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:
Apr. 03, 2001
Filed:
Sep. 12, 1997
Daniel Edward House, San Jose, CA (US);
Brian Joseph Owings, San Jose, CA (US);
International Business Machines Corporation, Armonk, NY (US);
Abstract
A method, apparatus, and article of manufacture and memory for a component neutral builder interface. The interface comprises a dynamic link library (DLL) stored in the memory of and executable by a computer that is communicatively coupled to the user-definable component and the build utility, and a program interface implemented in the DLL which enforces an interface protocol between the component and the utility having a command set including all interface commands for the user-definable component. In this invention, the instruction set for implementing the component functions can reside in the DLL itself, an external component, or can be shared between the DLL and the external component. A method of implementing a user-definable component in a build utility is also disclosed. The method comprises the steps of invoking a DLL when a user-definable component associated with the DLL is selected from a build utility, reading user-definable component data from the user-definable component via the DLL, and implementing the user-definable component in the build utility in accordance with the user-definable component data.