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:
Feb. 03, 2004
Filed:
Aug. 31, 1999
Curtis H. Brobst, Rochester, MN (US);
James E. Carey, Rochester, MN (US);
Verena Kranzl, Vienna, AT;
Stephen Porter, Oldham, GB;
Siegfried Wiesenhofer, Vienna, AT;
International Business Machines Corporation, Armonk, NY (US);
Abstract
An extensible Object-Oriented (OO) framework in an object-oriented programming system defines objects and classes used to correspond to and track a collection document. The collection document can be an accounts receivable (the debt is to be received) or an accounts payable (the debt is to be paid) collection document. A collection document is an unconditional order in writing in which a debtor promises to pay a debt to a bearer in exchange for at least one benefit that has been or will be received by the debtor. The OO framework defines a collection document object that corresponds to and tracks a collection document through its many states until the collection document finally ends in an ending state. Even then, the collection document object may be retained (e.g., in a persistent or frozen state) for future reference. Each of the states of the collection document object corresponds to one of the states of the collection document.