Methods and apparatus for managing plug-in services

A computer system comprising:

• a memory;
• a processor;
• and
• an interconnection mechanism coupling the memory and the processor,
• wherein the memory is encoded with a plug-in manager application that, when performed on the processor, produces a plug-in manager process that manages services associated with a plurality of plug-in modules encoded within the memory by performing the operation steps of:
• obtaining identities of a plurality of plug-in modules including a first plug-in module and a second plug-in module;
• initiating a query to the first plug-in module of the plurality of plug-in modules;
• in response to the query to the first plug-in module receiving dependency information from the first plug-in module indicating that the first plug-in module requires a service provided by the second plug-in module;
• initiating a query to the second plug-in module;
• in response to the query to the second plug-in module, receiving dependency information from the second plug-in module
• producing a plug-in initiation order based on the dependency information received from the first plug-in module and the dependency information received from the second plug-in module;
• initiating service operation of plug-in modules on the processor according to the plug-in initiation order, such that if a first plug-in module provides a service required by a second plug-in module, the first plug-in module is initiated such that the service provided by the first plug-in module is available to the second plug-in module when required by the second plug-in module.

A computer program product having a computer-readable medium including computer program logic encoded thereon, that when executed on a computer system having a coupling of a memory and a processor, provides a plug-in manager process for managing plug-in services by causing the processor to perform the operations of:

• obtaining identities of a plurality of plug-in modules including a first plug-in module and a second plug-in module;
• initiating a query to the first plug-in module of the plurality of plug-in modules;
• in response to the query to the first plug-in module, receiving dependency information from the first plug-in module indicating that the first plug-in module requires a service provided by the second plug-in module;
• initiating a query to the second plug-in module;
• in response to the query to the second plug-in module, receiving dependency information from the second plug-in module;
• producing a plug-in initiation order based on the dependency information received from the first plug-in module and the dependency information received from the second plug-in module;
• and
• initiating service operation of plug-in modules on the processor according to the plug-in initiation order, such that if a first plug-in module provides a service required by a second plug-in module, the first plug-in module is initiated such that the service provided by the first plug-in module is available to the second plug-in module when required by the second plug-in module.

A computer system comprising:

• a memory;
• a processor;
• and
• an interconnection mechanism coupling the memory and the processor;
• wherein the memory is encoded with a plug-in manager application that, when performed on the processor, produces a plug-in manager process that manages services associated with a plurality of plug-in modules encoded within the memory by operating on the computer system and causing the computer system to provide:
• means for obtaining identities of a plurality of plug-in modules in the memory;
• means for initiating a query to a first plug-in module of the plurality of plug-in modules;
• means for receiving dependency information from the first plug-in module indicating that the first plug-in module requires a service provided by a second plug-in module in response to the query to the first plug-in module;
• means for initiating a query to the second plug-in module;
• means for receiving dependency information from the second plug-in module in response to the query to the second plug-in module;
• means for producing a plug-in initiation order based on the dependency information received from the first plug-in module and the dependency information received from the second plug-in module;
• means for initiating service operation of plug-in modules on the processor according to the plug-in initiation order, such that if a first plug-in module provides a service required by a second plug-in module, the first plug-in module is initiated such that the service provided by the first plug-in module is available to the second plug-in module when required by the second plug-in module;
• and
• wherein the first plug-in module is initiated via the step of initiating operation of plug-in modules after initiation of the second plug-in module, and wherein the second plug-in module includes a wait-state operation causing the second plug-in module to wait to provide the service offered by the second plug-in module until initiation of the first plug-in module.