SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR RELOCATION OF TELECOMMUNICATION SERVICES

SYSTEME ET METHODE DE DEPLACEMENT DE SERVICE DE TELECOMMUNICATION

Claims

WHAT IS CLAIMED IS:
1. A method of data extraction comprising the steps of:
comparing a data file to a data template to extract non-template data.
2. A method of legacy data extraction comprising the steps of:
comparing a new data file to an older data file to extract time varying
updates.
3. A method of automatic account set up comprising the steps of:
responding to requests for data from a web site by providing said data.
4. A method of automatic account set up comprising the steps of:
responding to requests for data from a web site by providing said data in
emulation of a
user entering said data.
5. A method of data extraction comprising the steps of:
extracting formatting code from a markup language data file to obtain data.
6. A method of data extraction comprising the steps of:
extracting formatting code from a markup language data file to obtain data
types.
7. A method of obtaining data from a web site comprising the steps of:
requesting and obtaining data from a web site in emulation of a user
requesting said data.
8. A method of converting data comprising the steps of:
converting said data from a source format to an intermediate format.
9. A method of converting data comprising the steps of:
converting said data from an intermediate format to a target format.
10. A computer-based method comprising the steps of:
extraction of data from a source in the source's format
transmission of said data from the source to the service switching facility,
conversion of said data from the source's format to an intermediate format ,
storage of said data in intermediate format in a temporary memory,
conversion of said data in intermediate format into the format required for
the
destination,
transmission of said data from the service switching facility to the
destination
11. As 10 with the addition of means to analyse, record, and reconstruct the
data structures
[folder structures] of the source system in the destination system.
12. As 10 with the [additional] [preliminary] step comprising:




the end-user initiates the process by [filling in an html form] and [pressing
a submit
button].
13. As 10 with the [additional] [preliminary] step comprising:
~ prior to the transmission of any data to the destination, the said
destination is
[prepared] primed to receive the data
14. As 10 with the addition of a means to [take account of] OR [circumvent]
the complex and
ever-changing session control requirements of the source service.
15. As 10 with the addition of a [timer] means to log on to the source system
at [appropriate]
intervals to monitor for the arrival of mail and send a message to the end-
user at the
destination system informing of said activity.
16. As 10 with the addition of a means to invoke automatic forwarding of mail
received at the
source (now the 'legacy') system.
17. As 11 with the addition of a means to record details of the transaction
for billing
purposes, to provide and audit trail, and to give credible feedback to the
initiating end-
user.
18. As 10 with the mechanism to derive the relevant source data by analysis of
the html using
a 'delta' technique [subtracting template information from the data and
recognising the
various types of data by 'positional information', tags or sequence] ([I
assume this is
prior art andnot to be subject of a separate application!])
19. As all of preceding claims with addition of a single queuing system for
tasks to ensure
optimal use made of resources, and that priorities can be assigned to tasks to
minimise
affect on the end-user of system delays.
20. As all preceding claims, with the addition of the ability to generate
multiple parallel
transactions with the source system to improve the speed of transfer of the
data. [multi-
threading]
21. As all preceding claims with the addition of the ability to include
'brandlining' of web-
page to amke it 'appear' to be 'owned by' the 'partnering organisation',
although in fact it
resides on the 'service switching facility'
22. As claim 10, but adding the ability extract data from multiple sources,
combining like
data in the service switching facility, and transferring said combined data to
a single
destination service.
23. As claim 10 with the addition of a means to generate multiple destination
copies for each
source.




24. As claim 10 with the addition of a means of [SSL] encryption to provide a
level of
security for the data throughout the transfer process.
25. As for claim 10, but omitting steps for translating into a temporary meta
data, instead
doing 'on the fly' translation between source and destination formats.
26. As for Claim 10 with the addition of step(s) to record information
directly pertaining t o
the habits of the end-user in order to provide a 'persona' profile of the user
for business
purposes.
27. A method of data extraction comprising the steps of:
sorting and extracting data from a plurality of arriving data packets.
28. A method of data extraction comprising the steps of:
creating a folder structure for arriving data.
29. A method of data extraction comprising the steps of:
creating a folder structure for a target web site which mirrors a source web
site.
30. A method of data extraction comprising the steps of:
extracting a folder structure from a target web site.
31. A system for executing the method of any one of claims 1 through 30.
32. An apparatus for executing the method of any one of claims 1 through 30.
33. A computer readable memory medium for storing software code executable to
perform
the method steps of any one of claims 1 through 30.
34. A carrier signal incorporating software code executable to perform the
method steps of
any one of claims 1 through 30.

Description

CA 02305112 2000-04-12
ServiceSwitch.com
Want users with pre-loaded stickiness?
We've got 500 million for you!
Project Overview - DRAFT
March 30th, 2000
ServiceSwitch.com Inc. Confidential and Proprietary


CA 02305112 2000-04-12
ServiceSwitch.com
"Creating Internet LiquidityT"""
Executive Summary:
The Internet landscape is getting more and more competitive and so is the
battle to get
and keep customers. Stickiness is the only weapon that will guarantee a
customer will
stay with you...
What if something better comes along?... Better Features, Quality of service,
Price,
etc... How do you get users to switch service providers if their lives
(stickiness) are
already are embedded in a competitor's service?
We offer a solution to this problem!
Our Mission:
ServiceSwitch.com provides the first comprehensive system which enables
consumer
and business users of Internet services to move their intellectual property
(stickiness) to
a competitor's, our partners, services for an incentive... To become the
leading Internet
persona movement company.
We displace stickiness and make 500 million existing Internet service provider
users and
their data available to our affiliate/partner Service Providers for a nominal
fee...
Our partners will be able to offer their own branded and customized version of
our
service and get new customers that would not otherwise be possible!
ServiceSwitch.com will offer a complete affiliate branded hosted solution.
The Opportunity:
Users generate revenues and are the biggest asset for any Service Provider!
Pureplay
Internet Portal Service Providers spend an average of $108 U.S. to acquire
each
customer (March 2000 issue of Business 2.0). Telcos and financial institutions
spend a
much higher amount to acquire customers since subscribers of these services
generate
much higher revenues for them.
There currently exists thousands of well established and financed service
providers
worldwide which could be ServiceSwitch.com customers in the following markets:
~ Pureplay Internet Portals (ex: Yahoo.com)
~ Wireless Service Providers (ex: Bell Mobility)
~ Telecommunications Service Providers (ex: AT&T)
~ Application Service Providers (ex: HotOffice.com)
The number of web-based services is growing exponentially. Primarily due to
the wide
spread growth of web software-development tools and the market demand for
browser-


CA 02305112 2000-04-12
based software. With this explosion, it will be more important for users to
have the
ability to switch from one service to another ...taking all of their content-
creation efforts
along with them from one site to another.
Thinking big:
Banks and Financial Institutions have excelled due to the high switching costs
of moving
from one bank to another. Via the web, a bank customer can check account
balances,
pay bills and review account transactions. That's all that ServiceSwitch.com
needs. By
establishing a partnership with banks and getting permission from the
customer, we can
generate all the necessary forms required to switch services.
How much would this be worth to the customer? How much would this be worth to
the
service provider, in this case, the online financial institutionlbank (ex:
Wingspan.com)?
Current Status:
We already have a working prototype which has been developed and tested over
the
past 5 months and have filed for patents regarding our concepts and
technology. We
have a management team with the experience and knowledge to succeed and we
plan
on being first to market with a production service which will be ready by
October 2000
We want to establish ourselves as the Ebay of services switching.
ServiceSwitch.com now requires $x.x million of investment in order to expand
and speed
up it's development and marketing activities for it's next phase.


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The ServiceSwitch.com Market Opportunities:
Services Convergence:
As the Internet continues it's explosive growth and new technologies in the
Wireless space and increases in bandwidth capacity, convergence especially
between the telephony, wireless and Internet service providers will be
significant.
As this happens, there will be a high turnaround of customers who will require
their persona to be moved. ServiceSwitch.com is prime to take advantage of
this
phenomenon.
We will partner with customers in the following markets...
Telecommunications
Services
Wireless Financial
Services Services
Service Switching Engine>
"Creating Internet lJquidity"
ASPS Internet Portal
Services
~ Wireless Market:
With the advent of emerging wireless devices and communications services which
offer
instant access to your e-mail, calendaring and stock information. More and
more celco's
(cellular communication services providers) are partnering with established
Internet
portals to integrate each other's services and offer 1 bundle to the user...
As an
example, in Canada, Bell Mobility will be bundling the Lycos.com services such
as e-
mail, calendaring and stocks to their wireless customers. Rogers/AT&T will be
bundling
the Excite e-mail, calendaring and stocks to their wireless customers. What
will happen
if a Bell Mobility customer wants to switch to Rogers/AT&T (because
Rogers/AT&T is
now offering a much better price than Bell Mobility?... The Bell Mobility
customer has
his or her entire life now integrated into the Bell Mobility/Lycos system and
would require


CA 02305112 2000-04-12
alot of work to switch this over manually to Rogers/AT&T... ServiceSwitch.com
will have
significant opportunities in the wireless market where high turnarounds are
frequent
based on ever changing prices, quality of service and new features...
~ Pureplay Internet Portals:
~ Telcommunications Service Providers
It will be absolutely critical for telcos (and celcos) within the next 3 years
to own
the majority (or 100%) of your online persona. All communication services and
devices will enhance the life of it's users (communications management
services)
by relying and leveraging information from the following sources:
~ Your Unified messaging mailbox
~ Your calendar
~ Your address Book
~ Your folders
~ Your mailing lists...
~ Your behaviour
Your stock portfolio
~ Your sports preferences
~ Your Weather preferences
~ ... and any other service based persona information which can be leveraged
Communication Service Providers will offer super bundles to users and since
their persona will be completely tied into the service, owning that persona
will be
essential and worth a significant amount to the service provider.
ServiceSwitch.com will allow our Telco and Celco partners to obtain users'
persona from service provider sources or competitors. The opportunity is
enormous in this space.
~ Financial Service Providers
More and more people are starting to take control of their investments and the
Internet is enabling them to do so conveniently. A high percentage of novice
investors first start by monitoring stocks of interest on sites that allow
users to
build free stock portfolios and get near real-time quotes. Owning users at
this
level is worth a lot to service providers since they can generate revenues by
advertising and up-selling possibilities. All online financial service
providers are
constantly adding new features and improving service quality.


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The Value Chain:
"Everyone Wins!"
Service Providers get new customers which would not have been possible to
obtain
otherwise...



Service Providers com
ServiceSwitch


Users .


(affiliates/partners)


servlceswltch.com will
earn a fee


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to another servicenew (or re-sellers)


Provider and get users which are Instantlyeverytime users switche
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revenues and up-selling
capabilities.




CA 02305112 2000-04-12
Version 1 Features:
~ This version is built to be extremely high speed, reliable and scalable.
This is achieved by using a sophisticated switching queue control system and a
multi-
threaded architecture that can spawn a high number of simultaneous transfer
sessions
It's components will be built to run on Windows NT with minor components on
Linux to
fully maximize on speed advantages.
It will offer affiliate administrator the option of totally customizing the
look and feel of the
service so that the user continues to think they are still in our affiliate's
site and keeps
the trust.
The switching experience for the user will be extremely easy and rapid.
Another major aspect of this version is the Billing module.
User Features:
~ Switch services
~ Service Provisioning
~ View transactions log
Administration Features:
~ System Administration
~ Affiliate/Partner system administration
Core Architecture Special Technical Features:
~ High level of Security
~ Affiliate/Partner Billing Module
~ Affiliate/Partner service provider interface (API)
~ Friendly user interface
~ Conflict management and resolution agent
~ Switching Incentives Wizard
~ Service Provisioning Module
~ Service Switching Engine
~ Modular based architecture
~ Multi-threaded architecture
This version will switch the following elements:
- User profiles
- Messages
- Folder structures
- Address books
- Calendars/Reminders




Image


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Version 1 Source Service Providers:
~ Yahoo, Hotmail, Excite, Infoseek, Lycos, AOL, MSN
Version 1 Components Overview:
Wnte -~- Wnte - ~. wee-_._~ ~ user -.
Thread Thread Thread i Intertace
_ O r-1 i
Multi Thread
Process
_7 ~ ~ , -. Mgr.
Read ~ Read ~_I Read
Thread ~ Thn:ad ~ Thread Multi Queue __-
Mgr. ri Aff iliate
~l lMgr l
Read/Write Queue Transactions ,'~~~ Affiliate
Request DB ~ DB~ ~ DB
I
Billing
L
L.~... Mgr.
Future Strategy I Vision:
(insert here)
Future Versions Features:
- Contact Managers
- WorkGroup / Collaboration
- Bank/Financial accounts
- Document Storage
- News and Weather Preferences
- Sports Preferences
- Persona Management
Future Versions Source Service Providers:


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~ USA.net, MyEvents.com, eCal.com, Altavista.com, NetCenter.com, When.com,
(Planet Calendar Services, (Planet Web Messaging Services, AnyWho.com (AT8~T),
Egroups.com, & many others...


CA 02305112 2000-04-12
Business Model:
Users are worth money to service providers!
Why?
~ Advertising
Brand awareness
~ Upselling
~ Subscriptions
Our partner's browsing userslpotential customers will be presented with
compelling incentives for
switching from their current services...
Switching Incentives are:
~ Price
Quality of service
~ Features
~ Other
Revenue Streams:
~ User switching transaction fees (from partnerslaffiliates and re-sellers)
Selling aggregate market data on users behaviors
Licensing technology
Evolve... Offer Free version of service (self-portal) with Advertising...


CA 02305112 2000-04-12
ServiceSwitch.Com - Vision Statement
"Creating Liguidity for LifeT'"~~
Sandy Walsh - Jan 27, 2000
A Little History
Stickiness is an over-worked term in the Internet business. Stickiness is the
ability for a web site to draw its
users back to the site time and time again. There are a number of ways to
accomplish this:
~ constantly change the content, and keep it interesting enough for people to
come back
~ provide a simple way for people to enter data into the site, thus producing
a dependency on the site.
Consider a web site that offers some service like email. You can easily create
and receive emails, you can
easily create a list of your friends email addresses. The bigger the list gets
the easier it is to create emails.
The more emails you send, the more you get. The more you email get, the more
you become dependent on
the web service to receive critical information. It quickly snowballs into
something huge.
Now, consider the work you have to go through to switch to another email
service. First, you have to create
the new account. Then you have to start using it ... but all your contacts
still use the old email address.
Even if you email them all and let them know the email address has changed, it
still takes time for this to
sink in. They still send email to the old address. Your friendly address book
is stashed away on some server
that you can't get at, so you have to manually re-enter all your email
addresses. Without doing a surgical
cut from the old service, this switch can take a lifetime. So, the switching
time from Service A to Service B
can take months.
Well, that's email. But consider all the other web services cropping up daily:
~ stock portfolios
~ group calendaring
~ project planning
~ threaded discussion groups
~ document management
All of these services generally create stickiness by drawing you in, but
giving you very little means for
getting out. It's usually a long drawn-out manual process. In short, people
usually stick with one service.
That leaves very little opportunity for the up and coming little guys.
ServiceSwitch.Com intends to fix this by Creating Liguidity for Life!
The Opportunity
ServiceSwitch will create proprietary software to log into a web-based
service, extract the users private and
personal information and, for a fee, move it to another web-based service ...
all in a secure and expedient
manner.
The number of web-based services is growing exponentially. Primarily due to
the wide spread growth of
web software-development tools and the market demand for browser-based
software.
A few notable services include:
~ www.concentric.net
~ www.netopiavo.com
~ MyExcite
~ MyYahoo
MyAOL
~ MyDeja
~ www.321 intranet.com


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~ Twigllmp
Intralink ST
~ Catouzer Synergy
www.hotmail.com
www.anyday.com
www.jump.com
www.desktop.com
www.hotoffice.com
www.visto.com
Netcentral
~ www.instinctive.com
~ Web.Dox
www.when.com
~ www.appoint.net
Some interesting growth figures for web-based service are as follows:
Deja.com 45,000 discussion forums
Zcentral.com Launched in April 1999 ... 10,000 users so far
.comfax 30,000 registered users since June 2, '99
Critical Path 5,000,000 outsourced mailboxes
USA.net 8,000,000 email users
HotMail 12 million registered users as of '98
70,000 new users daily
Excite@Home 20 million registered users as of Jan '99
@Home has 65 million cable installations
HotOffice about 3,000 clients as of April, '99
Sympatico over 500,000 users
The ASP market is growing at exponential rates, which by its nature will force
more and more software
vendors to offer web-only versions of popular software. With this explosion,
it will be more important for
users to have the ability to switch from one service to another ... taking all
of their content-creation efforts
along with them from one site to another.
Thinking Big
Without even knowing it, some very big companies have exposed themselves to
the power of the Internet.
Consider banking institutions ... in a rush to get to the web, they opened
themselves to a weakness. Banks
have excelled due to the high switching costs of moving from one back to
another. Look at an average
customer with a chequing account, a savings account, a line-of credit and a
visa card. They also have
automatic deposit from their work into their chequing account and automatic
withdrawal from the same
account for their mortgage, car and RRSP. They still have to manually pay
their cable, heat, property tax,
cell phone, Internet connection and phone bill.
If that customer desired to switch these accounts from, let's say, CIBC to
Royal Bank, it would take a
considerable amount of work. Hows and hours of analyzing their account
numbers, all the dependant
creditors, account balances, etc. It's really too much for the average person
to bear.
But what if this was automated?
Via the web, CIBC has "PC Banking". You can check your account balances, pay
your bills and review
account transactions.
That's all ServiceSwitch needs!


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By scraping this data from the web, we can extract the following information
about this customer:
~ which accounts they have
~ account balances including credit cards and PLC's
~ which automated deposits are made in each account
~ which bills are registered to the customer, with the 3'd party account
numbers
~ and much more
By establishing a partnership with Royal Bank and getting permission from the
customer, we can generate
all the necessary paperwork required to switch services.
We have to create filled-in forms for:
~ the Royal Bank to create all the required accounts and credit cards (with
enough of an overdraft to
avoid in-sufficient fiends during the switch)
~ the Royal Bank to create all the required pre-registered billing accounts
~ the customers employer to change direct deposit locations
~ the third-party creditors to change automatic withdrawals
How much would this capability be worth to the Customer? To the Royal Bank?
Thinking Big for ServiceSwitch means exploiting holes created by old companies
jumping into the web too
quickly.
Creating Stickiness for ServiceSwitch.Com
We can simply charge a transaction for a user to move from one service to
another and expect reasonable
success. However, as with any successful web site, we need to draw the user
back for multiple transactions.
To successfully switch from one email service to another requires, not only
moving the email addresses,
folders and mailing lists. But also monitoring the old email service for
activity after-the-fact. So, for a
period of time, let's say three months, ServiceSwitch.Com will monitor the old
email site for stray emails.
We can report to the user on the activity levels that these old services are
experiencing.
For example, let's say you use four web-based email systems:
Bill~(~hotmail.com
BbobCa7fyahoo.com
But, you have just moved over to Deja.Com, so your new active account is:
Bill~(yde'ao com
Over the three month period after the switch, you should see a decrease in the
amount of traffic this site
experiences:


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Exam le switch from Hotmail and Yahoo to Deja:
_ r ~_.
v. ., w
By giving a on-going update on how successful the transition has been, the
user has a reason to return to
our site. More importantly, for a fee we can notify the straggler sends
informing them of the new address.
We have to think of creative ways to draw users back to our site after the
initial conversion has occurred.
The Strategy
ServiceSwitch.com is in an interesting position.
First, we need a proof of concept to illustrate the potential of what we have
in mind. We need to show that
it is technically feasible to do.
Secondly, we don't want to publicly show our hand so as not to invite
competition too early. To hit the
widest audience we need to create support for as many different services as
possible.
This is in itself a tricky decision, as many site have considerable depth of
functionality. We can spend our
time become experts on a given site or become moderately knowledgeable on a
wide range of sites. We
need to hit the sweet-spot of functionality across all services, extracting
from them the critical information
that will assist the widest audience. We don't need to spend a lot of time
supporting every little feature of a
service.
Phase One - Proof of Concept
Important questions for a proof of concept include:
~ Which categories of web services will we support?
~ Which web services will we support?
~ What level of support will we provide for each service?
As a first pass, we should look at the majority of web-services currently in
use by the population. This
generally means emai! and stock portfolio management.
Specifically, the web services of interest should be the ones with the largest
user communities. Other
possibilities for this selection would be to select the most technically
challenging. The rationale being, if
we can handle them, we can handle any of them. Since we are interesting in
showing this prototype off, we
should stick to what people can relate to. Therefore we will go after the
widest audience.
Finally, we have to look at email and stock portfolios individually to
determine what level of support we
should offer for each.
Email Services
A typical email service has the following components:
~ address book
~ mailing lists (lists of users, grouped by a particular interest)
~ storage folders (groups of received emails, clustered by a category)
~ each storage folder contains a list of actual emails
An email consists of:
~ the recipient (To:)


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~ the sender (From:)
~ carbon copied recipients (Cc:)
the subject line
~ the send/received date
~ the body of the message
~ attachments
Once read, an email generally has little use to a user. The real value is the
email addresses. Whether they
are in the address book or still living in the actual email itself. When
moving to another service, the user
should have the option of only moving the primary data, the secondary data or
both.
Stock Portfolio Services
Stock portfolio services do not always have to manage your personal actual
stock portfolio ... if you even
have one. Rather many people use web-based portfolio services to monitor
hunches. They generally enter
the stock symbols of interest, the current market value and then keep an eye
on it over time.
A general stock portfolio consists of:
~ the portfolio name (often classified by some category. Le. mining,
technology, biomed, etc.)
Within each portfolio, we generally are interested in:
~ the stock symbol
~ the purchase price
~ the number of shares held
~ the date the stock was purchased (optional)
We do not need the hi-low, buy-sell, market value or any of the other
statistical values, since these are
obtained by the web-service itself.
When the user locates a new portfolio service with more/better features, they
may want to change. For
example, from MyExcite to SmartMoney.com (a real world example ... because I
really want to do this!)
Similar to the email strategy, we simply provide the username and password for
MyExcite, then for
SmartMoney. The system then extracts the above list of available portfolios,
then stores it to its local
database, and ultimately transfers it to its new home.
Limitations with a Proof of Concept
As the name implies, a proof of concept means that it's not-ready-for-prime-
time, but rather shows that
something is technically possible. The realities of the real world often
impose radically different design
considerations than the proof of concept.
The purpose of this proof of concept is to create a demo, not a final product.
Once we waltz the demo under
the noses of enough market-savvy people we can start on creation of a robust,
flexible and scalable
implementation.
This is often called Kleenex Software, because it's like a tissue: Blow and
Throw.
Phase Two - Getting Ready for Market
After the proof of concept, and a "product viability" roadshow, we start on
the full-blown commercial
version. This version must exhibit the following characteristics:
~ Scalable; able to service hundreds of concurrent user sessions
~ Wide market scope; providing support for a full range of existing web
services. Including the ones
listed above


CA 02305112 2000-04-12
~ Sound underlying technology; with a set of base software that allows for
quick driver development. A
driver is a piece of software that support a specific web service. There would
be a separate driver for
each service available ... one for HotMail, one for Excite email, one for
Excite stocks, one for Deja,
etc. Our ability to rapidly develop these drivers is key to our success.
~ Isolating the screen-scraping code; as we move into other verticals and
services, we will quickly need
to change our system to accommodate alternative user interfaces. By having a
flexible, component-
based underlying architecture this can be achieved.
~ Full e-commerce support, including on-line credit card processing and
outbound SSL support to secure
web services likes banking. Security is king in this market.
~ A rapidly configurable web-site; with the ability to quickly change the
daily content on the site.
Making a web site like a newspaper increases repeat usage, which equates to
more transactions for us.
This implies a strong database driven content architecture vs. custom HTML
code.
~ Brand-able; creating an Other Equipment Manufacturer (OEM) version of the
software is also key to
our success. Services like AOL, Yahoo, CIBC will certainly want to offer our
movement services
within their site. To play in their game, we have to be able to change the
look-and-feel of the system to
match theirs.
A Phase One Use Case
Use Cases are used in software development to articulate how an average user
will interact with the system
in a typical fashion. Use Cases are intended to identify the 80% functionality
that most people will use.
Most other interactions and features/functionality are usually variations cm
this base Use Case.
The user comes to the www.ServiceSwitch.Com web site
v The user enters his username and password




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CA 02305112 2000-04-12
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CA 02305112 2000-04-12
Functional Units
User SSL Support ISPs, ASPS
Residencies Cookie Management
Switch Tendencies POST/GET operations
Inference Engine Multi-threaded architecture
High availability
Conflict Resolution
Address Books Portfolio Accounts


Content Purchases Automatic Transactions


Lists/Groups (symbol, amount, when) Bills


Yahoo SmartMoney CIBC


Excite
E-trade TD


HotMail
Ameritrade Royal Bank


Sympatico
CIBC ' Bank of Montreal


Deja TD Greenline Bank' of Nova Scotia




CA 02305112 2000-04-12
Note that each of the following components are proprietary software packages
developed,
maintained, hosted and managed by ServiceSwitch.com
Web Presence: this is the ServiceSwitch.com web-site. This site is not
normally accessed
directly by the client, but rather is referred to by a partner web-site. The
web-site will then
portray the look and feel of the referring web site.
Queuing Engine: The queuing engine is a front-end application to the RDBMS. It
takes business
logic events and translates them into entries in the database schema. The
Scheduling Engine,
Read/Writers and Persona Managers all interact with the Queuing Engine rather
than with the
RDBMS directly. Items such as queue items, logging and billing information all
pass through
this application.
Scheduling Engine: The Scheduling Engine watches for items in the queue and
matches them
with the appropriate Reader/Writer based on the current load of the system,
the priority of the
request, and the "best-match" of the reader/writer to the request. It may be
considered a "dating
service" for switch-reauests.
Core Reader/Writer: Reader/Writers (RW) fetch client data from one service and
move the data
to other services. There are specific RW's for each service the client may
use. The Core RW
takes care of operations common to all RW's regardless of their specialty.
This includes, but is
not limited to, 'Cookie' management, talking with the services web server, and
SSL (Secure
Sockets Layer) certificate negotiations.
Vertical R/W: To build on the Core RW's, there are also RW's that are specific
to a particular
vertical, e.g., Email, Stock Portfolios, Banking, Application Service
Providers (ASP). These
Vertical RW's (VRW's) take the raw HTTP/web communications and translate them
into


CA 02305112 2000-04-12
industry specific business objects. Business entities such as accounts,
portfolios, mailing lists, etc
all reside in the VRW's
Specific VRW: at the most fine-grained level of the system are the Specific
VRW's (SVRW's).
The SVRW's are the exact implementations for dealing with a single web-based
service. Services
such as YahooTM Email, YahooT"~ Stock quotes, CIBCT~~ portfolio manager,
HotmailT~~ email
would all require their own SVRW's.
Persona Manager: As the system extracts more and more information about a
particular client,
this information is accumulated in the Persona Manager. The service traits,
level of support,
feature utilization, etc., of a particular user are stored in this system and
analyzed with an
inference engine.


CA 02305112 2000-04-12
Database Schema
Features Supported Site
Features


Integer ID Integer SiteID Integer SiteID


Integer Feature Integer FeatureType String SiteName
Type


String Desc String URL


Re uest


Audit Integer ID State Change
Table


Integer ReqID DateTime Request Integer ReqID


DateTime When Integer State Integer FromState


Integer EntryType Long FromSite Integer ToState


String Comment String FromUsr DateTime ChangeTime


Integer CurrState String FromPwd String Comment


Long ToSite


String ToUsr ransaction
Data


String ToPwd Integer ReqID


Integer ReadWriteID Integer DataType


DateTime RefreshTime Text XMLData


Integer TransID


Data Tvpes DateTime EntryTime


Integer DataType
String DTD
This is the database schema which is managed by the Queuing Engine. All
operations stem from
the Request Table. Each operation, e.g., extraction, move, or refresh, is
written into this schema.


CA 02305112 2000-04-12
The schema does not depend on the content of the data being moving, that is,
it does not care
whether the data is an email or a stock portfolio. The details of this
information are stored in the
Data_Type and Transaction tables as eXtensible Markup Language (XML)-based
textual
information. The Document/Data(?) Type Definition (DTD) of the vertical
specific data is
updated and versioned in the Data Type table.


CA 02305112 2000-04-12
State Transition Diagrams
To Be Assigned:
New request waiting to be
assigned to an R/W
Read: Read Error:


A Reader has been The read could not proceed.
assigned


to extract data from Retry later.
source


site. Retry Sleep:


Waiting to try again.


Write: Write error:


A Writer has been The Write did not succeed.
assinged to


put data on the atargetRetry later.
site.


Sleep:
The operation was successful.
Check again after appropriate
period.
Refresh: Expired:
Recheck the legacy Source This is a dead request. It wont
sites) for any activity. be looked at again.
A request has a life-cycle. It starts as a new request, ("To Be Assigned"),
for a switch to occur.
Then, behind the scenes, it transitions through the steps of actually
performing the switch,


CA 02305112 2000-04-12
"Read", "Write", and at the end of the session, "Sleep". If an error occurs on
the read ("Read
Error") or write ("Write Error"), it waits for a while ("Retry Sleep") and
retries the operation.
Once the initial switch is performed, the request sleeps for a while until the
system thinks that
something new or interesting may have occurred on the source site.
At this point it lives for a period in "Refresh" state, where it periodically
wakes up and checks
the source site for any renewed activity there. After a spell of refreshes
(about 3-6 months or
suitable inactivity in the account), the request is "Expired" and the job is
done.


CA 02305112 2000-04-12
Primary Sequence Diagram Ready
A sequence diagram is basically a flow-chart without the decision-making
portions. It shows the
relationship between multiple components of a software system in terms of
message flows.
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This first sequence diagram shows a request from a user to move some data from
one service to
another service. The specifics of what type of service it is are irrelevant
since this is handled at
the SVRW level. Whenever we speak of a RW, we are actually talking about an
SVRW.
Remember that we only ever create SVRW's, it just so happens that all SVRW's
share Core RW
code. Similarly, all email related SVRW's share Email-VRW code.
We see the request for a move come in from our "Web-Presence" on the left. The
queuing engine
handles the request and waits for the scheduling engine to find the best-
suited RW to handle it.
Based on the load of the system and the priority of the request (e.g., new
switches are higher
priority than refresh switches), the scheduler will allocate a RW to do the
work. When the
SVRW is finished with its previous chores it asks the queuing engine for the
next item to
process. First the reader portion of the RW extracts the information from the
source web-site and
places the data in the RDBMS via the queuing engine. All the data extracted is
stored in a
specific XML format for the type of data it relates to. There is a single
definition for an email,
just as there is a single definition of a portfolio and bank account. This is
critical in ensuring
consistent data movement across RW'ers.
All the while, the user may carry on with other activities while this work is
being performed.
When the reader is done, it marks the request as "READ DONE" and waits for the
"Scheduler"
to allocate the appropriate writer to finish the job.


CA 02305112 2000-04-12
grimar-y Sequence Diagram (Write)
Continuing on from the read, once the write is finished, the user is notified
and the billing
information is updated.
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CA 02305112 2000-04-12
Primary Sequence Diagram Update
Periodically, e.g., daily, weekly or monthly, the (old) source account (Legacy
Site) is reviewed
for activity.
While particular embodiments of the present invention have been shown and
described, it is
clear that changes and modifications may be made to such embodiments without
departing from
the true scope and spirit of the invention.
The method steps of the invention may be embodiment in sets of executable
machine code
stored in a variety of formats such as object code or source code. Such code
is described
generically herein as programming code, or a computer program for
simplification. Clearly, the
executable machine code may be integrated with the code of other programs,
implemented as
subroutines, by external program calls or by other techniques as known in the
art.
The embodiments of the invention may be executed by a computer processor or
similar
device programmed in the manner of method steps, or may be executed by an
electronic system
which is provided with means for executing these steps. Similarly, an
electronic memory
medium such computer diskettes, CD-Roms, Random Access Memory (RAM), Read Only
Memory (ROM) or similar computer software storage media known in the art, may
be
programmed to execute such method steps. As well, electronic signals
representing these
method steps may also be transmitted via a communication network.
The invention could, for example, be applied to computers, smart terminals,
personal digital
assistants, Internet or two-way pagers, satellite telephones, Internet-ready
telephones or other
Internet, television or telephony appliances. Again, such implementations
would be clear to one
skilled in the art, and do not take away from the invention.
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