Patent Application
20090063623
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method, system, and article of manufacture for determining connection information to use to access an artifact from an application on a remote server.
2. Description of the Related Art
To communicate requests for an artifact to a target application on a remote server in a network environment, a client application needs to determine connection information on the location of the server including the target application, such as a communication protocol, network address and port on which to transmit the request. If the connection information changes, then a user must reconfigure the connection parameters for the server including the target application with new connection information.
The Java Naming and Directory Interface (JNDI) provides an application programming interface (API) for a directory service that allows clients to discover and lookup data and objects via a name, and use that information to communicate with the named object. However, if the connection information for the servers that include the objects changes, then the user needs to update the connection information for those servers that are communicating using a different network address, port and/or communication protocol.
There is a need in the art for improved techniques for determining and using connection information to communicate artifact requests to applications in a distributed computing environment.
Provided are a method, system, and article of manufacture for determining connection information to use to access an artifact from an application on a remote server. A request is received in a local server for an artifact at a target application executing on a remote server. A determination is made as to whether a local repository includes connection information on the remote server. The connection information is used to communicate the request for the artifact to the remote server over a network. The connection information is accessed from the local repository in response to determining that the local repository includes the connection information for the remote server. A determination is made as to whether a common repository is available to provide the connection information for the remote server in response to determining that the local repository does not include the connection information for the remote server. Communication is made to the common repository over the network to access the connection information for the remote server in response to determining that the common repository is available to provide the connection information.
A cell 16 provides a grouping of servers 12a, 12b, 12c that are registered with the common repository 14 to share connection information for the applications 10a, 10b, 10c running in the servers 12a, 12b, 12c grouped in the cell 16. Thus, the local repositories 12a, 12b, 12c in the servers 2a, 2b, 2c in the cell 16 share connection information for the registered applications 10a, 10b, 10c in the cell. The local repository 12 for the server 2d that is not grouped in the cell 16 may not receive connection information maintained in the common repository 14.
The network 4 may comprise a network, such as a Local Area Network (LAN), Storage Area Network (SAN), Wide Area Network (WAN), wireless network, etc. The network may implement one or more network types. The repositories 12a, 12b, 12c, 12d and 14 may include processing and communication capabilities as well as persistent storage implemented in storage or memory, such as magnetic storage media (e.g., hard disk drives), Flash Memory, etc. The common repository 14 may be implemented in one server 2a, 2b, 2c in the cell 16 or in a separate system.
Although four servers and one cell are shown in
If (at block 132) the local repository 12a, 12b, 12c, 12d does not include an entry 50 for the application 10a, 10b, 10c, 10d providing the requested artifact and if (at block 136) the artifact loader client 8a, 8b, 8c is in a server 2a, 2b, 2c in the cell 16 including the common repository 14, then the artifact loader client 8a, 8b, 8c communicates (at block 138) with the common repository 14 in the cell 16 in which the artifact loader client is located, if one is available, such as if the artifact loader client 8a, 8b, 8c is in the cell 16, to obtain the connection information 56 for the remote server including the target application 10a, 10b, 10c. The artifact loader client 8a, 8b, 8c uses (at block 140) the connection information from the common repository 14 to transmit the request for the artifact indicating the application and artifact to the artifact loader server 6a, 6b, 6c in the remote server 2a, 2b, 2c, e.g., communicates the request to the port and network address indicated in the connection information. The artifact loader client 8a, 8b, 8c may further update the local repository 12a, 12b, 12c with the connection information provided from the common repository 14.
If (at block 136) the artifact loader client 8d is not in the cell 16 including the common repository 14, then the artifact loader client 8d determines (at block 142) a remote server 2a, 2b, 2c in the cell 16 including the target application 10a, 10b, 10c and transmits (at block 144) the request 70 (
In one embodiment, the common repository 14 may only be available to provide updated connection information not found in the local repository 12a, 12b, 12c if the local server 2a, 2b, 2c including the artifact loader client 8a, 8b, 8c trying to obtain the connection information 56 is in the same cell 16 including the remote server including the target application having the artifact. In one embodiment, the artifact loader client 8d may transmit the artifact request to a remote server 2a, 2b, 2c in the cell 16 in which the artifact loader client 8d is not included.
In certain embodiments, a named application 72 in an artifact request 70 may be located on multiple servers 2a, 2b, 2c in the cell 16. In such case, the artifact loader client 8a, 8b, 8c may utilize load balancing techniques to select one of the servers 2a, 2b, 2c having the application 10, 10b, 10c. For instance, the artifact loader client 8a, 8b, 8c may query the servers having the named application or otherwise obtain information on the current processing load at the servers 2a, 2b, 2c having the named application 72 to select one server 2a, 2b, 2c to which to direct the request that has the least processing load. Alternatively, the artifact loader client 8a, 8b, 8c may use a round robin or other selection technique to alternate selection of the one of the multiple servers 2a, 2b, 2c having a named application so that multiple artifact requests to the same application 10a, 10b, 10c are distributed among the servers 2a, 2b, 2c having the target application 10a, 10b, 10c.
Described embodiments provide techniques to locate a server in a network environment including an application having an artifact needed on another server in the network. In the described embodiments, the operations to locate and send artifact requests to applications in different servers are handled by an artifact loader client and server components running on every participating server.
Further, the described embodiments provide an application name based programming model, such that when an application 10a, 10b, 10c, 10d needs to load artifacts from a target application, the requesting application does not need to provide the location of the server 2a, 2b, 2c, 2d on which the target application is installed. Instead, the requesting application need only provide the name of the application having the requested artifact and the artifact loader client and server will handle selection and routing to the server including the target application capable of providing the requested artifact.
The described operations may be implemented as a method, apparatus or article of manufacture using standard programming and/or engineering techniques to produce software, firmware, hardware, or any combination thereof. The described operations may be implemented as code maintained in a “computer readable medium”, where a processor may read and execute the code from the computer readable medium. A computer readable medium may comprise media such as magnetic storage medium (e.g., hard disk drives, floppy disks, tape, etc.), optical storage (CD-ROMs, DVDs, optical disks, etc.), volatile and non-volatile memory devices (e.g., EEPROMs, ROMs, PROMs, RAMs, DRAMs, SRAMs, Flash Memory, firmware, programmable logic, etc.), etc. The code implementing the described operations may further be implemented in hardware logic implemented in a hardware device (e.g., an integrated circuit chip, Programmable Gate Array (PGA), Application Specific Integrated Circuit (ASIC), etc.). Still further, the code implementing the described operations may be implemented in “transmission signals”, where transmission signals may propagate through space or through a transmission media, such as an optical fiber, copper wire, etc. The transmission signals in which the code or logic is encoded may further comprise a wireless signal, satellite transmission, radio waves, infrared signals, Bluetooth, etc. The transmission signals in which the code or logic is encoded is capable of being transmitted by a transmitting station and received by a receiving station, where the code or logic encoded in the transmission signal may be decoded and stored in hardware or a computer readable medium at the receiving and transmitting stations or devices. An “article of manufacture” comprises computer readable medium, hardware logic, and/or transmission signals in which code may be implemented. A device in which the code implementing the described embodiments of operations is encoded may comprise a computer readable medium or hardware logic. Of course, those skilled in the art will recognize that many modifications may be made to this configuration without departing from the scope of the present invention, and that the article of manufacture may comprise suitable information bearing medium known in the art.
The terms “an embodiment”, “embodiment”, “embodiments”, “the embodiment”, “the embodiments”, “one or more embodiments”, “some embodiments”, and “one embodiment” mean “one or more (but not all) embodiments of the present invention(s)” unless expressly specified otherwise.
The terms “including”, “comprising”, “having” and variations thereof mean “including but not limited to”, unless expressly specified otherwise.
The enumerated listing of items does not imply that any or all of the items are mutually exclusive, unless expressly specified otherwise.
The terms “a”, “an” and “the” mean “one or more”, unless expressly specified otherwise.
Devices that are in communication with each other need not be in continuous communication with each other, unless expressly specified otherwise. In addition, devices that are in communication with each other may communicate directly or indirectly through one or more intermediaries.
A description of an embodiment with several components in communication with each other does not imply that all such components are required. On the contrary a variety of optional components are described to illustrate the wide variety of possible embodiments of the present invention.
Further, although process steps, method steps, algorithms or the like may be described in a sequential order, such processes, methods and algorithms may be configured to work in alternate orders. In other words, any sequence or order of steps that may be described does not necessarily indicate a requirement that the steps be performed in that order. The steps of processes described herein may be performed in any order practical. Further, some steps may be performed simultaneously.
When a single device or article is described herein, it will be readily apparent that more than one device/article (whether or not they cooperate) may be used in place of a single device/article. Similarly, where more than one device or article is described herein (whether or not they cooperate), it will be readily apparent that a single device/article may be used in place of the more than one device or article or a different number of devices/articles may be used instead of the shown number of devices or programs. The functionality and/or the features of a device may be alternatively embodied by one or more other devices which are not explicitly described as having such functionality/features. Thus, other embodiments of the present invention need not include the device itself.
The illustrated operations of
The foregoing description of various embodiments of the invention has been presented for the purposes of illustration and description. It is not intended to be exhaustive or to limit the invention to the precise form disclosed. Many modifications and variations are possible in light of the above teaching. It is intended that the scope of the invention be limited not by this detailed description, but rather by the claims appended hereto. The above specification, examples and data provide a complete description of the manufacture and use of the composition of the invention. Since many embodiments of the invention can be made without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention, the invention resides in the claims hereinafter appended.
