METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR AN ACTIVE FILE SYSTEM

摘要

A computerized file system is provided that is accessible by users over the Internet or other type of network, in which certain "triggering events" pertaining to the operation of the file system automatically generate a notification message to certain of the users. Once a user has been properly authenticated, this user's access rights are determined to see whether the user can read, write, or read/write files on the file server of the file system, and these rights also determine if the user may download files from or upload files to the file server. An Automatic Notification function checks to see if any "triggering" events have occurred when a user performs a particular task. The Automatic Notification function defines what exact type of event will become a triggering event, and also defines what will be the triggering action, once the triggering event occurs, and stores this information in a database. In the preferred embodiment, these Automatic Notification messages are transmitted via E-mail technology. By use of E-mail-type messages, the notification process can be initiated simultaneously for all users who are to receive any such notification message. The Auto-notification function can also comprise other programs that are launched to perform certain tasks. The precise type of auto-notification message is fully configurable for each component in the file system. More than one single file can be stored having the same virtual filename, at least as far as the individual users can determine. The actual filename on the file server is always unique for each individual file, and the actual filenames are stored in a "Files Table", and links to the files are stored in the database.