Patent Publication Number: US-7716461-B2

Title: Capturing and restoring application state after unexpected application shutdown

Description:
RELATED APPLICATION 
   The present application is a continuation of U.S. application Ser. No. 11/331,405, filed on Jan. 12, 2006, and entitled CAPTURING AND RESTORING APPLICATION STATE AFTER UNEXPECTED APPLICATION SHUTDOWN. 

   BACKGROUND 
   Computer and software users have grown accustomed to performing a variety of tasks using a number of different software applications. Letters, memoranda and other documents are prepared using word processing applications. Presentations and drawings are prepared using slide presentation applications. Financial reports and other data manipulation are prepared and performed using spreadsheet applications. Electronic mail, calendar information, tasks and notes are entered, exchanged and maintained using electronic mail and calendar applications, and a variety of other tasks are performed with other applications. 
   At any given time, a typical software user may have multiple applications and multiple documents in use, where each application user interface and each launched document is displayed in one or more display frames on the user&#39;s computer display screen. In such cases, deployed applications and associated documents are in a given state at any given time. For example, a deployed word processing application may be displaying page 4 of a memorandum. At the same time, a user&#39;s electronic mail application may be deployed showing the user&#39;s contacts information. A spreadsheet document may be deployed, and the fifth sheet of data may be displayed showing data the user is reviewing while preparing the memorandum currently displayed by her word processing application. 
   Unfortunately, computers and software applications are often unexpectedly shut down for a variety of reasons. A power outage may cause a computer and any applications presently in use to shut down. An operating system or software application may “crash” where some aspect of data being processed or some aspect of processing sequencing in the operating system or application becomes problematic and causes the operating system or application to shut down. On the other hand, often a computer or software application shutdown is intentional, but still unexpected to the user. For example, while the user is away from her computer, a computer system administrator at her organization may load a software patch (update or other software modification) to one or more applications she is currently using, followed by a restart of her computer for properly integrating the patch with the subject application. 
   Such intended or unintended shutdowns and restarts often cause a loss of data being entered or edited by a user at the time of the shutdown, and moreover, such shutdowns and restarts often result in a loss of the current application state of the various applications in use at the time of the shutdown and subsequent restart. That is, the number of applications deployed, the locations on the display screen of the various application display frames, the deployment of particular documents or other data, the editing locations in deployed documents, and other application settings states are lost. After the shutdown and subsequent restart, the user must redeploy each application and associated document or other data, reposition and resize the application display frames for each deployed application, and redeploy each document or other data in use to a position in the document or data at which the document or data was being edited prior to the shutdown. 
   It is with respect to these and other considerations that the present invention has been made. 
   SUMMARY 
   This summary is provided to introduce a selection of concepts in a simplified form that are further described below in the detailed description. This summary is not intended to identify key features or essential features of the claimed subject matter, nor is it intended as an aid in determining the scope of the claimed subject matter. 
   Embodiments of the present invention solve the above and other problems by providing for capturing and restoring application settings states during application shutdowns and subsequent restarts. Pre-shutdown deployed user data also may be captured for redeployment after subsequent application restart. According to an embodiment of the invention, an in-use application periodically saves data representing its current state. For example, data representing the size and location of deployed application user interface components and display frames, the location of scrollbars and other displayed application components, and data representing presently displayed documents and the viewing and editing positions of presently displayed documents are stored to memory on a periodic basis. 
   In addition to storing application state data, user data, for example, data being presently entered or edited in an in-use document or data, is stored to memory on a periodic basis. According to one embodiment, a draft data storage mechanism is provided for storing user data such as draft calendar data being entered or edited during an electronic calendar application session. 
   Both application state data and user data may be automatically stored at regular intervals, for example, every 10 minutes, or alternatively, application state data and user data may be stored automatically upon the detection of an impending application shutdown. According to one embodiment of the invention, if a planned application shutdown is scheduled, a restart manager module notifies any in-use application to automatically save application state data and any user data. 
   When an application is restarted after an intended or unintended shutdown, the application is redeployed to the application state stored for the application prior to shutdown. And, any documents or other user data that were in use at the time of application shutdown are automatically redeployed and displayed according to the last stored state for the documents or other data prior to application shutdown. 
   These and other features and advantages will be apparent from a reading of the following detailed description and a review of the associated drawings. It is to be understood that both the foregoing general description and the following detailed description are explanatory only and are not restrictive of the invention as claimed. 

   
     BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS 
       FIG. 1  illustrates an exemplary computing operating environment. 
       FIG. 2  is a simplified block diagram illustrating a relationship and interaction between a software application, software application components and a computer operating system. 
       FIG. 3  is a logical flow diagram illustrating the storing of application state data and user data prior to application shutdown and illustrating the restarting of an application after an intended or unintended shutdown. 
   

   DETAILED DESCRIPTION 
   As briefly described above, embodiments of the present invention are directed to capturing and restoring application state and user data during unexpected application shutdowns and subsequent restarts. Data representing in-use application settings state and in-use user data are stored on a periodic basis, or upon notification of an impending application shutdown. Upon restart, any application deployed prior to shutdown is re-deployed according to the stored application settings state for each application and any in-use documents or other data are re-deployed according to the stored user data. According to embodiments of the present invention, storage and restoration of application settings state and storage and restoration of user data may be performed separately. That is, both pre-shutdown application state and user data may be captured and restored, or alternatively, only application state may be captured and restored automatically upon restart, and any pre-shutdown user data may be re-deployed manually or automatically based on a separate storage of that user data. 
   In the following detailed description, references are made to the accompanying drawings that form a part hereof and in which are shown by way of illustrations specific embodiments or examples. These embodiments may be combined, other embodiments may be utilized, and structural changes may be made without departing from the spirit or scope of the present invention. The following detailed description is therefore not to be taken in a limiting sense and the scope of the present invention is defined by the appended claims and their equivalents. 
   Referring now to the drawings, in which like numerals refer to like elements through the several figures, aspects of the present invention and an exemplary computing operating environment will be described.  FIG. 1  and the following discussion are intended to provide a brief, general description of a suitable computing environment in which the invention may be implemented. While the invention will be described in the general context of program modules that execute in conjunction with an application program that runs on an operating system on a personal computer, those skilled in the art will recognize that the invention may also be implemented in combination with other program modules. 
   Generally, program modules include routines, programs, components, data structures, and other types of structures that perform particular tasks or implement particular abstract data types. Moreover, those skilled in the art will appreciate that the invention may be practiced with other computer system configurations, including hand-held devices, multiprocessor systems, microprocessor-based or programmable consumer electronics, minicomputers, mainframe computers, and the like. The invention may also be practiced in distributed computing environments where tasks are performed by remote processing devices that are linked through a communications network. In a distributed computing environment, program modules may be located in both local and remote memory storage devices. 
   Embodiments of the invention may be implemented as a computer process (method), a computing system, or as an article of manufacture, such as a computer program product or computer readable media. The computer program product may be a computer storage media readable by a computer system and encoding a computer program of instructions for executing a computer process. The computer program product may also be a propagated signal on a carrier readable by a computing system and encoding a computer program of instructions for executing a computer process. 
   With reference to  FIG. 1 , one exemplary system for implementing the invention includes a computing device, such as computing device  100 . In a basic configuration, the computing device  100  typically includes at least one processing unit  102  and system memory  104 . Depending on the exact configuration and type of computing device, the system memory  104  may be volatile (such as RAM), non-volatile (such as ROM, flash memory, etc.) or some combination of the two. System memory  104  typically includes an operating system  105  suitable for controlling the operation of a networked personal computer, such as the WINDOWS® operating systems from MICROSOFT CORPORATION of Redmond, Wash. The system memory  104  may also include one or more software applications  106  and may include program data  107 . This basic configuration is illustrated in  FIG. 1  by those components within dashed line  108 . 
   According to embodiments of the invention, the application  106  may comprise many types of software applications, such as an electronic mail program, a calendar program, an Internet browsing program, and the like. An example of such programs is OUTLOOK® manufactured by MICROSOFT CORPORATION. The application  106  may include a number of other types of software applications including a multiple-functionality software application for providing many other types of functionalities. Such a multiple-functionality application may include a number of program modules, such as a word processing program, a spreadsheet program, a slide presentation program, a database program, and the like. An example of such a multiple-functionality application is OFFICE™ manufactured by MICROSOFT CORPORATION. 
   The computing device  100  may have additional features or functionality. For example, the computing device  100  may also include additional data storage devices (removable and/or non-removable) such as, for example, magnetic disks, optical disks, or tape. Such additional storage is illustrated in  FIG. 1  by removable storage  109  and non-removable storage  110 . Computer storage media may include volatile and nonvolatile, removable and non-removable media implemented in any method or technology for storage of information, such as computer readable instructions, data structures, program modules, or other data. System memory  104 , removable storage  109  and non-removable storage  110  are all examples of computer storage media. Computer storage media includes, but is not limited to, RAM, ROM, EEPROM, flash memory or other memory technology, CD-ROM, digital versatile disks (DVD) or other optical storage, magnetic cassettes, magnetic tape, magnetic disk storage or other magnetic storage devices, or any other medium which can be used to store the desired information and which can be accessed by computing device  100 . Any such computer storage media may be part of device  100 . Computing device  100  may also have input device(s)  112  such as keyboard, mouse, pen, voice input device, touch input device, etc. Output device(s)  114  such as a display, speakers, printer, etc. may also be included. These devices are well known in the art and need not be discussed at length here. 
   The computing device  100  may also contain communication connections  116  that allow the device to communicate with other computing devices  118 , such as over a network in a distributed computing environment, for example, an intranet or the Internet. Communication connection  116  is one example of communication media. Communication media may typically be embodied by computer readable instructions, data structures, program modules, or other data in a modulated data signal, such as a carrier wave or other transport mechanism, and includes any information delivery media. The term “modulated data signal” means a signal that has one or more of its characteristics set or changed in such a manner as to encode information in the signal. By way of example, and not limitation, communication media includes wired media such as a wired network or direct-wired connection, and wireless media such as acoustic, RF, infrared and other wireless media. The term computer readable media as used herein includes both storage media and communication media. 
     FIG. 2  is a simplified block diagram illustrating a relationship and interaction between a software application, software application components, and an operating system according to embodiments of the present invention. As described herein, according to embodiments of the present invention, application state data and user data are periodically and/or automatically stored to memory so that application state and user data state may be restored after unexpected application shutdown. Referring to  FIG. 2 , the application  106  is representative of any software application, for example, a word processing application, slide presentation application, spreadsheet application, database application, calendar application, or other application for which application state and associated user data may be stored prior to application shutdown for subsequent restart and restoration of pre-shutdown application state and user data state. 
   The application settings  210  are representative of one or more application settings associated with a given application prior to unexpected application shutdown. For example, the application settings  210  include the number and placement of application display frames. For example, a word processing application may have a display frame in which a document is displayed. A calendar application may have one or more display frames representing contacts data, electronic mail data, tasks data and the like deployed on a display screen of the user&#39;s computer. Additional application settings include the locations, sizes and shapes of deployed application display frames. Additionally, the application settings include any user customization of user interface components, for example, the inclusion, exclusion, and/or placement of individual functionality controls in a user interface component such as a toolbar or dropdown menu. Other application settings state data includes the position of scrollbars and other user interface components in a given application display frame, as well as, other application display frame display properties such as user interface component background colors and the like. 
   As should be appreciated from the foregoing, individual users often deploy a variety of different software applications simultaneously, and the users often place application components, such as application display frames and displayed user interface components in a variety of customized locations, positions, sizes and orientations. As is well known to those skilled in the art, display frames of a given application, or display frames of a plurality of presently in-use applications may be stacked on a display screen according to the priority of use. For example, if a user presently has deployed a word processing application user interface, an electronic mail application user interface and a spreadsheet application user interface, a presently selected application user interface will be displayed in an application display frame on the surface of the display screen, and other presently deployed application user interface components in their respective application display frames will be deployed in positions underneath the presently selected application user interface and associated display frame. 
   According to embodiments of the invention, each application  106  presently in use stores to memory data representing the present application settings for each respective application. The automatic storing of application settings may be set by user control to occur at regular intervals, for example, every 10 minutes, every five minutes, every one minute, and the like. Alternatively, a default application settings storage interval may be set, for example, every 10 minutes. At the scheduled storage interval or frequency, each application  106  in use will automatically store to memory the number, shapes, sizes, positions, user interface component settings and customizations, display order and other application settings for displayed application components. 
   According to an alternative embodiment, a “crash” detection module may be utilized wherein application settings are automatically saved upon the detection of an impending unexpected shutdown of a given application. That is, even though an application settings storage interval may be set to every 10 minutes, if the application crash module detects that an application is shutting down, application settings applicable to each in-use application may be automatically stored immediately before the shutdown is complete. 
   The user data  215  is representative of user data that is presently deployed via the in-use applications  106 . For example, the user data may include word processing documents, spreadsheet application data, slide presentation application slides, drawings and the like, electronic mail and calendar information including electronic mail messages, calendar information, tasks information, and the like. That is, the user data  215  is representative of any user data that is presently deployed via the in-use applications  106  and that is being reviewed, manipulated, edited, or otherwise utilized via the in-use applications  106 . As described above for the application settings  215 , on a periodic basis, for example, every 10 minutes, user data is automatically stored to memory so that the user data may be restored after an unexpected application shutdown. For example, if the user is presently preparing a memorandum for her employer, on a periodic basis, for example, every 10 minutes, user edits, data entry, or other modifications to the data are automatically stored to a draft version of the document that may be utilized if the application is unexpectedly shut down during a time in which the user has failed to manually save her most recent changes to the data. As described above for the application settings data, in addition to periodic storage of user data, for example, every 10 minutes, user data including electronic mail and calendar data, described below, may be stored automatically upon the detection of an impending application shutdown. 
   According to embodiments of the present invention, an improved data storage and draft data function is provided for calendar information entered or edited via an electronic calendar application  106 , for example, OUTLOOK®, manufactured by MICROSOFT CORPORATION. According to this embodiment, on a periodic basis, calendar information such as appointments, meeting requests, tasks, contacts, and other electronic mail and calendar application data are stored to a draft data folder so that the data may be restored in the event of an unexpected application shutdown. For example, if a user is presently entering an electronic meeting request into her electronic calendar application  106  for establishing a meeting with one or more colleagues, the electronic meeting request being prepared by the user is periodically stored to a draft meeting request folder so that the draft meeting request may be restored after an unexpected application shutdown. Likewise, tasks, notes, contacts data, and other electronic mail and calendar application data being entered or edited are periodically stored to a draft data folder so that those data items may be restored if an unexpected application shutdown occurs during entry and/or edit of any of those electronic mail and calendar application data items. 
   Referring still to  FIG. 2 , the application restoration module  205  includes sufficient computer executable instructions for directing the restoration of stored application settings and user data after an unexpected (intended or unintended) application shutdown. According to embodiments of the present invention, the application restoration module  205  is representative of software application instructions integrated with each application  106  for directing the periodic and/or automatic storage of application settings state data and user data. Alternatively, the application restoration module  205  may operate as an independent software application that calls each in-use application  106  from time to time or upon an impending application shutdown to direct the automatic storage of application settings state data and user data. 
   According to embodiments of the present invention, application restart may be performed independently of the restart of any other application in use including the operating system  105 . That is, a given application  106 , for example, a word processing application, may experience an unexpected shutdown even though other applications in use, including the operating system  105 , may continue running under normal operating conditions. Alternatively, the in-use applications  106  may be shut down and restarted in conjunction with the operating system  105 , particularly when a shutdown of the associated computer  100  occurs, which causes a shutdown of all in-use applications, or when the shutdown of a given application  106  is directed via the operation system  105 . 
   A restart manager module  220  may be utilized in association with the operating system  105  to direct the automatic storage of application settings state data and user data of a given application  106  when a shutdown of one or more applications  106  is scheduled to occur. For example, if the computer system administrator of a given organization desires to load a software patch (update or other modification) to one or more applications  106 , the restart manager module  220  may be utilized by the system administrator to call each in-use application  106  and direct each in-use application  106  to store application settings  210  and user data  215  prior to a scheduled application shutdown. For example, a user may be presently using one or more applications  106  for entering, editing or otherwise manipulating various user data. While the user is away from her computer, a system administrator of her organization may desire to load a software update or patch to the applications  106  in use by the user. 
   As is appreciated by those skilled in the art, often after the upload of a software patch or other update or modification to a given application  106 , a shutdown and restart of the application  106  is required to properly integrate the software patch or other update to the subject application. If the shutdown and restart occurs while the user is away from her computer, but while the user has presently deployed software applications and user data, application state and user data may be lost because of the shutdown and restart. According to embodiments of the present invention, the restart manager module  220  may be utilized by the system administrator to direct the in-use applications  106  to automatically store application settings state and user data prior to the shutdown and restart even though the time for a periodic storage of application settings state data and user data has not elapsed, for example, the elapse of a 10-minute interval between automatic data storage cycles. 
   Referring still to  FIG. 2 , the memory storage  104  is representative of system memory to which application settings state data and user data may be stored, as described herein. As should be appreciated, the memory storage  104  is representative of the system registry of the computer  100 , or any other suitable local or remote storage medium which may be used for storing application settings state data and user data described herein. 
   Having described an exemplary operating environment for embodiments of the present invention with reference to  FIGS. 1 and 2  above,  FIG. 3  is a logical flow diagram illustrating the storing of application state data and user data prior to application shutdown and illustrating the restarting of an application after an intended or unintended shutdown. For purposes of illustration, consider that an example user is operating one or more applications  106  and that the user has placed display frames of the in-use applications  106  at various locations, orientations and sizes, and that the user has further deployed one or more user data items, for example, word processing documents, spreadsheet documents, slide presentation documents, electronic mail and calendar data, and the like for entering and/or editing the user&#39;s data. 
   The logical flow  300  begins at start block  305  and proceeds to application run block  310  in which the user is presently running and utilizing one or more applications  106 , as described above. At decision operation  315 , a determination is made as to whether operation of a given application is to be terminated because of a planned application shutdown and restart. As described above, if the applications  106  and/or operating system  105  are to be shutdown and restarted under planned conditions owing to the upload of a software application patch to one of the applications  106  and/or operating system  105  or owing to some other planned shutdown, the restart manager module  220  may notify the in-use applications  106  and the operating system  105  that a shutdown and restart will occur. 
   If a planned shutdown is to occur, the logical flow proceeds to automatic save operation  335 , and the restart manager module  220  directs each in-use application  106  to automatically save the present state of any user data  215 , as described above. For example, if the user is presently editing a word processing application, a spreadsheet application, or is entering and editing electronic mail and calendar application data, the restart manager  220  will direct the associated applications  106  to automatically store the user data at its present state so that the data may be restored to its current state after the applications have been restarted. In addition, as described above, if data being entered and/or edited by the user includes electronic calendar data including meeting requests, contacts information, appointments information, tasks or notes information, the associated electronic calendar application  106  will automatically save the current state of that data to an appropriate storage medium  104 , as described above. 
   At application settings save operation  340 , the restart manager module  220  directs each in-use application  106  and/or the operating system  105  to automatically store the current state of the application settings  210 , as described above. For example, the current state of displayed user interfaces, display frames, or other application components, including the shapes, sizes, locations and orientations of displayed user interface components and display frames, and including the states of user interface components, for example, toolbars, buttons, controls, scrollbars and the like are automatically stored. At save operation  345 , the user data and application settings state data are stored to memory  104 . At application close operation  350 , the in-use applications  106  and/or operating system  105  are shut down. 
   Referring back to decision operation  315 , if a planned shutdown of in-use applications  106  and/or the operating system  105  is not to occur, the routine proceeds to automatic save operation  320 , and user data  215  is automatically stored on a periodic basis, for example, every 10 minutes, as described above with reference to  FIG. 2 . At automatic save operation  325 , application settings state data  210  for any in-use application  106  and/or the operating system  105  are automatically stored on a periodic basis, for example, every 10 minutes, as described above with reference to  FIG. 2 . 
   As described above, the intervals between automatic data storage for both user data and application settings state data may be modified by user input, or the intervals between automatic data storage may be set by default. Alternatively, the automatic storage of application settings data and the automatic storage of user data may be performed independently of each other. For example, application settings state data may be stored every 5 minutes, and user data may be stored every 10 minutes. For another example, at automatic save operation  320 , a determination may be made as to whether any changes to user data have occurred since the last automatic saving of user data. If no changes have occurred to the user data, then no automatic saving of user data must be accomplished. On the other hand, even if no changes have been made to the user data since the last automatic saving cycle, changes may have nonetheless occurred to the application settings state, for example, the user may have moved a display frame from one location on the display screen to another. In such a case, the automatic saving of application settings state data will be required at operation  325 . As described above with reference to  FIG. 2 , automatic saving of user data and application settings state data may also occur outside the normal automatic saving intervals or frequencies, and may occur just before an application shutdown if an application shutdown is detected by the respective applications  106  and/or operating system  105 . 
   At decision operation  330 , a determination is made as to whether operation of a given application is being terminated because of an unplanned application shutdown. If no shutdown of the in-use applications  106  and/or operating system  105  occurs, the routine proceeds back to application run operation  310  and proceeds as described above. If an unplanned application shutdown occurs at decision operation  330 , the routine proceeds to application restart operation  335 . As should be appreciated, the application restart operation  335  also proceeds from the planned application closing operation  350  described above for planned shutdowns. 
   At application restart operation  335 , the in-use applications  106  and/or the operating system  105  are automatically restarted after a previous shutdown, as described above. At retrieve settings operation  360 , the application settings state data stored for the in-use applications  106  and/or the operating system  105  are retrieved from memory storage  104  by the application restoration module  205  for each in-use application  106 . As should be appreciated, if the application shutdown was for an individual application  106 , the application restoration module  205  may be automatically invoked upon restart of the application  106 . Alternatively, the application restoration module  205  may direct the restart of each respective in-use application  106  at the direction of the restart manager module  220 , particularly in the case of planned application shutdowns and restarts, as described above. At user data retrieval operation  365 , the user data stored for each in-use application  106  is retrieved from memory storage  104 . 
   At operation  370 , the in-use applications  106  and/or operating system  105  are restarted, and the user interface components, for example, application display frames, user interface components, scrollbar settings and the like are automatically drawn for display on the user&#39;s computer display screen according to the stored application settings state data. That is, each display frame is redrawn to its previous location, to its previous size, and is drawn to contain user interface components that were displayed prior to the shutdown in accordance with the application settings state data that were stored prior to shutdown. 
   At operation  375 , user data is drawn for display according to the user data that was saved prior to application shutdown. For example, if the user was editing a word processing document, and page 5 of the word processing document was displayed with an edit insertion point deployed between two particular words at the time the user data was saved prior to application shutdown, then the document will be drawn to include the particular page and editing insertion point according to the last saved user data prior to application shutdown. 
   At display operation  380 , the application display frames, user interfaces, and user data are displayed on the user&#39;s display screen so that the user experience is restored to a point equaling the last stored application settings state data and user data stored prior to application shutdown. 
   According to an alternative embodiment, application settings state data and user data may be stored by a user action. For example, if the user has a number of applications in use with display frames organized according to the user&#39;s desire, and the user is currently editing a number of user data items, for example, word processing documents, spreadsheet documents, slide presentation documents, and a variety of electronic mail and calendar data, the user may desire to manually force the saving of application settings state data and user data so that the user may manually shut down her computer and in-use applications while the user is away, for example, while the user is on a vacation. 
   According to this embodiment, a user may selectively save current application settings state data and present user data, followed by a manual shutdown of the in-use applications  106  and/or operating system  105 . When the user subsequently desires to restart her computer, the user may selectively return the applications  106  and the user data to the states of the applications  106  and the user data manually stored by the user prior to shutdown. Thus, the user may efficiently and automatically return to application settings states and displayed user data states at which the applications and user data were displayed prior to the user&#39; intentional shutdown. According to one embodiment, the user may perform the planned (intended) shutdown and data saving operations via the restart manager module  220 . The routine  300  ends at operation  395 . 
   It will be apparent to those skilled in the art that various modifications or variations may be made in the present invention without departing from the scope or spirit of the invention. Other embodiments of the present invention will be apparent to those skilled in the art from consideration of the specification and practice of the invention disclosed herein.