Abstract: Methods and systems consistent with the present invention provide an improved software development tool which displays versions of source code with the indications of the edits in a graphical representation, wherein the graphical representation of the source code is not merely a text representation on a user interface. Each version reflects an instance in an edit history, i.e., reflects the changes made to the source code.

Abstract: Methods and systems consistent with the present invention provide an improved software development tool that allows a developer to locate a portion of source code corresponding to a message from a verification tool. The improved software development tool displays a graphical representation of the portion of the source code corresponding to the message in a visually distinctive manner.

Abstract: Methods and system consistent with the present invention provide a workflow modeling and project planning integration tool that allows a user to model a business process or workflow, to create and activate a project plan based on the workflow, and to track the progress of the activated project plan. The tool also allows the workflow to be reused to create more than one project plan based on the workflow. Moreover, the tool simultaneously manages the execution of the plans. The integration tool may include a Web-based “Distributed Authoring and Versioning” (WebDAV) server that operates as a virtual file system for computers on a network to allow more than one user on different computer systems to view the same workflow or project plan, monitor the progress of an activated project plan, or simultaneously create and activate different plans from the same workflow.

Abstract: A system and methods for rapidly incorporating changes to a project is described. An object derived from a frame component container is embedded into a project, with the frame component container being freely changeable as desired. Any changes made to the frame component container are automatically included, by inheritance, into the source files of the project. Preferably, the method synchronizes on a display all instances of the object derived from the frame component container to the frame component container. The development system includes a computer and an interface for creating frame objects having components. Software permits the creation of descendant frame objects from an ancestor frame, propagation of modifications of the ancestor frame to each descendant frame object, notification of the descendant frame objects that its corresponding ancestor frame has been modified, and synchronization on a display of all of the descendant frames with any modifications to the components of the ancestor frame.

Abstract: Methods and systems consistent with the present invention provide an integrated process modeling and project planning tool that allows an enterprise affiliate to improve a workflow that models a process. To improve the workflow, the tool initiates execution of a plan created from the workflow such that an instance of the process is at least partially performed, receives a characteristic about the performance of the plan, and modifies the workflow to reflect the characteristic so that a subsequent plan created from the modified workflow has the received characteristic.

Abstract: Methods and systems consistent with the present invention provide an improved software development tool that simplifies a graphical representation of software code for a developer. The software development tool provides the developer with a more coherent, manageable, and abstract graphical view of the project model, and facilitates the developer in graphically debugging and editing the associated software code. The improved software development tool detects a group of related elements in the code, and collapses a portion of the graphical representation of the code associated with the group of related elements.

Abstract: Improved license management system and method for a convertible floating license for software that permit conversion from one license state to a second license state to permit authorized license use and management thereof while the user and/or client computer is alternately connected and disconnected from a network having a server computer and license management software thereon for managing and controlling the authorized use of licensed software to a multiplicity of computers and/or users.

Abstract: A method for mixed-mode execution in object-oriented programs is disclosed whereby certain portions of source code can be executed by a higher-level mode of execution having access to the program at its highest level of abstraction, while other portions can be executed by a lower-level mode of execution. The invention described can be applied to any object-oriented environment where the higher-level mode of execution has components that are executed by the lower-level mode of execution and where new objects can be added to a running program at the lower-level mode of execution. In a presently preferred embodiment of the present invention, a source code interpreter operates directly on portions of Java source code where detailed information about the program is required (such as debugging information, profiling information or coverage information) while a virtual machine executes compiled byte code at all other times.

Abstract: The present invention relates a method and systems for generating, applying and defining patterns for software development. The software development tool receives an indication of a pattern, generates software code reflecting the pattern, and stores identification information for the pattern in a comment associated with the generated software code. The software development tool receives an indication of the software element, determines whether the software element is capable of playing the role, and when it is determined that the software element is capable of playing the role, designates that the software element plays the role in the pattern. The software development tool displays a plurality of software elements to a user, receives an indication of a selected one of the plurality of software elements, receives an indication of a user-defined pattern role that the selected software element plays in a pattern, and stores the plurality of software elements as the pattern.

Abstract: Methods and systems consistent with the present invention provide an improved software development tool which allows a developer to simultaneously view a graphical and a textual display of source code. The graphical and textual views are synchronized so that a modification in one view is automatically reflected in the other view. In addition, the software development tool is designed for use with more than one programming language.

Abstract: A system providing methods for adjusting a user's selection of source code of a program to correspond with a parsed version of the program is described. The method commences with user input of a selection of source code of a program for performing an operation such as a refactoring. The user's selection is compared with a parsed version of the program. If the user's selection does not correspond with the parsed version of the program, the user's selection is adjusted to achieve correspondence with the parsed version of the program.

Abstract: A system providing an improved method for compiler-assisted refactoring of a software application is described. Upon receiving a request for refactoring of a software application (e.g., changing a given symbol of the application), the binary files of the application are parsed to identify those binary files containing references to the given symbol. The source files of the identified binary files are then retrieved and fed into a compiler. The compiler is used to generate a list of all uses of the given symbol in the software application. This list includes not only the text name of the symbol, but also type information and position information regarding its location(s) in the source file. Based upon the list, changes are applied to the software application.

Abstract: A system and methodology for providing a Unified Modeling Language (UML) diagram of a program for display in a graphical user interface of a development system is described. Relationships between a plurality of files of a program are determined using a compiler. When a request for display of a UML diagram is received, a UML diagram of the currently selected file is generated based upon the determined relationships between the currently selected file and other files of the program. The UML diagram displayed in the graphical user interface enables a user to navigate to a particular file of the program by selecting one of the nodes of the UML diagram. The system enables a user to view source code or a UML diagram of a particular component displayed in the UML diagram.

Abstract: A transaction processing system providing improved methodology for invoking two-phase commit protocol (2PC) is described. More particularly, a transaction is handled without use of 2PC until the system determines that the transaction does, in fact, involve changes to more than one database. The methodology improves overall system performance by looking at each transaction to determine whether the transaction actually requires use of 2PC before incurring the overhead associated with use of the two-phase commit protocol. Because only a small percentage of real world transactions result in updates to more than one database, the methodology improves the overall performance of transaction processing systems considerably.

Abstract: A logging system which accepts logged messages concurrently from any number of parts of the application software. Each message is written to a message queue and then read and passed to a message forwarder, which the message forwarder analyzes one or more of the data fields of the message in order to decide whether to forward a particular message. In the event that the message will be forwarded, the forwarder also determines which destination or destinations to forward it to, which data fields from the logged message will be forwarded, and how those fields will be formatted when forwarded. The forwarder code executes on its own Operating System thread or task to decouple the continued execution of the application from the process of forwarding the messages to their destination or destinations.

Abstract: Methods for permitting concurrent access to an object in a data store of the type having an exclusive access cache are disclosed. The method uses first-in-last-out conditions to control which concurrent transaction, if there is more than one transaction pending for a given object, can provide updated data to the exclusive access cache. Only the first transaction can ever obtain data from the exclusive access cache, but the existence of current transactions when that first one completes precludes the first from updating the exclusive access cache. Rather, the last transaction to commit can update the cache, or leave it empty as the case may be.

Abstract: Methods for minimizing conflicts in an optimistic concurrency database access scheme are described. The method provides users or software processes with cache copies of database records and tracks which data items in the cache copy were modified and whether they were read, or read before ever being modified. A decision is then made using this information as to whether the current transaction can be committed to the database. The inventive scheme engrafts intelligence to the commitment decision process and accommodates many transactions which prior art schemes consider as conflicting. Consequently, the inventive method increases throughput in such systems.

Abstract: A system providing improved methods for remote method invocation of a service is described. The system includes methodology for a client to cast, at design time, a generic interface class to a remote service having a defined interface. The generic interface class dynamically generates a proxy for making a remote method call on the remote service at runtime, while also providing for runtime type checking. Moreover, the generic interface class is subclassed to provide support for particular wire formats and methods of transport. The dynamically generated proxy converts a remote method call by the client into a wire format specified in the remote service's interface definition and calls the remote service using the method of transport specified in the interface definition. The system also includes methods to support making a service available to remote clients. The system includes modules that listen for remote method calls on a service and deserialize these calls into native format.

Abstract: A transaction processing system providing improved methodology for invoking two-phase commit protocol (2PC) is described. More particularly, a transaction is handled without use of 2PC until the system determines that the transaction does, in fact, involve changes to more than one database. The methodology improves overall system performance by looking at each transaction to determine whether the transaction actually requires use of 2PC before incurring the overhead associated with use of the two-phase commit protocol. Because only a small percentage of real world transactions result in updates to more than one database, the methodology improves the overall performance of transaction processing systems considerably.

Abstract: An Object Request Broker (ORB) working in the Common Object Request Broker Architecture (CORBA) is structured to handle the registration of multiple and diverse communications protocols. The protocol engine of the ORB has it architecture modified so that it can accept a plug-in component which has a protocol connector and a protocol adapter portion for communication between client and server applications, respectively. The plug-in converts from the client/server applications to the General Inter-ORB Protocol used by the ORB. The plug-in will be fully operational if it has an interface to the rest of the ORB as required by the invention, including a protocol connection interface for the connector interface and Listener and Dispatcher interfaces for the server-adaptor interface.