Building complex hierarchical queries

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10649989-B2
Application number	US-201514927951-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Oct 30, 2015
Priority date	Oct 30, 2015
Publication date	May 12, 2020
Grant date	May 12, 2020

Abstract

Provided are a computer program product, system, and method for building complex hierarchical queries. A User Interface (UI) representation of a logical query is received, wherein the UI representation describes object types, relationships between the object types, and attributes of the object types. The UI representation is translated to a logical query. The logical query is converted to data layer calls to retrieve objects having the object types, the relationships between the object types, and the attributes of the object types. The objects are received. Then, a directed graph is generated using the identified objects.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A computer program product for, the computer program product comprising a computer readable storage medium having computer readable program code embodied therein that executes to perform operations, the operations comprising:
retrieving object types of stored objects, attributes of the object types, and relationships between the object types;
building a query builder User Interface (UI) using one or more templates to allow selection of the object types of the stored objects, the attributes of the object types, and the relationships between the object types;
in response to receiving, using the query builder UI, selection of one or more object types, one or more relationships between the object types, and one or more attributes of the object types, building a UI representation;
translating the UI representation to a logical query that filters for objects of the stored objects having the selected one or more object types, the selected one or more relationships between the object types, and the selected one or more attributes of the object types;
converting the logical query to data layer calls to retrieve objects having the object types, the relationships between the object types, and the attributes of the object types;
generating a directed graph using the objects retrieved by the data layer calls; and
translating the directed graph to the UI representation, wherein the UI representation is modified to generate a modified directed graph.

2. The computer program product of claim 1 , wherein the query builder UI displays, for an object type of the object types, attributes of that object type and other object types that are related to that object type.

3. The computer program product of claim 1 , wherein the objects are vertices of the directed graph, and wherein the relationships are directed edges of the directed graph.

4. The computer program product of claim 1 , wherein the attributes are displayed in the directed graph.

5. The computer program product of claim 1 , wherein an external configuration file describes the object types, the relationships between the object types, and the attributes of the object types.

6. The computer program product of claim 5 , wherein the objects are retrieved from a database using information in the external configuration file.

7. A computer system, comprising:
a processor;
a computer readable storage medium coupled to the processor and storing program code, wherein the program code, when executed, performs operations, the operations comprising:
retrieving object types of stored objects, attributes of the object types, and relationships between the object types;
building a query builder User Interface (UI) using one or more templates to allow selection of the object types of the stored objects, the attributes of the object types, and the relationships between the object types;
in response to receiving, using the query builder UI, selection of one or more object types, one or more relationships between the object types, and one or more attributes of the object types, building a UI representation;
translating the UI representation to a logical query that filters for objects of the stored objects having the selected one or more object types, the selected one or more relationships between the object types, and the selected one or more attributes of the object types;
converting the logical query to data layer calls to retrieve the objects having the object types, the relationships between the object types, and the attributes of the object types;
generating a directed graph using the objects retrieved by the data layer calls; and
translating the directed graph to the UI representation, wherein the UI representation is modified to generate a modified directed graph.

8. The computer system of claim 7 , wherein the query builder UI displays, for an object type of the object types, attributes of that object type and other object types that are related to that object type.

9. The computer system of claim 7 , wherein the objects are vertices of the directed graph, and wherein the relationships are directed edges of the directed graph.

10. The computer system of claim 7 , wherein the attributes are displayed in the directed graph.

11. The computer system of claim 7 , wherein an external configuration file describes the object types, the relationships between the object types, and the attributes of the object types.

12. The computer system of claim 11 , wherein the objects are retrieved from a database using information in the external configuration file.

13. A method, comprising:
retrieving object types of stored objects, attributes of the object types, and relationships between the object types;
building a query builder User Interface (UI) using one or more templates to allow selection of the object types of the stored objects, the attributes of the object types, and the relationships between the object types;
in response to receiving, using the query builder UI, selection of one or more object types, one or more relationships between the object types, and one or more attributes of the object types, building a UI representation;
translating the UI representation to a logical query that filters for objects of the stored objects having the selected one or more object types, the selected one or more relationships between the object types, and the selected one or more attributes of the object types;
converting the logical query to data layer calls to retrieve objects having the object types, the relationships between the object types, and the attributes of the object types;
generating a directed graph using the objects retrieved by the data layer calls; and
translating the directed graph to the UI representation, wherein the UI representation is modified to generate a modified directed graph.

14. The method of claim 13 , wherein the query builder UI displays, for an object type of the object types, attributes of that object type and other object types that are related to that object type.

15. The method of claim 13 , wherein the objects are vertices of the directed graph, and wherein the relationships are directed edges of the directed graph.

16. The method of claim 13 , wherein the attributes are displayed in the directed graph.

17. The method of claim 13 , wherein an external configuration file describes the object types, the relationships between the object types, and the attributes of the object types.

18. The method of claim 17 , wherein the objects are retrieved from a database using information in the external configuration file.

Assignees

• IBM

Inventors

• Lereya Daniel
• Parag Nadav
• Shalikashvili Vladimir
• Zemah Moshe

Classifications

• G06F16/2452 Primary

  Query translation · CPC title

• G06F16/9024

  Graphs; Linked lists (G06F16/9027 takes precedence) · CPC title

• G06F16/2428

  Query predicate definition using graphical user interfaces, including menus and forms (G06F16/2423 takes precedence) · CPC title