System and method of managing software product-line customizations

1. A method of managing web analytics application service provider client customization requests, the method comprising:

receiving a client customization request, wherein the client customization request specifies at least a partial customization to be performed on a customizable resource, wherein the customizable resource is used by an analytics application and reporting subsystem to generate a customized output report for a client, wherein the output report is generated by the analytics application and reporting subsystem and displayed on a client system;

creating a configuration managed file tailored to the client customization request, wherein the configuration managed file specifies how the customizable resource should be customized based on the client customization request;

binding the configuration managed file to the customizable resource, wherein binding the configuration managed file to the customizable resource comprises creating a resource abstraction of the customizable resource, wherein a resource abstraction is a persistent representation of the customizable resource with the client customization request applied to the customizable resource;

deploying the resource abstraction to a data store, wherein deploying the resource abstraction to a data store comprises storing the persistent representation of the resource abstraction in the data store;

receiving a client request for a customized output report;

retrieving the resource abstraction from the data store;

instantiating the resource abstraction in the analytics application and reporting subsystem, wherein instantiating the resource abstraction comprises creating a runtime data structure for the resource abstraction within the analytics application and reporting subsystem;

generating a customized output report in the analytics application and reporting subsystem using the instantiated resource abstraction;

sending the customized output report to a web publishing module; and

sending the customized report from the web publishing module to the client system.

2. The method of claim 1 , further comprising performing an inheritance instantiation on the runtime data structure, wherein inheritance instantiation comprises further customizing the runtime data structure based on an Industry Vertical of the client.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein a plurality of resource abstractions, for a plurality of clients, in a plurality of Industry Verticals are stored in the data store.