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Abstract

The invention provides a process-centric, scenario-driven business service assembly software environment that uses encapsulated, iconographic building blocks--each representing a discrete Web Service component to be executed within a business service--to logically depict service processes as well as complex relationships between these processes, their audiences, and means of deployment. Fundamental to the invention are an Interactive Flow Assembler, an Interactive Flow Engine, a design-time Service Manager, and an implicit XML-based data and process model. Business users employ the Interactive Flow Assembler to create online business services that are executed by the Interactive Flow Engine by chaining a series of logical business steps that codify business rules, collect data, and take actions. The Services Manager leverages Web Service standards to provide collaborating business analysts and IT resources with an environment in which to centralize business-relevant decisions such as business rules, authorized data sources, design-time and runtime roles and profiles, and deployment characteristics to change the appearance and behavior of applications built using the Interactive Flow Assembler. The invention's intrinsic data and process model facilitate easy integration of networked business services built using the invention as well as the underlying datasets captured by the online business services.

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First Claim