Patent ID: 8549035

Claim:
A method of retrieving operational data, the method comprising: at a front-end unit, generating a query for retrieving requested operational data, including real-time operational data; responsive to said generating, sending an operational information provider from the front-end unit to the back-end unit, wherein the operational information provider is sent as a query interface to describe the query to identify real-time operational data to be retrieved from the back-end unit and to specify a retrieval method for the back-end unit that includes data request and data response operations to be performed by the back-end unit; responsive to receiving the data request and response operations at the back-end unit, executing at least one business operation at the back-end unit, wherein the at least one business operation performs analysis and data mining operations to generate the requested operational data; and receiving at the front-end unit from the back-end unit the requested operational data, including the real-time operational data.