In accordance with an exemplary embodiment of the present invention, association forming entities are: a) maintained as objects in a like manner to the data objects being associated; and b) are themselves partitioned objects comprising two or more association fragments, each association fragment being mostly concerned with the interfaces to a particular data object participating in the association. In accordance with an exemplary embodiment of the present invention, each association fragment affiliated with a particular data object is stored in a location that enhances the ease of interaction between the association fragment and the data object. For example, where a first data object and second data object are maintained in data stores at some distance from one another, physically or logically, then a first association fragment will be located with or near to the first data object, and a second association fragment will be located with or near the second data object, at least within the same partition. This arrangement may be preferable because the volume of interaction between a data object and its respective association fragment may far outweigh the interaction needed between the two association fragments. This arrangement may also be preferable as the volume of interaction between a client application and both the data object and respective association fragment may exceed the interaction needed between the two association fragments. Some interactions will employ only one of the association fragments with the net result being a reduction in communications requirements and an improvement in performance. The present invention further provides for defining logical domains which are arbitrary and entirely orthogonal to partitions.

Method and system for managing partitioned data resources

Methods and apparatus, including computer program products, for interacting with a user to define business rules in a declarative manner. A rule set is displayed (FIG. 6, 604, 606, 608, 610, 612, 614, 616, 618, 620, 622) as an editable list of conditions (606) and an editable list of actions (608), the conditions and actions being linked to each other by the combination of an editable list of if-values (612) and an editable list of then-values (614). If-values and then-values are explicitly linked to each other, conditions and if-values are explicitly linked to each other, and then-values and actions are explicitly linked to each other in the displayed lists. Inputs can be received from a user editing one or more of the editable lists. In particular implementations, the editable lists are displayed in a matrix structure of four quadrants (606, 608, 612, 614). Adjacency of if-values and then-values is used to represent a rule.

Business rules user interface for development of adaptable enterprise applications

A spoken dialog system and method having a dialog management module are disclosed. The dialog management module includes a plurality of dialog motivators for handling various operations during a spoken dialog. The dialog motivators comprise an error handling, disambiguation, assumption, confirmation, missing information, and continuation. The spoken dialog system uses the assumption dialog motivator in either a-priori or a-posteriori modes. A-priori assumption is based on predefined requirements for the call flow and a-posteriori assumption can work with the confirmation dialog motivator to assume the content of received user input and confirm received user input.

Method for dialog management

A method for distributing changes to digital assets across a network includes determining an asset type of a first digital asset and comparing the first digital asset to a prior digital asset to determine one or more deltas, the prior digital asset being a prior version of the first digital asset and the delta being a difference between the first digital asset and the prior digital asset. The method further includes evaluating the one or more of the deltas with one or more criteria to determine if the one or more delta assets should be created, the delta asset being a second digital asset containing the respective delta, the criteria determined by the asset type. The method further includes that if the delta meets the criteria, creating the delta asset, and marking the delta asset as a first delta asset of the first digital asset.

Method and system for deploying an asset over a multi-tiered network

A computer-based system provides secure, configurable access to computer network resources. A human-readable language is provided for defining access policy rules. Rules in this language are converted in an automated fashion into filters applied within the various subsystems and components in a multi-layer security system. Network users are authenticated by an access control security system that obtains basic information about that user. Based on the user ID, a set of abstract policies can be retrieved. The retrieved policies are associated with the user and the groups associated with that user. Based on the retrieved rules, a set of rules for multiple layers of the network are generated and applied to those subsystems. Two or more of the subsystems may be placed in series with different types of processing occurring in each of the subsystems, reducing the workload of subsequent subsystems.

Multilayer access control security system

A method and system are provided for providing an open and extensible object definition framework that manages business object definitions as specifications. This framework may be used to dynamically define any object that is to be processed by a computer. Objects can include Properties, Classifications, Knowledge, Business Objects, and Business Rules to name a few. Some examples of typical Business Objects include: business and social entities; locations, including spaces, places and channels; activities, including events and processes; items, including products and services; and business records, including orders and other forms of demand, inventory, jobs, deliverables, statements, transaction history et. al. The method and system may be used to define any object that is to be processed by a computer. Objects can include Properties, Classifications, Knowledge, Business Objects, and Business Rules to name a few. Typical Business Objects include: Business and social entities; Locations including spaces, places, and channels; Activity including events and processes; Items including products and services; Business Records including orders and other forms of demand, inventory, jobs, deliverables, statements, transaction history et. al.

Miles D. Burke

Papers

Building business objects and business software applications using dynamic object definitions of ingrediential objects