Patent ID: 7873617
Filing Date: 2011-01-18
Classification: A01B,G06Q,Y10S

Abstract:
1. A device for coordinating a machine fleet, comprising a memory for storing a large number of data records; an interface for communicating with several users; an administration unit for making changes to the data records in reaction to users' requests; wherein said memory is configured so that each data record represents a given portion of a working capacity of a machine in the machine fleet and includes an urgency threshold assigned to said data record by said administrative unit; and wherein said administration unit is configured so that the changes relate to an assignment of a portion of the working capacity represented by the data records to users making the change request and to implement a change to a data record when so requested by a user if the data record is not assigned to any other user, and when an urgency of the change indicated by the user which provides the change request reaches a threshold urgency specified for the given portion of working capacity represented by the data record; and wherein the urgency and the urgency threshold are quantified monetarily to reflect a decreasing difference in time between a time at which the user makes the change request and a time associated with the requested data record change.