Embeddable UI Snippets for Seamless Cloud Service Integration
Find Innovative SolutionsGenerate Solutions
Solution Overview
Problem
Current methods for building user interfaces, such as using individual REST APIs or embedding entire applications with iFrames, are inefficient and require users to log into multiple applications separately, making it difficult to integrate user interfaces with cloud services like Process Cloud Services (PCS) seamlessly.
Innovation Solution
The implementation of embeddable UI snippets that encapsulate functionality and communicate with REST APIs, allowing these snippets to be embedded into consuming applications without requiring users to log into the producing application, providing a consistent appearance and interaction while enabling two-way communication with REST services.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Adaptability or versatility
If individual REST APIs are used to build user interfaces, then flexibility and customization are improved, but integration complexity and development time increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments the user interface into reusable snippet components that can be independently developed and integrated. Each snippet encapsulates specific UI functionality (forms, tables, charts) that communicates with REST APIs, allowing selective integration without requiring complete UI reconstruction.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent introduces an intermediary layer (the snippet embedding mechanism with JavaScript library) that mediates between the producing application's REST APIs and the consuming application's UI. This intermediary handles the complexity of API communication while presenting simplified UI components to developers.
2Productivity
If entire applications are embedded using iFrame, then integration speed is improved, but user experience and interaction consistency deteriorate
Solution Approach 1:
The patent extracts only the necessary UI snippets from the producing application rather than embedding the entire application. This allows selective integration of specific components (forms, tables, charts) while maintaining the consuming application's overall context and interaction patterns.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent applies local quality by allowing different UI snippets to have different levels of integration and customization within the same consuming application. Each snippet can be configured independently with appropriate styling and behavior while maintaining consistency with the host application's design system.
3Reliability
If multiple applications are logged into separately, then security and access control are improved, but user convenience and operational efficiency decrease
Solution Approach 1:
The patent merges the UI functionality of the producing application into the consuming application through snippet embedding. Users interact with a single application (the consuming application) while accessing functionality that originally required separate login to the producing application, thereby improving convenience while maintaining security through the snippet's authenticated API communication.
Data Source
AI summary
A user interface of a producing application is accessed. The producing application includes embeddable snippets that each include encapsulated code that provides the functionality of one or more user interface component. Each of the components is for displaying at least a portion of the user interface with user data of the producing application obtained from a server computer and wherein the snippets communicate with Representational State Transfer (REST) application programming interfaces (APIs) of the producing application. At least a portion of a javascript library that includes the embeddable snippet is received. An embedded snippet is created in a user interface of a consuming application by embedding a particular snippet selected from the embeddable snippets into the user interface of the consuming application. The embedded snippet provides a user with the same appearance and interactions as the embeddable snippet without the user logging into the producing application.