562 results about "Job management" patented technology

A system and method for managing the workflow for processing Service Orders among a variety of organizations within a telecommunications company. The system and method coordinates all of the tasks and activities related to order processing among the various entities within the telecommunications company. Workflows are used to model business procedures used for processing Service Orders. Each workflow comprises a plurality of workflow steps. Business process models are depicted as workflow diagrams. Upon receipt of a Service Order, an appropriate Work Plan is selected based on information within the Service Order. Each workflow step is assigned a Resource and is scheduled for completion. The Workflow steps are then placed in In-boxes associated with the selected Resource. Once the processing steps have been scheduled, a current work step is calculated. Notification messages are sent to the appropriate systems to notify them to begin activity associated with the current work step. The system is automatically notified when the current work step is complete, so that the next work step can be processed in a similar fashion. Detailed statistical information is maintained for audit and reporting purposes. Users log-on to remote workstations coupled with a company-wide Intranet or the like. From the remote workstations, users from various organizations view their In-boxes and other detailed information about Service Orders according to selectable requests. Workflow steps can be transferred and re-assigned using the remote workstations. Detailed statistical information is maintained for audit and reporting purposes. Reports reflecting the effectiveness of workforce management and work administration is obtained.

The Job Management System (JMS) of the present invention processes job requests in an automated physical environment, such as a factory, hospital, order processing facility or office building, wherein the job requests are handled by a fleet of autonomously-navigating mobile robots. The JMS includes a map defining a floor plan, a set of virtual job locations and a set of one or more virtual job operations associated with virtual job locations. The JMS automatically determines the actual locations and actual job operations for the job requests, and intelligently selects a suitable mobile robot to handle each job request based on the current status and / or the current configuration for the selected mobile robot. The JMS also sends commands to the selected mobile robot to cause the mobile robot to automatically drive the actual job location, to automatically perform the actual job operations, or both.

An online work management system provides a marketplace for multiple job owner and workers. The job owners provide a job description that defines task. The job description may be processed to generate task descriptions that may be published for workers' application. The task descriptions specify the qualification or restrictions for workers to have the task assigned. The online work management system also provides various functions supporting coordination and management of task assignment such as determining the trust level of the user's identity, search the tasks or workers, monitoring the progress of job, managing payment to workers, training and testing the workers, evaluating the review by the job owners, and generation of surveys.

A ticket approval system and method of performing quality control in a field service application. The method includes obtaining a ticket, performing at least one task associated with the ticket, collecting data associated with at least one task, and transmitting the data to a work management server including database and approval applications. Also provided is a method of reviewing the data received by the approval application for quality control purposes.

Employees gain access to a payroll and work management system by authentication at a multi-purpose terminal with a bankcard encoded with a unique account number and a personal identification number (PIN). The terminal may then be used to check-in and checkout of work, to receive new work instructions or assignments, to review payroll details, to print a payroll stub, to execute financial transactions, to print a receipt of financial transactions or to review or to upload the results of work quality audits. The invention also includes systems and methods that utilize such multi-purpose terminals to calculate the payroll and deductions for each employee and to issue electronic fund transfers from the employer's bank account to deposit the net pay in a bank account associated with each employee's bankcard so that the pay is immediately accessible by each employee, such as by withdrawal of cash at an ATM or by purchases at a point of sale. Electronic payrolls may be processed and employee's accounts credited with pay on a daily basis, or on any preset period of time, including hourly.

A computer implemented system and method that ties in complex calendar event relationships, which provides the user with a context as to how the task needs to be completed and how it relates to larger initiatives. The system and method supports next to real time notification methods using a peer-to-peer (p2p) messaging architecture. As Calendar Events or Tasks are manipulated in the Work Management System, all scheduling clients can automatically adjust their events to reflect the changes. The present invention can also implement an Urgency Factor for tasks which can help visualize to the user which tasks need more immediate action from Work Management. The present invention can also provide a First Available function that not only finds the first available date that a task can be worked but also takes into consideration the resource's work hours, workdays and skill set via the work group that they have been assigned.

An online work management system provides a marketplace for multiple job owner and workers. The job owners provide a job description that defines task. The job description may be processed to generate task descriptions that may be published for workers' application. The task descriptions specify the qualification or restrictions for workers to have the task assigned. The online work management system also provides various functions supporting coordination and management of task assignment such as determining the trust level of the user's identity, search the tasks or workers, monitoring the progress of job, managing payment to workers, training and testing the workers, evaluating the review by the job owners, and generation of surveys.

A system and method for tracking and processing Service Orders for a telecommunications company. Workflows are used to model business procedures used for processing Service Orders. Each Workflow comprises a plurality of Workflow steps. Business process models are depicted as Workflow diagrams. The Workflow diagrams are stored in a library in a database. Work plans comprising a plurality of Workflow steps and associated data and are derived from information found in the Workflow diagrams. Upon receipt of a Service Order, an appropriate work plan is selected based on information within the Service Order. Each Workflow step is assigned a resource and is scheduled for completion with a start and a stop date and placed in the in-boxes associated with the selected resource. Users log-on to remote workstations coupled with a company-wide Intranet or the like. From the remote workstations, users from various organizations view their in-boxes and other information about current Service Orders. Such information includes detailed information about the Service Orders including, progress data, current, future and past Workflow step data, responsible groups, computer systems and organizations, whether schedules are maintained, and whether jeopardy points have been missed. If a Service Order is delayed, users can immediately determine information about the delay and take corrective action before it becomes critical. Workflow steps can be transferred and re-assigned using the remote workstations. Detailed statistical information is maintained for audit and reporting purposes. Reports reflecting the effectiveness of workforce management and work administration is obtained.

A failure recovery framework to be used in cooperative data stream processing is provided that can be used in a large-scale stream data analysis environment. Failure recovery supports a plurality of independent distributed sites, each having its own local administration and goals. The distributed sites cooperate in an inter-site back-up mechanism to provide for system recovery from a variety of failures within the system. Failure recovery is both automatic and timely through cooperation among sites. Back-up sites associated with a given primary site are identified. These sites are used to identify failures within the primary site including failures of applications running on the nodes of the primary site. The failed applications are reinstated on one or more nodes within the back-up sites using job management instances local to the back-up sites in combination with previously stored state information and data values for the failed applications. In additions to inter-site mechanisms, each one of the plurality of sites employs an intra-site back-up mechanism to handle failure recoveries within the site.

Methods and apparatus for service-level based and / or skills-based assignment of a work item to one (or more) of a plurality of resources based on fitness, for example, of skills required by the former to those provided by the latter. Assignment takes into account the level of stress on the work item and / or resources, such that the number of resources fit for assignment varies as the level of stress varies. Systems according to the invention can be used, by way of example, to route a call or other request made by a customer to a service center. The requirements for processing the call (determined, for example, by an incoming call operator) are matched against the skill sets of available customer service agents, taking call and / or resource stress levels into account. For example, some implementations may match an incoming call having a low stress factor (e.g., a newly received call from a standard customer) to a smaller pool of agents with both required and desired skills, while assigning a call with a higher stress factor to a larger pool of agents with at least required skills. Other embodiments may match an incoming call having a low stress factor to the larger pool of agents having at least the required skills, while assigning a call with a higher stress factor (e.g., a call from a priority customer) to an agent from the smaller pool of agents who have both required and desired skills.

In a job management device: a request reception unit stores job-input information in a storage device on receipt of a job-execution request; and an execution instruction unit sends to one or more job-assigned calculation nodes a job-execution instruction together with execution-resource information, and stores job-assignment information in the storage device in association with a job identifier. When the contents of the job database are lost by a restart of the job management device, a reconstruction unit collects the job-input information and the job-assignment information from the storage device, collects the execution-resource information from the one or more job-assigned calculation nodes, and reconstructs the job information in the job database.

A job management apparatus for use in a batch job execution system is provided. The job management apparatus includes a client communications part which receives a batch job from a client, an extracting part which extracts a task from the batch job, and an assigning part which receives signals from the service providers and delegates a task to a service provider who is capable of performing such task. The job management apparatus is in communication with a job database which stores the batch job after it is received from the client. At least one provider manager is in communication with the job management apparatus and in communication with the service providers which monitors the tasks as they are being performed on a service provider and provides status information about the task to the job management apparatus. The service providers are configured to output signals to the job management apparatus requesting work.

An image forming job management apparatus includes a virtual job assignment unit, a real job assignment unit, and a schedule managing unit. The virtual job assignment unit assigns an image forming job for forming images to a plurality of image forming apparatuses. The real job assignment unit assigns an image forming job for forming images to a single image forming apparatus. The schedule managing unit manages image forming jobs according to a schedule. The schedule is generated by assigning each of the image forming jobs to at least one image forming apparatus using either the virtual job assignment unit or the real job assignment unit.

An efficient and effective method for managing a plurality of print jobs is implemented on a print job management apparatus. The method includes receiving a plurality of print jobs, prescribing grouping criteria, grouping the plurality of print jobs into one or more of groups in accordance with the grouping criteria, the grouping being performed without user intervention, and transmitting a result of the grouping.

The invention is an integrated software system that provides one set of books for work management, accounting and regulatory reporting functions. The account structure of the general ledger is shared across the various entities (or departments) of the utility such that they all record the same information about activities, transactions and balances, thus sharing the same ledger structure comprised of a very limited number of segments, generally five to seven. The segments form an account flexfield. Certain segments of the account flexfield, if not supplied, may be derived from the other segments. The system is based on commercially available database software and allows for single ledger entries that are integrated throughout the accounting and reporting system of the utility. Account flexfields are entered into the system at a certain level of detail, such as, for example, activity, work order, natural account and regulatory account levels and may be summarized at a level of detail other than the one entered. The system provides reports in either an accounting format (financial and managerial) or in the form required by regulatory bodies without having to re-enter or reconcile data or keep separate sets of books.

Provided is a method used in a computer system which includes at least one host computer, the method including managing a job to be executed by the host computer and a power supply of the host computer, the method including the procedures of: receiving the job; storing the received job; scheduling an execution plan for the stored job; determining, based on the execution plan of the job, a timing to execute power control of the host computer; determining a host computer to execute the power control when the determined timing to execute the power control is reached; controlling the power supply of the determined host computer; and executing the scheduled job.

In the preferred embodiment, the operational process management methodologies are used to orchestrate the individual activities and project management methodologies are used to manage the schedule, cost, resources and other task attributes of that activity. The system is implemented such that we can fully leverage all standard project management features and operation management features available in existing tools while enabling us manage activities using both the methodologies. This enables managers to fully leverage both process management and project management functionality simultaneously without having to choose one or the other. Using a process increases the quality and consistent of the end result as the same process is repeated consistently. In the preferred embodiment, operational process management methods helps coordinate and monitor the individual activities more effectively and project management methods enable us to manage various activities in an organization in one or more projects which in turn helps better manage the schedule, cost and resources of the individual activities.

A client side physical computer into which the job is loaded issues a job execution request to a server side physical computer. The job execution request is accompanied by job execution statements and environment information. A management and control module on the server side starts an OS for a logical computer and exercises control to assign a server side volume corresponding to a client side volume and transfer the data on the client side volume to the server side volume. A server side job management module for the logical computer converts the original job execution statements and environment information to match the computer environment for the logical computer, and executes the requested job.

A work request is processed and interpreted to automatically establish job data structures associated with jobs constituent to the work and data storage structures associated with tasks constituent to the work. Further, parent-child relationships between jobs, sub-jobs and tasks are automatically established based on interpreting the work request. Once tasks are executed, log information related thereto is stored in respective data storage structures, for access and rendering upon request. Each data storage structure stores log information pertaining only to a respective task. In an embodiment, in response to receiving a request to delete a particular job, the particular job and all of its progeny sub-jobs and tasks are deleted. The work request does not include explicit commands to establish the job data and data storage structures, nor to store the log information in the data storage structures. Generally, structured work requests based on a job request language and interpreted by work management application layer provide the foregoing functionality. In embodiments, a representation of a job data structure and its constituent sub-job and / or data storage structures are rendered, along with linking mechanisms between various levels of the overall work aggregation hierarchy that is implied in an associated work request. The links can be used to traverse the hierarchy to easily access and view log information stored in data storage structures.

A failure recovery framework to be used in cooperative data stream processing is provided that can be used in a large-scale stream data analysis environment. Failure recovery supports a plurality of independent distributed sites, each having its own local administration and goals. The distributed sites cooperate in an inter-site back-up mechanism to provide for system recovery from a variety of failures within the system. Failure recovery is both automatic and timely through cooperation among sites. Back-up sites associated with a given primary site are identified. These sites are used to identify failures within the primary site including failures of applications running on the nodes of the primary site. The failed applications are reinstated on one or more nodes within the back-up sites using job management instances local to the back-up sites in combination with previously stored state information and data values for the failed applications. In additions to inter-site mechanisms, each one of the plurality of sites employs an intra-site back-up mechanism to handle failure recoveries within the site.

A time and attendance biometric terminal communicates with a payroll system via general packet radio service (GPRS) protocol. The biometric terminal may be remotely activated and set up by entry of its serial number and an internal activation token, which are both supplied after payment information is first entered and verified. Payroll stubs may be printed at a facsimile machine or at a remote printer by the steps of identifying a person, communicating with a payroll database to obtain payroll information for the identified person, communicating the payroll information for the identified person to the remote printer, and printing the obtained payroll information at the facsimile machine or at the remote printer as a payroll stub.

The invention provides a cluster job scheduling system with an elastic framework. The job scheduling system adopts a B / S structure, and a client can conveniently submit and manage jobs through a web browser to provide a single system image for multi-cluster job management. The system structure comprises a scheduler management module, a resource management module, a job management module, an application management module and a strategy management module, wherein the scheduler management module can construct different schedulers between clusters and inside the clusters; the schedulers can select and use different scheduling strategies; and the job management module obtains corresponding application configuration and application running commands from the application management module according to the application attributes of jobs. When the job is submitted, a job running script is automatically generated to provide a flexible scheduling mechanism for job scheduling, thereby facilitating users.

The present invention describes a computer-implemented system and method for creating and managing a task list for multiple franchise locations in an online work management system accessible to users. In some embodiments of the invention, users create multiple baselines with multiple tasks based on location attributes than can be combined into a unique, dynamic master task list for a particular location. Embodiments of the invention allow tasks to be associated with a timeline of franchise preparation, a subset of tasks to be selected based on keyword or filtering by various attributes, adding additional tasks to a particular franchise master list based on various attributes, adding tasks to multiple locations at the same time dynamically based on various attributes, restricting task list access based on user community or group, altering user access and tasks dynamically based on changing baseline characteristics, and providing a master task list dynamically on a user interface.

A work management data collection system 1 is provided with a data collection mechanism in a tool 2, and by counting a number of times a work operation has been executed or the like, obtains a work data identifying the work task that has been executed and detects a time data required for the work task. The system is provided with an RFID tag 3a on an ID card 3 held by a worker, and by writing data into the ID card 3 of the worker who carried out the work task, using an RFID reader / writer 4 provided on the tool 2, the system obtains data necessary for the work management from the ID card 3 of the worker.

A printer controller receives firmware attached to e-mail from a mail server, downloads the firmware to an internal hard disk drive, and registers the job at the bottom of a job registration table. On subsequently receiving a print job or a scan job, the printer controller registers the job in the job management table, judges whether a firmware rewriting job is registered in the job management table, and if so, moves the print job or the scan job to be before the firmware rewriting job in the job management table. In this way, firmware rewriting jobs are always executed after print jobs, meaning that processing of print jobs is not delayed.

A method for managing a plurality of pint jobs is implemented in a print job management apparatus connected to printers. The method includes receiving print job, and visually presenting a display screen to a user, the display screen including first, second and third panels for classifying the received print jobs according to processing phase thereof, the first panel being provided for listing print jobs that are awaiting assignment of printers thereto for processing the print jobs, the second panel being provided for listing print jobs that have been assigned to printers and that have not been completed by the assigned printers, the third panel being provided for listing at least one of first and second categories of print jobs, the first category including print jobs that have been completed, the second category including print jobs that have been cancelled.