Appliance development toolkit

Abstract

An appliance development toolkit ( 10 ) has a system configurator ( 28 ) to create content ( 20 ) that affects the operation of and user interaction with an appliance ( 12 ). For example, an editor ( 30, 32 ) creates instances ( 42 ) and associations by which the appliance ( 12 ) can create a dynamic user interface ( 64 ) at runtime.

1 . An appliance development toolkit to enable creation of content to affect operation of a component in a communicating appliance or to affect user interaction with an appliance, the toolkit comprising:
 a system configurator having an editor to create the content including at least one of appliance user domain data and control system domain data, and a viewer,   a communication driver to establish a link between the system configurator and at least one control board in an appliance or simulation thereof,   software configured to command operation of the at least one control board in the appliance or simulation thereof and to generate data in the viewer based on the operation, and   one of an appliance simulator and an appliance wherein a user can observe the data in the viewer and create or modify the content using the editor in response to communication over the link.   
     
     
         2 . The appliance development toolkit of  claim 1  further comprising a smart coupler in the link. 
     
     
         3 . The appliance development toolkit of  claim 1  wherein the viewer has a command window where a user can define and initiate a command for operation of the at least one control board. 
     
     
         4 . The appliance development toolkit of  claim 1  further comprising a sequence model useable by the editor to create the content including instances of cycle data for the appliance. 
     
     
         5 . The appliance development toolkit of  claim 3  further comprising a sequence model useable by the editor to create the content including instances of cycle definitions for the appliance wherein a user can use the command window to establish a portion of the cycle data by observing one of the data in the viewer and the appliance contemporaneously with initiating the command and use the editor to include the portion in the content. 
     
     
         6 . The appliance development toolkit of  claim 5  wherein the content includes at least one of a cycle definition, a cycle structure, information about a cycle structure, a paired element, source identification information, a message data payload structure, and information about a consumable. 
     
     
         7 . The appliance development toolkit of  claim 6  further comprising access to a datastore and credentials for writing information into the datastore wherein the content can be stored in the datastore for later retrieval for use with the appliance. 
     
     
         8 . The appliance development toolkit of  claim 7  wherein the datastore is a consumable information holder. 
     
     
         9 . The appliance development toolkit of  claim 3  wherein the viewer includes a data analyzer configured to display the useable data from the communication link with non-usable data describing the useable data wherein a user can understand the meaning of the useable data. 
     
     
         10 . The appliance development toolkit  claim 9  wherein the data analyzer is configured to accept other content including a portion of the useable data and a portion of the non-useable data associated with the portion of the useable data wherein the association enables the display without specific coding of the data analyzer with respect to the useable data. 
     
     
         11 . An appliance development toolkit to enable creation of content for use with and to enable a dynamic user interface of an appliance, the toolkit comprising:
 access to a plurality of user interface control definitions,   access to renderable assets or identifiers thereof,   an editor configured to create at least one instance derived from the plurality of user interface control definitions, to associate at least one renderable asset or identifier thereof with the at least one user interface control definition instance, to create at least one locator object having addressing information for locating the renderable asset at runtime, and to associate the at least one renderable asset or identifier thereof to the at least one locator object,   a graphical user interface-  03 -: a for viewing and using the editor wherein information is derived from the creating and the associating, and   at least one converter for generating a builder file from at least a portion of the information, wherein the builder file can be exported to an appliance to enable the appliance to create a dynamic user interface at runtime.   
     
     
         12 . The appliance development toolkit of  claim 11  wherein the at least one locator object is of the form of one of a URI, URN, URL, UUID, arbitrary alpha-numeric identifier, and a unique addressing path. 
     
     
         13 . The appliance development toolkit of  claim 11  wherein the at least one locator object comprises addressing information. 
     
     
         14 . The appliance development toolkit of  claim 13  wherein the addressing information is in the form of one of a URI, URN, URL, UUID, arbitrary alpha-numeric identifier, and a unique addressing path. 
     
     
         15 . The appliance development toolkit of  claim 11  wherein the converter is configured to export the builder file in the form of at least one of xml, html, relational database, text, and a binary file. 
     
     
         16 . The appliance development toolkit of  claim 15  wherein the converter is a simple converter. 
     
     
         17 . The appliance development toolkit of  claim 11  wherein the editor is configured to create at least one renderable asset where it forms part of the information.