Patent ID: 7657636

Claim:
A method for workflow decision management, the method comprising: maintaining a device state history; identifying a device usage pattern in dependence upon the device state history; identifying a workflow scenario in dependence upon the device usage pattern; identifying a workflow in dependence upon the workflow scenario; executing the workflow including: sending, to an intermediate message validation service, a message to be forwarded to a device to administer at least one value of an attribute of the device; determining, by the intermediate message validation service, that the message is valid, further comprising: determining differences between the structure of a packet of the message and a predefined proper packet structure, wherein the predefined proper packet structure is derived from the Consumer Electronics Bus (‘CEBus’) specification, and the predefined proper packet structure includes a Link Protocol Data Unit (‘LPDU’), a Network Protocol Data Unit (‘NPDU’), and an Application Protocol Data Unit (‘APDU’); determining that differences between the structure of the packet of the message and the predefined proper packet structure do not exceed a threshold similarity requirement, further comprising: determining a difference between a length and content of an LPDU, NPDU, and APDU of the packet and a length and content of the LPDU, NPDU, and APDU of the predefined proper packet structure; and forwarding, by the intermediate message validation service, the valid message to the device.