Patent ID: 9710502
Date: 2017-07-18
CPC Classifications: G06F

Claim:
1. A computer-implemented method of centralized document version management, the method comprising the steps of: establishing, based on information received from a user associated with a first party, a document chain to which individual document versions are associated as a collection, where each document version includes at least some content that is same as content in at least one other document version in the document chain and where the document chain allows for document versions that include some content that is different from content in other document versions in the document chain; allowing one or more users associated with the first party to a project to associate a document version to a specified document chain and to obtain initial access granting authority over the associated document version such that the associated document version would be private and exclusive to users associated with the first party and such that users associated with any different party to the project cannot access the associated document version until a grant of access from one or more of the users associated with the first party; allowing one or more users associated with a second party to the project, where the users associated with the second party is non-overlapping with the users associated with the first party, to associate a different document version to the specified document chain and to obtain exclusive initial access granting authority over the associated different document version such that the associated different document version would be private and exclusive to the second party and such that users associated with any different party to the project, including users associated with the first party, cannot access the associated different document version until a grant of access from the one or more users associated with the second party; allowing a different specified document version to be associated with the specified document chain and to remain private and exclusive to a user that did not first establish the specified document chain but that has access to the different specified document version associated with the specified document chain, such that the different specified document version is private from all other users including a user that first established the specified document chain in the system; managing information about each of the plurality of document versions including associations to one or more other document versions and also determining which users have access to which document versions; and controlling information conveyed to both the users of the first party and the users of the second party based on the managed information about each of the plurality of document versions in the specified document chain.