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:
Dec. 24, 2002
Filed:
Sep. 22, 1998
Eric C. Brown, Seattle, WA (US);
David G. De Vorchik, Seattle, WA (US);
James D. Harriger, Woodinville, WA (US);
Microsoft Corporation, Redmond, WA (US);
Abstract
An extensible user interface architecture is disclosed. The interface operates by storing user interface information in a display database, preferably part of a directory services database. The data to be displayed, preferably directory objects, are bound to the display information in the display database. The user interface application retrieves display information from the display database based on the object to be displayed. The display information for an object is contained in a display specifier, which contains pointers to software modules. After retrieving the display specifier, the user interface application parses out the software module pointers, which are then executed to display aspects of the data to be displayed. As a result, the user interface can be extended by changing the information, i.e., software pointers, contained in the display specifier.