DE19635351A1 - Data conversion procedures - Google Patents

Abstract

The invention concerns a method of converting data between two applications or software packages which use different data formats. A fundamental problem in data-processing today is the combination and exchange of source data from different software packages. Intelligent conversion software predominantly uses data structures of data bases and data-processing equipment. Proceeding from a first recognition of a rough structure, the file form is pre-classified in conversion tools. The conversion software provides an algorithm set by means of which the fine structure is automatically recognized and converted. The analysis of model files of applications A and B is continued as far as the substructure level, the source data finally being converted by means of the analysis into the target data which are imported by application B.

Description

The invention relates to a method for converting data between two applications or software packages that use different data formats, according to the generic term of claim 1.

The invention is the fundamental problem of incompatibility lity of data from different applications or software pa keten under. Many programs have their own data form mat for the internal processing of the data. But this is only rarely readable by other programs for further processing. The user faces the problem of any data from users to transport manure A to application B, with him generally mean the data formats of applications A and B are not known are. The data to be transported is mostly databases, but it can also be used in the broadest sense data, such as text files, CAD data, Sound formats, spreadsheets and others.

To implement the data transfer described above modern and flexible programs offer the possibility Read data in the most common formats and in their own Format to process further. To exchange between ver different applications, for example from other Be drive systems is possible with some software packages an import and export function in ASCII format or another common format provided.  

In addition, there are many utilities that convert data Allow changes from format A to format B. This have a fixed conversion algorithm imple mented which corresponds to the respective application. The An wender can now choose between which data formats A and B the program should perform a conversion. This auxiliary programs can partially determine the type of file or the type of Application A automatically based on simple specific notes paint with the file form, such as the file form and fe most infostructures and version IDs within the file, detect.

A special procedure for data conversion is already out known from DE 41 28 940 A1. With the help of this procedure prepared digital data one with a text and / or Graphics software on the screen of a data processing system created document in facsimile-specific transmission data converted. This procedure replaces the cumbersome, time elaborate and error-prone method, one on the screen Data processing system created document on one at the Data processing system to print connected printer and then the document printed on paper by a to scan the optoelectronic unit of a facsimile device. The scan data of the optoelectronic unit are then fak coded and transmitted simile-specific.

Both the conversion pro programs as well as the independent auxiliary programs for data con Both have the disadvantage that only a limited number Selection of data formats is made available with the program's fixed algorithms can be converted nen. As a rule, these conversions do not take into account the element contents and their links, such as Character content and length, linguistic aspects, existence rules, element transformations, language space, element patterns and ele interpretation of the ment. Also, most of the data formats  not very well standardized, and bring many applications their own data structures. The data elements are for The source application is optimized and can be used in the target application Processing errors cause time-consuming work need to be corrected by hand or even a white make processing of the data impossible.

It is an object of the invention to provide the user with a method for To provide data conversion that is flexible Data adjustment from different application programs with allows relatively simple means.

This object is achieved by the features of Pa claim 1 solved.

Inventive developments and refinements of the invention are described in the subclaims.

The conversion software according to the invention is in the Location, data of any format A in data of any to transfer formats B semi and fully automatically, in principle, no limitation regarding the possible Data formats occur. Since the data formats A and B from the he conversion software according to the invention via the rough structure of the data both semi and fully automatically in their Fine structure to be analyzed is the possible error rate when transferring data from application A to application B clearly less than with the usual aid programs. In addition are Data changes and data adjustments at various levels, for example in the file, record, element level and others, provided to reduce the error rate in the target application gladly.

The structure of the method for data conversion according to the invention tion is shown in the drawing and below purifies. In it show:  

1 shows the information flow diagram of the method for data transfer;

Fig. 2 is a diagram for analyzing the structure of the process with detailed structural assembly;

Fig. 3 shows the course of the synthesis procedure for Bil dung of the data B from the data A;

FIG. 4 shows the information flow diagram according to FIG. 1 in a more detailed representation.

Fig. 1 shows in the form of an information flow diagram the procedure of a data transfer by the method of the invention or the conversion software (1) according to the invention. A user would like to transport any source data Q ( 2 ), which are generated and exported by application A ( 3 ), to application B ( 4 ) in order to process them there. Each of the applications A ( 3 ) and B ( 4 ) can import and export their data in a format that they can understand; this is implemented in applications ( 3 ) and ( 4 ) to exchange data between applications of the same type in different workplaces.

The user can now generate a sample export of, for example, approximately 500 data records from the database of application A ( 3 ) and that of application B ( 4 ). This creates template file VA ( 5 ) from application A ( 3 ) and template file VB ( 6 ) from application B ( 4 ). A prerequisite for the functioning of the data conversion method is that application B ( 4 ) can import its own exported template file VB ( 6 ), which it has produced and exported, which should of course work. Now the template files VA ( 5 ) and VB ( 6 ) can be analyzed ( 7 ) using the conversion software ( 1 ).

In principle, it would also be possible to exchange data directly from application A ( 3 ) to application B ( 4 ) without going through the file (for example OLE, DDE and others). This saves the detour through the files, while the analysis and linking processes remain effective, of course.

Since the user generally does not know anything about the structure of the data structures and the data structures of applications A ( 3 ) and B ( 4 ), and does not want to know anything about them, complex algorithms are required for the analysis in order to avoid the user from Relieve decisions and automate the analysis and linking process ( 8 ) or at least partially automate. The implemented algorithms can be easily expanded to be able to analyze new, future data structures. The scope of the analysis ( 8 ) of the structures is explained in more detail below with reference to FIG. 2. After the analysis and linking process ( 8 ), the conversion software ( 1 ) knows the data structure of the template files VA ( 5 ) and VB ( 6 ) and also the necessary links between the elements of the template files VA ( 5 ) and VB ( 6 ). This conversion pattern for the transfer of the data from application A ( 3 ) to application B ( 4 ) is stored as a pattern process file M.

If the user wants to carry out further data transfers between the same applications A ( 3 ) and B ( 4 ) as explained above at a later point in time, it is possible to save the conversion pattern just determined in the form of pattern sequence data M ( 9 ) ( 10 ). Thus, the user does not need to generate template files VA ( 5 ) and VB ( 6 ) in the next conversion process, and the conversion software ( 1 ) can directly access the saved sample sequence data M ( 9 ) and the sample sequence data during data transfer without analysis process ( 8 ) Read M ( 9 ) again ( 10 ).

As shown in particular in FIG. 4 in addition to FIG. 1, the analysis phase of both the template file VA ( 5 ) and the template file VB ( 6 ) is subdivided into a rough analysis, a subsequent fine analysis, a further subsequent sub-analysis and so on to finally arrive at the final analysis. The analysis phase is then followed by the linking phase, in which the analyzes of the template files are linked.

In the synthesis phase ( 11 ), a conversion of the source data Q ( 2 ) into the target data Z ( 12 ) is achieved with the aid of the determined analysis and linking result. In the last step, application B ( 4 ) can import the target data Z ( 12 ), since they are in the data format that can be imported and exported by application B ( 4 ), and process them further.

With this method according to the invention for data conversion, it is also possible for the user to make data changes by using special rules defined by the user in the synthesis ( 11 ) of the source data Q ( 2 ) into the target data Z ( 12 ). As examples, and by no means fully listed, here are just the replacement of ä, ö, ü by ae, oe, ue and the transformation of the elements [Dear] and [Mr. xyz] into the elements [Dear Mr.] and [ xyz] called. Of course there are also very complex data changes possible, which can best be compared with the term "morphing" from image processing, which describes the change from pattern A to pattern B without loss of information.

As shown in FIG. 1, the source file ( 28 ) to be exported from application A ( 3 ) is placed in the source analysis ( 29 ). After he has carried out an analysis for automatic rule formation and links in block ( 8 ), the target analysis ( 11 ) is created. The converted data are then placed in the importable target file ( 30 ). In the process of exporting the source file ( 28 ) into the target file ( 11 ) by means of the pattern flow data M, a source or target analysis is no longer necessary. The rule formation and the links were already generated in this case with the template files VA ( 5 ) and VB ( 6 ). In the synthesis, the source file Q ( 2 ) is read and processed with the data filter from the sample sequence data M. The data records generated are written to the target file. The data filter can use external files for comparison as well as internal files for searching and sorting.

In Fig. 2 a diagram is shown, which construction the structure is a general data transfer file in detailed form. The analysis ( 8 ) of the template files VA ( 5 ) and VB ( 6 ) is divided into several phases. On the basis of the first knowledge of the rough structure ( 13 ), the file form is first pre-classified, as in the case of conversion programs known to date. The intelligent conversion software now also provides a set of algorithms that are able to automatically recognize the fine structure ( 14 ) of the data at hand. The analysis ( 8 ) is continued in order to recognize the substructures ( 15 ) within the data elements ( 17 ).

As can also be seen clearly from FIG. 3, the rough structure ( 13 ) serves to recognize the file structure, the separators, the element identifiers, the character length, etc. in the file space and in the sentence space ( 16 ). In the rough structure ( 13 ) files are differentiated according to their file form. The differences can be recognized, for example, from file extensions or information structures within the entire file.

The fine structure ( 14 ) serves to recognize element existence, element character contents, element character length etc. such as element dream ( 19 ) and drawing space ( 20 ). The fine structure ( 14 ) relates to the sentence level, which contains the structure of a single data record in the so-called sentence space ( 16 ) from the elements ( 17 ), as well as the links between the sentence elements ( 17 ), the so-called sentence control space ( 18 ). When finding characteristics for the data record structure and the data record structure, field names in a data record ( 16 ) are analyzed, the use of special separators for elements ( 17 ) and data records ( 16 ), the use of start and stop symbols for structuring within the elements ( 17 ) and the number of elements ( 17 ) per record ( 16 ) determined.

The substructure ( 15 ) serves to recognize words and sub-elements with sub-separators in the individual elements, such as element dream ( 19 ), drawing space, word space. The substructure is thus broken down again into the element level, the element space ( 19 ), and the drawing level, the drawing space with number space ( 20 ). In the element level ( 19 ) the existential characteristics for an element ( 17 ) are determined.

For example, the following exist as characteristics: minimum and maximum data element character length, data element existence requirements (must, can, may), permissible and occurring characters in a data element ( 17 ), language space used, limited list structures within data elements ( 17 ), Word analysis, etc. The character level ( 20 ) specifies the possible selection spaces for numbers, letters, special characters, OEM characters and others.

For example, the "Working Time" element can be a

As a result, there is apparently a substructure in the "Working Time" element doors separated by the "/" character. Such and similar Substructures are recognized and how they are analyzed additional elements with identifiers, namely Meier, Müller, Graf, Kemper, and relevant content treated.

As already mentioned elsewhere above, the element "title" contains several words:
1st sentence: "Dear Sir",
2nd movement: "Dear Mrs.",
3rd sentence: "Hello, Lord" and
4th sentence: "Dear Mr. Dipl.-Ing".

These substructures are adopted as words in word lists and if necessary individually further according to additional patterns and bowling analyzed.

Another example serves to illustrate this. The "Street" element contains the patterns
1st movement: "Hofweg 13",
2nd movement: "At the long Kant 77" and
3rd movement: "Bremer Strasse 19".

These substructures ( 15 ) are analyzed as words and examined for patterns. For example, street names and house numbers can be split.

It is very important that the substructures ( 15 ) relate to objects in one level under the sentence elements. Here the element contents are searched for further patterns.

In the pattern structure, the pattern and linkage analyzes are carried out with the aforementioned analysis results (sentence space ( 16 ), sentence rule space, element space ( 19 ), word space). Overarching patterns and rules are determined using fixed algorithms and neural as well as fuzzy algorithms.

In order for the pattern recognition in the linguistic analysis ( 8 ) of fine structure ( 14 ) and substructure ( 15 ) to run as automatically as possible, the algorithms require the use of modern techniques such as neural networks and fuzzy logic in addition to fixed algorithms. If one omits such approaches, the user may have to make individual links manually.

Fig. 3 shows, in diagram form, now the course of the synthesis (11) for the formation of the data elements (21) for the application B (4) from the data elements (22) of the application A (3). The analysis ( 8 ) of the template files VA ( 5 ) and VB ( 6 ) described above results in a data filter ( 23 ) which contains the previously determined linking rules ( 24 ) between the data elements ( 21 ) and ( 22 ). If you send the data records ( 25 ) from application A ( 3 ) through this data filter ( 23 ), you get new data records ( 26 ) with new data elements ( 21 ), which can be exported and exported by application B ( 4 ) Data format available. The number of data elements ( 22 ) of data records ( 25 ) from application A ( 3 ) is not necessarily the same as the number of data elements ( 21 ) of data records ( 26 ) for application B ( 4 ), the number of data records ( 25 ) and ( 26 ) is generally the same for both applications A ( 3 ) and B ( 4 ).

In addition to the data filter ( 23 ) for the data transfer from application A ( 3 ) to application B ( 4 ) resulting from the analysis ( 8 ) of the template files VA ( 5 ) and VB ( 6 ), there is also a comparison of the data elements ( 21 ) and ( 22 ) with an external database or several external databases ( 27 ), for example also the mixture of several databases, such as customer file + invoice file. With such an external comparison, for example, the postal codes of data records ( 25 ) and ( 26 ) can be checked by comparing the data elements ( 21 ) and ( 22 ) of country, city, street and postal code with those of the external database ( 27 ) compares.

In addition, one or more internal twos are created Possibility to search and sort on file level Lich. This is necessary for a quick search and sor animals, for example according to the alphabet or special notation paint, to enable.

If the element, substructure and File descriptions and possibly also external data sources len, for example of databases, by an implemented bare procedural script or programming language logically ver ties, converted and generally changed, then will thereby created the possibility by means of such  Script language a simple process control for the converters provision. In such a language, procedures, Functions and loop controls for logical linking, Calculation and change of determined analysis data available and there should also be a link to external ones Databases may be possible.

It has been shown that a scripting language quickly becomes complex can, if from element widths to record widths, file wise ten and finally up to file widths of the functions of external databases is expanded. Here the reveals itself Advantage of those described in claims 12 and 13 Features.

The script language or programming language is below explained in more detail using examples. It is the mentioned data for examples and possible matches with living people are purely coincidental.

With a link "Element-wide", for example with a change of element data, and a Filter_PLZ (Pos) = Ort (Pos) with the subelement (2 von Ort (Pos)), the following results for the individual Pos. 1, 2 and 3:
Location (Pos) after Filter_PLZ: Hagen Cologne Huerth.

When linking functions "record-wide" with the generation creation of new intermediate elements and the exemplary data:

Total sales (item) = total (sales1 (item) sales2 (item))
Max. Order value (item) = Max (sales1 (item) sales2 (item))
Order tendency (item) = if (sales1 (item) <sales2 (item))

then the order trend = 1
otherwise:
if (sales1 (item) <sales2 (item))
then the order trend = -1
otherwise the order trend = 0

logically follows for the individual positions of:

Pos 1: total sales 350; max.order value 150; Tendency 0
Pos 2: total sales 50; max.order value 50; Tendency 0
Item 3: total sales 300; max.order value 100; Tendency 0.

These examples can be applied accordingly to the above Disclosed are continued, for example for the Sales. Here it could be assumed that sales for everyone Pos. Is from 0 to 20 or from 20 to 40 or from 30 to 40, etc.

Finally, the functions "file-wide" for external Databases exemplary for the question "Existiert_PLZ (Pos) = if (search_location (sub-element (2 of location (Pos) and sub-element (1 of Location (Pos) and Existiert_In_Ort)), then Existiert_PLZ = TRUE; otherwise FALSE: "as follows:

Pos. 1 Existiert_PLZ (Pos) = FALSCH
Pos. 2 Existiert_PLZ (Pos) = FALSCH
Pos. 3 Existiert_PLZ (Pos) = TRUE.

You can continue to calculate with all intermediate elements as with the original element data. It should be emphasized that with the Features in claim 12 all types of link under Patent protection are provided, namely "element wide", "sentence wide", "File-wide" and "File-wide" with external databases.

Reference list

1 conversion software or process
2 source data Q
3 Application A
4 Application B
5 template file VA
6 template file VB
7 Incoming analysis templates
8 Analysis, analysis process
9 Sample expiry dates M
10 Save the pattern run data
11 Synthesis, synthesis phase
12 target dates Z
13 rough structure
14 fine structure
15 substructure
16 data set
17 (data) element
18 sentence control area
19 element level
20 drawing level
21 data elements
22 data elements
23 data filter
24 links, link rules
25 records
26 records
27 external database
28 Source file
29 Source analysis
30 target file

Claims (13)

1. A method for converting data and non-file-related methods between two applications or software packages that use mutually different data formats, characterized in that from the database of the first application A ( 3 ) and the database of the second application B ( 4th ) a sample export of data records of a relatively small amount is generated, from which a template file VA ( 5 ) from application A ( 3 ) and a template file VB ( 6 ) from application B ( 4 ) are formed, of which application B ( 4 ) the template file VB ( 6 ) generated by it can be imported again, that the template files VA ( 5 ) and VB ( 6 ) are analyzed to determine their data structures and, if necessary, to determine the links between the elements using conversion software ( 1 ) are, and that the source data Q ( 2 ) are converted using the analysis results in the target data Z ( 12 ), which are imported by the application B ( 4 ). 2. The method according to claim 1, characterized in that the analysis result is stored as a conversion pattern for the transmission of the data of the first user A ( 3 ) for the second application of the B ( 4 ) in the form of pattern sequence data M ( 9 ). 3. The method according to claim 1, characterized in that the source data Q ( 2 ) after passing through the analysis ( 8 ) and linking are given in a target synthesis ( 11 ), from which they are converted into the target data Z ( 12 ). 4. The method according to any one of claims 1 to 3, characterized in that the analysis ( 8 ) of the template files VA ( 5 ) and VB ( 6 ) is divided into several, in particular three phases, the after recognizing the rough structure ( 13 ) File form is first pre-classified, then a set of algorithms for automatically recognizing the fine structure ( 14 ) is made available by the conversion software and finally, in continuation of the analysis, the substructures ( 15 ) are recognized within data elements ( 17 ). 5. The method according to claim 4, characterized in that in the rough structure ( 13 ) the files are differentiated according to their file form. 6. The method according to claim 4, characterized in that the fine structure ( 14 ) relates to the sentence level, which includes the construction of a set ( 16 ) of elements ( 17 ) and the Ver links of the sentence elements ( 17 ) with each other. 7. The method according to claim 4, characterized in that the substructure ( 15 ) is subdivided into the element level ( 19 ) and in the drawing level ( 20 ) with drawing space and number space, wherein in the element level ( 19 ) the existential features for an element ( 17 ) can be determined. 8. The method according to any one of the preceding claims, characterized in that the technologies of the neural networks and / or the fuzzy logic are used in the algorithms for pattern recognition of the language and logical analysis ( 8 ). 9. The method according to any one of the preceding claims, characterized in that from the analysis ( 8 ) of the template files VA ( 5 ) and VB ( 6 ), a data filter ( 23 ) is formed, which the linking rules ( 24 ) between the data elements ( 21, 22 ) at the file level or together with one or more external data sources (comparison), whereby after passing through data records ( 25 ) from application A ( 3 ) through the data filter ( 23 ) new data records ( 26 ) with new data elements ( 21 ) are obtained which are in a data format that can be imported and exported by application B ( 4 ). 10. The method according to any one of the preceding claims, characterized in that the data elements ( 21 , 22 ) with an external database ( 27 ) can be compared. 11. The method according to any one of the preceding claims, characterized, that one or more internal intermediate databases for searching and Sorting of records is or will be set up. 12. The method according to any one of the preceding claims, characterized, that the element, substructure and File descriptions and external data sources through a procedural script or programming language logically linked, are converted and generally changeable. 13. The method according to claim 12, characterized, that the scripting or programming language general functions, Procedures and loop controls for processing the utility has data.