Portal Software, Inc.

Oracle International Corporation

Sun Microsystems, Inc.

International Business Machines Corporation

Gary L Owens

David S Labuda

James R Haddock

David Labuda

Saul G Wold

Systems and methods for accessing a relational database through an object-oriented querying interface are provided. A class of objects that are to be stored in the relational database are defined. One or more relational database tables are created and a mapping is produced that maps each data member of an object to one or more columns in a relational database table. Additionally, object-oriented paradigms like inheritance may be supported and the allocation of storage for array elements may be deferred until necessary.

Method and apparatus for object oriented storage and retrieval of data from a relational database

A real time billing system for accounts that locks out transaction events when the billing process is underway is provided. When a transaction event is received that should be posted to an account during the billing process, the account is locked. It is determined if the next bill time is in the past for the account and if it is, close billing of the account is performed on the account without billing the transaction event. After close billing of the account is finished, the transaction event may be posted to the account and the account unlocked.

Method and apparatus for providing a clean accounting close for a real-time billing system

Computer-implemented program product and method of deferring allocation of storage for array elements of objects

Method and apparatus for providing a clean accounting close for a real

Method and apparatus for object oriented storage and retrieval of data

Disclosed is a container object that allows a user to define new payment resources without requiring the user to redesign a relational database system used for persistent storage of transaction information. An object server maps data that is represented in transient memory according to an object-oriented scheme to data that is represented in persistent memory according to a relational database scheme. The object server generates appropriate tables and columns for a relational database scheme automatically so that the object-oriented scheme generated by a user may be efficiently stored and searched in persistent memory. Preferably, array elements are represented as rows in a table, not as columns so that storage space is not wasted with place holder data. In certain embodiments, a rating engine is provided that searches available rates and creates a rate stack for the purpose of authorizing transactions and adjusting payment source balances when authorization events or payment events occur.

Method and apparatus for tracking multiple payment resources and

An embodiment of the present invention provides an efficient and robust way to incorporate new installation scripts into an existing operating system in order to install and reboot a system using a new platform specific kernel and new device specific drivers. The embodiment determines the platform architecture of the system and stores it in an address space of an existing operating system kernel. The embodiment also pre-processes a file with dynamic entries in order to generate device independent package names. If the platform architecture type stored in each package matches the platform architecture type stored in the kernel address space then the file system is used to install the files from the package onto the system. The existing operating system then reboots the system using the installed platform specific kernel.

Layering hardware support code on top of an existing operating system

A boot device, a local or remote install media, and a local or remote storage device are provided to a computer system. The boot device comprises an install media locator and starter module. The local or remote install media comprises an install set up and control module and an install module. The local or remote storage device comprises a defaulted or a customized collection of installation files. The defaulted/customized collection of install files comprise a classification rules file, a number of pre-install class class script files, a number of install class parameter files, and a number of post-install class script files. Together, these elements cooperate to automatically install software products on the computer system, and configure the operating environment of the computer system.

Automated software installation and operating environment configuration

The system and method of this invention automatically routes a connection between data processing systems in different network domains. As an example, an application running on a data processing system utilizing a network domain such as TCP (Transmission Control Protocol), can automatically make a connection to another data processing system utilizing a different network domain such as SNA (Systems Network Architecture). The connection is automatically performed in the layer containing the communication end point objects. In a preferred embodiment, the connection is automatically performed in the socket layer of the AIX operating system, or in the socket layer of other operating systems based upon the Berkeley version of the UNIX operating system.

Growing community of inventors

Mountain View, CA, United States of America

Gary L Owens