Patent ID: 7904816

Claim:
An information processing apparatus for utilizing services provided by a plurality of service providing devices that exist on a network, comprising: an information acquiring unit configured to acquire device information concerning the plurality of service providing devices and service-related information relating to services capable of being provided by the plurality of service providing devices; a first display control unit configured to display a list of service functions of available services based upon the device information and service-related information; a service-function selecting unit configured to select a service function to be utilized from the list of service functions of available services displayed by said first display control unit; a service-function judging unit configured to judge utilizable service functions based upon the service to be utilized selected by said service-function selecting unit; ad a second display control unit configured to identifiably display the utilizable service functions judged by said service-function judging unit; an availability judging unit configured to judge setting items relating to non-available service functions among services capable of being provided by the plurality of service providing devices, based upon the utilizable service functions judged by said service-function judging unit; a setting prohibiting unit configured to prohibit the setting of a service function judged to be unavailable by said availability judging unit; a conflicting-service-function detecting unit configured to detect a service function for which the setting of the setting item that is currently selected will be impossible owing to selection of a specific service function by said service-function selecting unit; and a confirmation-screen display control unit configured to display a confirmation screen if a service function for which the setting will be impossible is detected, said configuration screen indicating the fact that this service function has been detected.