Patent ID: 7546226

Claim:
A computer-readable storage medium having computer-readable program instructions embedded therein for directing operation of a processor associated with a computer system, wherein the computer-readable program instructions, when executed by the processor on the computer system, enable the processor to implement a data processing system, that comprises: a model service system configured to receive, as an input, an object model description, indicative of a first object model that represents business data, and generate a dimensional model based on the input; an entity generator generating a second object model based on the dimensional model, the second object model representing business data represented by the dimensional model; and a navigation service configured to identify a data navigation path from relationships between individual sets of data that comprise the business data, and output the data navigation path for navigation by a user from a first data set to a related second data set wherein the navigation service comprises: a plurality of navigation providers each associated with a specific type of navigation; a navigation service layer configured to transmit a navigation service request to one or more of the navigation providers that are registered with the navigation service layer; and a metadata service for providing the plurality of navigation providers with access to a metadata store, each navigation provider being configured to respond to a received data navigation request by interacting with the metadata service to identify at least one data navigation path and to return the at least one identified data navigation path to the navigation service layer for output to the user.