Collaborative Spreadsheet Copy-Paste Conflict Transforms
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Solution Overview
Problem
Collaborative spreadsheets face inefficiencies and high network traffic due to conflicting copy-paste operations, particularly when multiple users edit the same portion, leading to ambiguity and excessive data transfer.
Innovation Solution
Implement operational transforms on copy-paste operations using collaboration logic, where devices and servers minimize data transfer by sending only copy-paste instructions, adjusting cell ranges to resolve conflicts, and applying consistent transforms across all devices.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If each device transmits the data resulting from each edit over the network to resolve conflicts, then conflict resolution is achieved, but network traffic increases excessively
Solution Approach 1:
The patent extracts only the essential conflict information (edit type, cell range, revision number) from the full spreadsheet data and transmits this minimal set of data over the network. This allows conflict detection and resolution without transmitting the entire spreadsheet dataset, thereby resolving conflicts while minimizing network traffic.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent creates and transmits simplified copies of edit operations (change records) rather than the actual spreadsheet data. Each change record contains only the necessary information to identify and resolve conflicts (operation type, affected cells, revision number), enabling conflict resolution through data copying rather than full data transmission.
2Stability of the object's composition
If all devices receive and process complete edit data to ensure synchronization, then data consistency is maintained, but processing overhead and network traffic increase
Solution Approach 1:
The system extracts only the critical elements needed for consistency (change type, cell references, revision number) and transmits these extracted elements across the network. This extraction approach maintains data consistency through minimal data transfer, avoiding the need to transmit complete spreadsheet datasets while still ensuring all devices can synchronize their state.
3Reliability
If devices transmit complete spreadsheet data for every edit operation, then data integrity is ensured, but network bandwidth is excessively consumed
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements a copying mechanism where only essential change information is replicated and transmitted across devices. Each device maintains a local copy of the spreadsheet and receives only the differential change records (containing edit type, cell range, revision number) from other devices. This copying approach ensures data integrity through centralized revision control while minimizing network data transfer volume.
Data Source
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AI summary
Systems and methods are disclosed herein for editing a collaborative spreadsheet hosted on a server. Multiple users may edit the spreadsheet, resulting in situations of intersecting or conflicting edits. A change provided by one user may intersect the cells affected by a change provided by another user. In these cases, one user's change is transformed against the other user's change. In this manner, the conflict is resolved and both changes can be applied to the spreadsheet. Each user device may perform these transforms, and the server may also perform these transforms. This can result in transmission of a reduced volume of data over a network between the devices and the server, in comparison with other methods.