce development is provided in Tenenbaum, et al., “
Eco System: An Internet Commerce Architecture
”, Computer, May 1997, pp. 48-55.
To open commercial transactions on the Internet, standardization of architectural frameworks is desired. Platforms developed to support such commercial frameworks include IBM Commerce Point, Microsoft Internet Commerce Framework, Netscape ONE (Open Network Environment), Oracle NCA (Network Computing Architecture), and Sun/JAVASoft JECF (JAVA Electronic Commerce Framework).
In addition to these proprietary frameworks, programming techniques, such as common distributed object model based on CORBA IIOP (Common Object Request Broker Architecture Internet ORB Protocol), are being pursued. Use of the common distributed object model is intended to simplify the migration of enterprise systems to systems which can inter-operate at the business application level for electronic commerce. However, a consumer or business using one framework is unable to execute transactions on a different framework. This limits the growth of electronic commerce systems.
Companies implementing one framework will have an application programming interface API which is different than the API's supporting other frameworks. Thus, it is very difficult for companies to access each others business services, without requiring adoption of common business system interfaces. The development of such business system interfaces at the API level requires significant cooperation amongst the parties which is often impractical.
Accordingly, it is desirable to provide a framework which facilitates interaction amongst diverse platforms in a communication network. Such system should facilitate spontaneous commerce between trading partners without custom integration or prior agreement on industry wide standards. Further, such systems should encourage incremental path to business automation, to eliminate much of the time, cost and risks of traditional systems integration.
Overall, it is desirable to provide an electronic commerce system that replaces the closed trading partner networks based on proprietary standards with open markets.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The present invention offers an infrastructure for connecting businesses with customers, suppliers and trading partners. Under the infrastructure of the present invention, companies exchange information and services using self-defining, machine-readable documents, such as XML (Extensible Markup Language) based documents, that can be easily understood amongst the partners. Documents which describe the documents to be exchanged, called business interface definitions BIDs herein, are posted on the Internet, or otherwise communicated to members of the network. The business interface definitions tell potential trading partners the services the company offers and the documents to use when communicating with such services. Thus, a typical business interface definition allows a customer to place an order by submitting a purchase order, compliant with a document definition published in the BID of a party to receive the purchase order. A supplier is allowed to check availability by downloading an inventory status report compliant with a document definition published in the BID of a business system managing inventory data. Use of predefined, machine-readable business documents provides a more intuitive and flexible way to access enterprise applications.
A node in the commerce network establishes an interface for transactions according to the present invention that comprises a machine-readable specification of an interface, along with a machine-readable data structure that includes interpretation information for the machine-readable specification of the interface. The machine-readable specification of the interface includes a definition of an input document and a definition of an output document, that are accepted and produced by transaction processes for which the node acts as an interface. The definitions of the input and output documents comprise respective descriptions of sets of storage units and logical structures for sets of storage units, such as according to a standard XML based document. The machine-readable data structure that includes interpretation information according to various aspects of the invention includes data type specifications (e.g. string, array, etc.) for logical structures in the definitions of the input and output documents, content models (e.g. lists of possible values) for logical structures and/or data structures that map predefined sets of storage units for a particular logic structure to respective entries in a list in order to provide a semantic definition of logical structures (e.g. mapping codes to product names).
According to other aspects of the invention, the interface includes a repository in memory accessible by at least one node in the network that stores a library of logic structures and interpretation information for the logic structures. The repository can be extended to include a library of definitions of input and output documents, a library of specifications of interfaces, and a library of specifications for participant interface nodes in the network.
Thus, a participant in the transaction framework of the present invention executes transactions amongst nodes in a network that includes a plurality of nodes executing processes involved in the transactions. The method includes storing a machine-readable specification of an interface for a transaction, the specification includes a definition of an input document and a definition of an output document. The definition of the input and output documents comprise respective descriptions of sets of storage units and logical structures for the sets of storage units. In a preferred system, the definitions are expressed in a manner compliant with a standard XML document type definition DTD, extended by semantic mapping, content modeling and data typing of some elements. The participant in the transaction receives data comprising a document through a communication network. The participant parses the document according to the specification stored for a transaction to identify an input document for the transaction. After parsing the document, at least a portion of the input document is provided in a machine-readable format to a transaction process which produces an output. An output document
Davidson Andrew Everett
Fuchs Matthew Daniel
Glushko Robert John
Meltzer Bart Alan
Persson Kenneth
Commerce One, Inc.
Coulter Kenneth R.
Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati
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