Decomposition of tasks into extensible and customizable business activities
AssigneeMicrosoft Corporation
InventorsElliot Lewis, Israel Hilerio, Sergey Sorokin, Jigar Thakkar
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Abstract
A method for organizing task data used in customer relationship management systems in which task data is decomposed into a set of business activity classes including a set of business task classes, where the business task classes are combined through association or multiple inheritance to create the business activity class. Each task class can be further decomposed into a base task class and a set of task characteristic classes where task definitions may be modified by associating additional task characteristic classes to the base task class.
Claims20
A method of organizing business task data on a computer-implemented customer relationship management system, the method comprising:
- creating a base task class comprising a set of base parameters;
- creating a set of task characteristic classes wherein each task characteristic class of the set of task characteristic classes contains a set of task characteristic parameters;
- forming a fundamental business task class by associating a first characteristic class with the base task class;
- and
- modifying the fundamental business task class by associating a second characteristic class to the base task class.
A computing apparatus, comprising:
- a display unit that is capable of generating video images;
- an input device;
- a processing apparatus operatively coupled to said display unit and said input device, said processing apparatus comprising a processor and a memory operatively coupled to said processor;
- a network interface connected to a network and to the processing apparatus, said processing apparatus being programmed to:
- form a set of task classes, each task class associated with a business task;
- and
- form a business activity class associated with a business activity wherein each business activity class comprises a union of at least two task classes.
A computer-readable medium having computer-executable instructions for performing steps comprising:
- forming a set of task objects, each task object of the set of task objects comprising a set of parameters required to execute a business task;
- designating a task object of the set of task objects as an index task object, the index task object comprising a fundamental set of parameters required to execute a business activity;
- forming a business activity object by associating the index task object with a set of task objects, wherein the business activity object comprises the fundamental set of parameters of the index task object and a set of parameters of the associated set of task objects.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.