US Patent 7870538 Configuration inheritance in system configuration

Methods and apparatuses provide configuration inheritance. One configuration can be derived from another (target) configuration, and properties and all content of the target configuration are inherited by the derived configuration. The derived properties and all content may exist virtually at the derived configuration, and local settings can exist locally at the configuration. The configuration architecture may allow for overwriting the derived configuration with local content to allow for modifications of the derived content to adapt to the circumstance/environment of the derived configuration.