Patent ID: 8150876

Claim:
A computing system comprising: an identity management server to process membership requests related to a plurality of dynamic groups based on a user data and a plurality of rules; a collaboration system to execute an application requiring a set of dynamic groups to which a user belongs, wherein said set of dynamic groups is contained in said plurality of dynamic groups; and a search tool operable to: receive a plurality of rules and a user data, said user data containing a set of attributes and corresponding values related to each of a plurality of users, each of said plurality of rules specifying a corresponding criteria to be used to include each user as a member of a corresponding dynamic group, said criteria specifying at least one attribute and a corresponding condition with respect to the condition to be satisfied for a user to be included in the corresponding dynamic group; maintain a cache data indicating which of a plurality of users are members of which of said plurality of dynamic groups, wherein the members of each group are determined by checking whether the value of an attribute for the corresponding user in said user data satisfies the condition contained in the criteria for being included in the corresponding dynamic group; receive a membership request from said application, said membership request requesting said set of dynamic groups to which said user belongs, said membership request including an identifier of said user to indicate that the set of dynamic groups to which said user belongs, is being requested; examine said cache data to determine said set of dynamic groups to which said user belongs; and send a response to said application indicating that said user belongs to said set of dynamic groups, wherein said cache data is maintained before said search tool receives said membership request.