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.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Oct. 03, 2000
Filed:
Oct. 31, 1997
John Weisz, Redwood Shores, CA (US);
Oracle Corporation, Redwood Shores, CA (US);
Abstract
A pickler apparatus and a process for pickling and unpickling data objects are disclosed. Data objects are described in metadata that store attributes of a source data object organized according to an abstract data type, and a data format of the computer system that is hosting the pickler. Using the metadata, the data object is transformed into a linear representation or image. The format, layout, alignment, and inheritance representation of the host system are applied to the image during transformation. The image has a length value, a prefix segment, and a string of bytes copied from the data object. The prefix segment may be the metadata, so that the metadata is transported with the image whereby a receiving process can reconstruct the data object from the image based upon the metadata. The image is canonical and is easily and rapidly transported across a network. When a pointer is encountered in the data object, it is transformed in the string of bytes into a value of the offset in bytes indicated by the pointer, a length of the data that is referenced by the pointer, and a segment of bytes copied from the data that is referenced by the pointer. Nested tables, arrays, and complex collections referenced in the object are efficiently linearized.