Method and apparatus for building an application interface

A computer program product comprising:

• a computer usable medium having computer readable program code embodied therein configured to build an application interface, said computer program product comprising computer readable code configured to:
• cause a computer to obtain a hierarchical display that displays a set of data fields and relationships defined for said data fields;
• allow a user to select from said hierarchical display at least one data field of said set of said data fields and said relationships;
• cause a computer to assign said selected at least one data field to at least one user interface component of an application, wherein said at least one user interface component of an application comprises a subband;
• and
• cause a computer to obtain an output hierarchy using said relationships to automatically generate a plurality of output levels, each of said plurality of output levels being associated with at least one component for displaying said at least one data field having a relationship with said selected at least one data field within said set of data fields and said relationships.

A system comprising:

• a set of data fields;
• one or more relationships defined for said data fields;
• a data palette configured to display said set of data fields and said one or more relationships defined for said data fields;
• an application interface having one or more interface components;
• an output hierarchy having a plurality of output levels, each of said plurality of output levels being associated with said one or more interface components of said application interface, wherein said one or more interface components of said application interface comprises a subband;
• and
• computer code configured to use said relationships to assign a selected one of said data fields to one of said one or more interface components of one of said plurality of output levels of said output hierarchy, wherein said one or more relationships comprises a one-to-many relationship and said computer code assigns said selected one of said data fields to a different output level than a corresponding data field specified in said relationship.