ProcessView is a Distributed Directory Service(DDS)
Product for the Internet. It uses the Standard X500 protocol for DDS and based on the
Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP) to access the remote information. In short,
it is like yellow pages for the Internet where a user can specify and organize, from a
completely unrelated set of information, his own areas of interest and can build his own
X500 search trees which can be stored as enterprise data on the back end RDBMS. He can
also create and share discussions on these views. This product (attempts to) maps the
non-relational world to relational (X500) world and helps users organize. The product
contains three main components.
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A NT Service 'ProcessView Sever', that is incharge
of retrieving and storing data by providing an API conform to the LDAP. |
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| Front End is based on the SLAPD
(Stand alone version of a directory server from Michigan University and now taken by
NetScape Corp. It has been converted from UNIX into a NT Service. This part deals with
TCP/IP, analyse directory requests and returns results to LDAP Client. |
| Back End is in charge of management
(storage/retrieval) of the persistent information. It interfaces with the front end with
functions close to the LDAP functions, but predigested. This part will access the
ProcessView schemas (user created), and the enterprise database (using ODBC) |
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An administrative component 'ProcessView builder'
that is a component with a user interface, that allows to define and manage the 'schema'
of ProcessView. |
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A client component in the form of an ActiveX
(Microsoft) control, that is a basic user interface to display and manage a ProcessView.
[the term ProcessView, is in some contexts, the view created by the user on the enterprise
data]. This component will talk with the ProcessView Server using LDAP. Notes :
ProcessView Client uses the concept architecture of a Directory User Agent (DUA). It uses
a Windows95 Explorer3 architecture and the 'name spaces' extension to the explorer. The
standard explorer as the left pane, will be integrated with the X500 global tree into a
name space. In the explorer, this will look like the new Internet mail or News group. This
will also take advantage of/be integrated with the standard file system, to integrate
seamlessly into office applications. |
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