The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.

The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.

Date of Patent:
May. 23, 2000

Filed:

Sep. 30, 1996
Applicant:
Inventor:

Patrick C Beard, Danville, CA (US);

Assignee:

Apple Computer, Inc., Cupertino, CA (US);

Attorney:
Primary Examiner:
Assistant Examiner:
Int. Cl.
CPC ...
G06F / ;
U.S. Cl.
CPC ...
709305 ;
Abstract

A variety of mechanisms are disclosed for a dynamically binding native methods in an interpreted bytecode program to functions that are contained in compiled code, such as a dynamically linked library. In one implementation, a shared function is specified by means of a naming convention that is appropriate for the bytecode interpreted program, such as a package of classes. When a native method is to be resolved during loading of a class, the name of the package is examined to see if the method resides in a shared library. If so, it is loaded using techniques that are specific to the compiled code in which the library exists. In another embodiment, a designated base class, or interface, is used to identify the method by which the shared library is to be loaded. In a third type of implementation, a given method requests a class to specify which libraries it needs to be linked to, as it is being loaded, after which the libraries are loaded and the class methods are linked to them.


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