Abstract: A flyswatter (10) having an elastically deformable swatting member (16) with a plurality of protrusions (20) formed thereon. The protrusions (20) are spaced apart on the swatting member (16), and have a height somewhat less than the height of the insect. When the swatting member (16) is struck on an object upon which the insect rests, the protrusions (20) contact the object, and the swatting member (16) elastically deforms and bows outwardly and strikes the insect without flattening or squishing the insect.

Abstract: Disclosed is apparatus for processing business data processing activities, the apparatus comprising: an activity instance; and a descriptor for the activity instance associated uniquely with the activity instance; wherein the descriptor includes parameters for determining lifecycle behaviors of said activity instance. The descriptor may be programmable to modify the lifecycle behaviors according to a use made of said activity instance. The use of the activity instance may be responsive to a request by a client. It may also be responsive to a request by an activity instance. The descriptor may be programmable to modify the lifecycle behaviors according to a position in a system hierarchy of the activity instance.

Abstract: Disclosed is data processing apparatus comprising: means for receiving inputs indicative of results from one or more participants of said one or more sets of data processing tasks; means for mapping each of said inputs to a corresponding mapped value by accessing a mapping table; outcome processor means for accepting the mapped values as inputs and determining an outcome for said one or more sets of data processing tasks; and means, responsive to said means for determining, for transmitting an indicator of said outcome to said one or more participants; wherein the inputs and mapped values of the mapping table are programmably changeable to thus provide a high degree of flexibility with respect to said inputs.

Abstract: A data processing apparatus has a direct access non-volatile memory storage device having a plurality of extent files for storing log records therein; an allocating unit for allocating a current extent file to be used for storing log records; a writing unit for writing log records into the current extent file until the current extent file cannot store any further log records; and a key-pointing unit for performing a key-pointing operation on the written log records when the writing unit has reached the point where no further log records can be stored in the current extent file.

Abstract: Extended business transactions are processed in a client-server system in a manner which allows processing initiated by a client to be interrupted before the transaction is complete and later resumed by the same or another client from the point of interruption. This is achieved by storing state information indicative of the progress of the transaction in a repository in association with an end-user identifier. When the end-user communicates his identifier via a client to the server for a second time, processing of the transaction can be resumed on the basis of the stored state.

Abstract: A data processing apparatus for carrying out a specific business logic data processing task, has a plurality of business activities running on at least one data processing machine, each activity communicates with other activities via a communications protocol in order to carry out the specific business logic data processing task. At least one of the activities includes a plurality of message broker data processing nodes.

Abstract: Disclosed are a system, method and computer program for component-based processing, comprising a component specification element, a control flow specification element, a data flow specification element, a resource specification element, a quality of service specification derivation element having for output an application model in combination with a quality of service specification derived by implication from relations between components, control flows, data flows and resources, and a runtime engine for deploying said quality of service specification as a runtime contract in a runtime processing environment. Examples of such qualities of service are requirements of a process to have provided for it support for transactionality, recoverability, asynchronous messaging and the like.