Patent ID: 7580948

Claim:
A system for generating job information to be processed by a spooling module, the system comprising: one or more processing units; logic executable by the one or more processing units to produce a data structure that specifies the job information, wherein the data structure defines a plurality of nodes organized into a hierarchical arrangement representing different aspects of the job information, the plurality of nodes including a plurality of documents, a number of renditions of at least one of the plurality of documents, metadata, at least one resource, at least one font, and at least one image, wherein the metadata, the at least one resource, the at least one font, the at least one image, or a combination thereof, are shared by two or more of the plurality of nodes, and wherein logic for producing the data structure comprises mechanisms for building higher-order structures from parts, the mechanisms comprising: logic executable by the one or more processing units to implement at least one sequence node of a package to produce the job information, wherein the at least one sequence node facilitates combining at least two aspects of the job information, wherein the at least two aspects combined comprise sub-parts of the job information, and wherein the sub-parts originate from a first application, a second application, or any combination thereof, and combining facilitates processing of all of the sub-parts as an ordered sequence; and logic executable by the one or more processing units to implement at least one selector node of the package to produce the job information, wherein the at least one selector node facilitates selecting from at least two aspects of the job information, and wherein the at least two aspects selected comprise different versions; and logic executable by the one or more processing units to store the data structure in a spool storage for later retrieval and processing by the spooling module.