Patent Document ID: 7574652
Application ID: 10465222

Base Claim:
1. A computer implemented method of interactively determining transformations for use in mapping at least one source data component from at least one source to target data component, said method comprising the steps of: (a) using a computer to detect selection of at least one said source data component; (b) for each said selected source data component, generating a corresponding list of representative data examples; (c) using a computer to compile a resulting list of representative data examples for said target data component from said lists of representative data examples of said selected source data components, said resulting list of representative data examples being a limited subset of the source data components and representative of said target data component; (d) using a computer to display said resulting list of examples in a graphical user interface; (e) using a computer to identify a user generated modification of a single textual entity example from said resulting list of examples, wherein said user generated modification is made by a user selecting the single textual entity example from said resulting list of examples displayed in the graphical user interface and then directly modifying the single textual entity example; and (f) using a computer to determine at least one transformation to be applied to the at least one source data component including its corresponding representative data examples displayed in the graphical user interface, said at least one transformation being selected from a list of solutions, each solution of the list of solutions being based on the modified example and comprising at least one function, wherein said at least one transformation is selected from the list of solutions according to one of: a length of connectors between said functions; and a weight assigned to said functions.

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Claim 23:
23. A method according to claim 1 , further comprising visualizing a collection of heterogeneous data sources using a set of mappings, said set of mappings acting to provide a unified representation of the said collection and comprising at least one said mapping, said target data component being a constituent part of said unified representation, said visualizing comprising the steps of: (1) selecting a set of mappings to use for the visualization; (2) selecting at least one data source to be visualized; (3) identifying, for each selected data source, a schema definition representative of said selected data source, and using said definition to identify all child definitions for said data source, to thereby form a schema view for the selected data sources; (4) generating a tree representation for said schema view; (5) applying each of said mappings of said mapping set to said schema view, each application of each said mapping comprising the steps of: (5a) identifying, for said mapping, said one or more source data components; (5b) if all said identified source data components exist in said schema view, then performing steps (5ba), (5bb) and (Sbc) as follows: (5ba) identifying the target data component of said mapping; (5bb) creating a visual representation of said target data component; (5bc) updating said schema view by inserting the created visual representation of said target data component into said schema view such that the hierarchical context of the target data component in the schema view is the same as a maximum common hierarchical context of the source view components of the said mapping; and (6) visually presenting the updated schema view.