FORM-2
THE PATENT ACT, 1970
(39 of 1970)
&
THE PATENT RULES, 2003
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION
(See section 10 and Rule 13)
TOOLS FOR BRIDGING SYSTEMS
TATA CONSULTANCY SERVICES LIMITED
An Indian Company
of Bombay House, 24, Sir Homi Mody Street, Mumbai-400 001,
Maharashtra, India.
THE FOLLOWING SPECIFICATION DESCRIBES THE INVENTION

Field of the Invention:
This invention relates to tools for bridging systems.
Particularly this invention relates to tools for automatically bridging systems.
Background of the Invention:
Every organization has islands of systems. They provide the functionality needed by the Organization. Each system internally supports the transactions, and sometimes the processes to realize this functionality. These systems have become vital to the organizations for managing their day-to-day operations and to create new products and services. These systems serve as coordinators of work across any organization. Systems such as Enterprise resource planning, Supply chain management, Customer Relationship Management, to name a few are built to provide the functionality needed by the Organization. Each of these systems have been built internally or acquired separately.
These systems, processes, functionalities or transactions may be new, old, compatible, or not-so-compatible with respect to each other. The presumption is that there exists a smooth flow of information from one system to another system. The interfaces and the integration mechanisms required for such an information flow is more complex than the applications. It is not hard to see that there could be duplication of data, processes, functionalities, transactions, and other kinds of overlaps between these systems. It is also possible that data in one system is needed by transactions in other system. Also, most of these information systems operate on


technologies and databases that are incompatible with one another. Therefore, Information Systems departments use manual methods to make these systems interact with each other. This situation is ripe for loss of integrity of these systems due to lack of consistency between these systems in relation to organization, differences in definitions and the like inconsistencies. Maintaining integrity across systems requires a disciplined usage of systems, requiring a role-playing user to access multiple systems and carefully use them to assure integrity. The crossover between systems is manual, tedious and error prone. The challenge is to ensure the automatic flow of information between different information systems across the organization without or with very minimal manual intervention.
Prior Art:
Currently Systems are bridged at the back-end (Database tables to Database table conversions) or file format conversion or manually people copy the data in the first system and paste it in the second system.
Traditionally, enterprise computing often takes the form of islands of automation, a group of operative systems that manage their operations properly and efficiently. The term reflects the inability of the systems to communicate easily with each other. These islands of automation are very often surrounded by gaps of non-interoperability. It occurs as the value of the individual systems is not maximized due to partial or full isolation. This phenomenon is pervasive in just about every organization in the world. The reasons for it being so wide spread include:
1. Multiple brands of front end devices which mean we need a different interface for each.

2. Lack of inexpensive means of collecting the information from all these islands.
3. Lack of an automatic way of configuring the system.
4. Lack of a standard and an inexpensive repository for the data.
To optimize the usage and operations of these systems, which are in some cases legacy in nature, it necessitates the need for the provision of a mechanism which facilitates the communication of these business systems. There are existing methods of overcoming the problem of islands of automation out of which the prominent practices are:
1. Physical Interoperability: Leave the systems as they are and provide total manual operations for interoperability. This requires a user to access the two systems separately and perform manual transactions, which at the primitive level include the transfer of data from one system to another. As we can see the process is prone to errors and not always can the integrity of the data be guaranteed. The process is also time consuming and does not guarantee the atomicity of the transactions. It is completely dependent on user efficiency which makes it very unreliable and inconsistent. This is generally employed in business environments that are simple, stable and where the applications, processes as well as the data are not complex.
2. Exploiting Convergence: Convergence or centralized control of systems is one of the widely used solutions for integration today as most organizations are seeking a holistic view of the enterprise and are under pressure to lower total cost of ownership while making the most of limited staff and budgets. As a business service management perspective becomes more prevalent, it can be expected that systems will converge in ways that take advantage of

potential synergies in key areas. Convergence can also create a more consistent approach across the organization. One of the biggest challenges facing certain technological operations is to securely build, deploy, monitor and patch multiple systems. Modern day Enterprise Resource Planning applications are the examples for the centralized operation of business processes. There are typically several departments involved, each with their own methods that operate independently of one another. The visible flaws in this system are, as systems grow more complex, the duplicative processes become labour-intensive and wasteful. It demands very high capital and time to implement the architecture. In some cases there may be loss of some functionality compared to a solution which completely concentrates in one particular domain than on combinations of more than one domain. It also causes inconvenience to use at it requires more technical knowledge than domain specific applications, during operations of overlapped transactions. The concept of centralized solution can at times potentially lead to legacy migration problems.
3. Enterprise Application Integration: EAI technologies are mainly built for interconnecting heterogeneous applications using different technological approaches and platforms and managing exchange of information between these applications and platforms. Two types of EAI solutions exist depending upon the complexity of environment. 'Tailored integration' is a good solution in a simple and stable environment, but becomes complicated, hard to modify and scale in complex technological environments whereas 'packaged integration' solutions are built to overcome integration problems. They are a result of years of research and experience of problems in connecting these islands of automation. Packaged EAI tools are integration

platforms that provide tools and services for connecting different applications. The actual integration solution is then parameterized on the top of these platforms Apart from interfaces to different kinds of applications EAI tools also provide rule engines for exchanging and converting information between applications. They often contain different kinds of conversion languages for data conversion purposes. The major disadvantage with this approach is that it is time consuming process and is costly.
4. Straight through processing: STP is an efficient utilization of computer based technology to transaction processing. It enables the overlapped transaction processes to be conducted electronically with out the need for re-keying or manual intervention, subject to constraints and regulatory restrictions. The completion of one transaction process triggers another. Multiple processes must realize high levels of STP. Here the transaction data would need to be made available on a just-in-time basis which is a considerably harder goal to achieve. The concepts of STP can be applied to reduce systematic and operational risk and to improve operational costs. The disadvantage with this approach is that it is difficult to maintain atomicity of transactions while realizing high levels of STP.
5. Global Business Process Interoperability: BPI is a state that exists when a process can meet a specific objective automatically utilizing essential human labor. Here the integration of the systems is achieved by automating the interoperability of data. Currently it is limited to enterprise solution systems in which functions are built to work together. The processes in these systems are constrained by information silos and the systems inability to communicate among each other. The main advantage with this approach is

that it minimizes the errors that are inherent in manual processes. We can eliminate inconsistent and redundant processes and automate machine to machine interactions. It improves privacy and strengthens security by reducing gaps among proprietary systems. The major disadvantage with this approach is that the enterprise solution is so complex that even the smallest modification is very expensive. Enterprises use a number of custom applications and coordinating changes among such a huge number of disparate internal systems so that interoperation across the entire global enterprise system is simply impractical. Centralized database repository is a primitive way of achieving BPI. The repository contains data and procedures. It serves as a hub in the center of a wheel where every application is a spoke. Applications could export their data to the central repository enabling departments to obtain the applications they need by simply accessing it.
6. Exchange of operations: This facilitates the operations or transactions on the required systems through Remote accessing means. In this method which is rarely employed, user of one system accesses another system through network and performs all the operations or transactions that are required on that system. The main disadvantage of this approach is that, during the time a system is remotely operating, no operations can be performed by the main user of the system. Also this is not a feasible solution for complex integration environments where multiple transactions take place at a given time as it supports sequential operations, and is time consuming.
7. Interoperability through Programming: We can build data interoperability for transfer of data from one system to another during transactions or during

execution of overlapped processes. This approach cannot be generalized as it is problem specific and depends on the systems between which integration is required. The advantage of this approach is that duplicate functions of various processes can be eliminated and guarantees high throughput. The disadvantage of this approach is that if the systems are in complex environment then it can potentially lead to violation of integrity problems. It becomes difficult to maintain the data consistency in such cases. If the problem of integration is huge, then this approach can potentially lead to deeper semantic problems also.
Objectives of the Invention:
An object of the invention is to provide a tool to simulate the bridging of two or more systems of information.
Another object of this invention is to automate inter-system processes.
Still another object of this invention is to maintain integrity across systems.
Summary of the Invention:
This invention envisages an apparatus and solution for introducing automation to bridge systems, leading to a possibility of completely avoiding manual intervention.
According to one embodiment of this invention, the automation tool is adapted to automatically obtain data from one system and provide it as inputs for a transaction in another system.

The automation tool comprises two components viz. a Script Editor Means and a Script Interpreter Means.
The Script Editor Means in accordance with this invention is adapted to achieve localization through a solving means which includes a solver and a platform. Script Editor Means includes a means used for viewing and modifying the solving means. The Script Editor Means also includes a screen scrapping means for interfacing with a system. But unlike traditional solving means that manipulate the processes of a computer, scripting tends to involve a far smaller set of simple instructions that control applications and devices in the computers. Many of these instructions are related to accomplishing a specific purpose, such as controlling the process of connecting one part of system to another. The script editor means will keep a track of changes which happen in the System
Scripting involves generating a sequence of messages specific to a device to perform device specific actions.
The systems that are part of the organization are transactions/process based. The processes/transactions that occur in these systems can be sequenced as a series of steps with each of these steps performed on a messaging subsystem. Each of these steps can then be programmed as scripts in accordance with this invention. Each script performs a certain part of the transaction/process. By executing the scripts required for a complete transaction/process in a system sequentially, the entire transaction/process can be automated. In case the same transaction/process needs to be repeated

in different machines then the same script can be used as the messages are standardized by the Operating System.
The Script Interpreter Means in accordance with this invention is the other component that processes the solutions and platforms provided by the solver of the Script Editor Means in a top-down order and performs the sequence of operations in an Operating system and environment to control the system specified in the corresponding solution and platform. The Script Interpreter Means provides an extensive array of supporting functionalities that make it easier for script writers to script Systems.
The automation tool in accordance with this invention has means within it to act as a temporary Operating System, to momentarily disable the existing Operating Systems of the devices to which it is connected and to generate user events and messages necessary for the System to function. The automation tool also has a developing means to' support a solution and platform built specifically for the purpose of integrating systems. This solution and platform contains directions to connect diverse pre-existing components. Each of these components is built to accomplish a task in the operating system such as sending and receiving mails, executing applications from the operating system, reading and writing to clipboard, generating key strokes, generating mouse events, navigating through the user interface and the like. By putting these pre-defined components together and executing those in sequence, the solution and platform can simulate manual methods required for working on two or more systems.

The fundamental aspect of screen scraping in accordance with this invention is interfacing with a legacy application through the screen input-output mechanism. In other words, the legacy system is tricked into thinking that the application is being run by someone, when in fact the screen scrapper is actually sending messages that mimic key strokes to an application using the screen input-output channel. Screen scraper means are not concerned about completeness or accuracy of the information gathered. Their goal is to obtain the data that in turn will give the end user an impression that they have legitimate access to information. Screen scrapper means have data extraction means which when applied to one device will extract data for the display output of another device. The methodology doing the work of scraping is referred to as Screen Scraper and the output being scraped is intended for user inputs, not for machine interpretation, typically in user-readable language rather than machine language. The tool allows an organization to re-engineer their processes through reconstructing the progression of data entry, update and retrieval in accordance with this invention.
This intervention is useful for automating inter-system processes in accordance with this invention. To maintain integrity across systems, it is necessary to identify those events in the real world that impact more than one system.
According to another embodiment of this invention, the tool includes an event handling means that synchronizes the requisite systems for the above events. This event handling means takes control of event occurrence, and interprets a script that assures that all corresponding systems are effectively acted upon to realize synchrony.

The tool therefore, enables a user to automatically obtain data from devices which use different Operating Systems and platforms and consolidate the data into a single usable document.
Brief Description of the Accompanying Drawings:
The invention will now be described in relation to the accompanying drawings in which:
Figure 1 illustrates the functional diagram of the automation tool in accordance with this invention and also illustrates the mechanism by which the automation tool overrides the operating system and generated the user events and messages necessary for the system to function; and
Figure 2 illustrates a detailed block diagrammatic description of the apparatus and solution in accordance with this invention and also illustrates the manual route in accordance with the prior art.
Detailed Description of the Accompanying Drawings:
Figure 1 illustrates the functional diagram of the automation tool (AT) in accordance with this invention and also illustrates the mechanism by which the automation tool overrides the operating system and generated the user events and messages necessary for the system to function. The automation tool (AT) contains commands to connect diverse pre-existing components (ERP System, CRM System, PMS System, HR System, Accounts System). Each of these components (ERP System, CRM System, PMS System, HR System, Accounts System) is built to accomplish a task in the operating system like sending and receiving mails, executing applications from the

operating system, reading and writing to clipboard, generating key strokes, generating mouse events, navigating thru the user interface and the like. By putting these pre-defined components (ERP System, CRM System, PMS System, HR System, Accounts System) together and executing them in sequence, the solution can serve as glue and simulate manual methods required for working on two or more systems or platforms.
Figure 2 illustrates a detailed block diagrammatic description of the apparatus and solution in accordance with this invention and also illustrates the manual route in accordance with the prior art. A scripting Tool monitors, defines and regulates the activities from the source system to the destination system via a specific route. The route includes navigating to the information page, screen scraping for interfacing purposes, filtering information relating to scripting parameters, and navigating to transaction platform.
The invention will now be illustrated with respect to a non-limiting exemplary embodiment as under:
Every organization develops and incorporates solutions in the products they produce, or develop solutions to support the build, manufacture, or delivery of the products and services they provide. As the solution component grows, schedule delays, cost overruns and quality problems caused by the solution become a problem. This is compounded by the increase in the size or complexity of the solution that is being developed. This can be addressed by better cost and schedule management, improved solution quality, and reduced solution development cycle time. From this, it can see that monitoring the time schedule is of utmost importance. Systems are built to

capture the time spent by every employee on different activities. Every employee of the organization fills in his timesheets in these systems on a weekly/monthly basis based on which future project plans are made.
Timesheet entry is done in a system that can be accessed by the user remotely. Timesheet entry involves user authentication, navigation through multiple screens, passing through several systems and finally landing up on platform where the entries for the desired period are filled up. This is a tedious process involving lots of manual intervention. As a result of this the following issues creep up:
• Entry of timesheet data doesn't occur daily.
Users typically enter the timesheets at the end of the month. There is a related concern - the correctness of data with such delayed bulk mode data entry.
• Peak loads at month ends due to bulk data entry overloads the
systems.
In accordance with this invention, the apparatus and automated mechanism was used to aggregate data so that users could update their time sheet data on a daily basis in the system reducing the aforementioned problem to a large extent. The users needed to fill in their timesheet entries as illustrated in Table 1 for all the activities they had done. They could also import the entries of their scheduled meetings from other locations onto this platform. The scripting means in accordance with this invention then interpreted the solution built for this purpose to upload the time sheet data every day. Whenever there was a change in the user credentials, then the user had to just modify the appropriate portion of the solution scripted by the scripting

means to reflect the change. An event was subsequently registered in a Task Scheduling Means used by the user which executed the uploading solution scripted by the scripting means, typically at the end of the day so that the time sheet data was uploaded into the system automatically.

Date Activity Module Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat Sun
10/03/2005 Tools Creation COM 3.75 3.71 2.48 3.66 1.98 3.8 0.61
10/03/2005 Documentation COM 0.56 2.26 2.06 0.78 1.58 1.26 2.31
10/03/2005 Responding to Mails COM 2.16 0.51 0.23 0.16 0.86 0.73 0.53
10/03/2005 Project Discussions COM 2 2 4 3.5 4 2 0
10/03/2005 Project Activities COM 0.5 0.5 1 0.5 0.5 0.5 0
Table 1: Time sheet entries to be uploaded into the Information System
The automated Time sheet uploading tool that was developed based on this approach was able to automatically upload the time sheet data from different platforms to the Project Management System successfully. However, over a period of time it was found out that if there was a migration in the platform for uploading, then the solutions responsible for navigating broke as it was based on screen scrapping technology in accordance with this invention. Therefore there arose a need to keep updating the solutions based on the changes made in the Project Management System.
The tool and the technique that is presented made it possible to automatically obtain data from one system and provide it as inputs for a transaction in another system. This tool achieved localization through scripting and used screen scrapping for interfacing with any system. It was clearly seen from the illustration that tool and technique in accordance with this invention was useful for automating inter-system processes.


While considerable emphasis has been placed herein on the specific steps of the preferred process, it will be appreciated that many steps can be made and that many changes can be made in the preferred steps without departing from the principles of the invention. These and other changes in the preferred steps of the invention will be apparent to those skilled in the art from the disclosure herein, whereby it is to be distinctly understood that the foregoing descriptive matter is to be interpreted merely as illustrative of the invention and not as a limitation.