Localization in distributed computer environments

• US 20020188722A1
• Filed: 05/30/2001
• Published: 12/12/2002
• Est. Priority Date: 05/30/2001
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Banerjee, Debasish, High, Robert Howard Jr., Zavala, David Alan, Frey, Jeffrey Alan, Schuerfeld, Ute
• Granted Patent: US 7,603,403 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 709/225
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/01 Protocols
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/51 Discovery or management thereof, e.g. service location protocol [SLP] or web services
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/52 specially adapted for the location of the user terminal
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 9/40 Network security protocols

Abstract

A method and system for providing client locale information to a server in a distributed computer enterprise. When a client generates a request to a remote server, the client'"'"'s locale and time zone information, known as the international context, is associated with the request. The server then processes requests from the client according to the internationalization context. The client'"'"'s international context is propagated to successive servers that further service the client'"'"'s request.

Claims

1. A system in a distributed computing environment having a plurality of nodes located across geographically dispersed boundaries, comprising:

a server configured with an internationalization application programming interface configured to extract an internationalization context provided by a client device; and

a resource manager configured to receive the internationalization context extracted by the server and process a request received from the client device using the internationalization context.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein the resource manager is a database management system.

3. The system of claim 1, wherein the resource manager comprises an application which is configured to use the internationalization context to perform calculations and return a result formatted according to a specification of the internationalization context.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein the internationalization context contains a country identification.

5. The system of claim 1, wherein the internationalization context contains a language identification.

6. The system of claim 1, wherein the internationalization context contains a time zone identifier.

7. The system of claim 1, wherein the internationalization context is transmitted by the server to at least one of the plurality of nodes in the distributed computer environment.

8. The system of claim 1, wherein the internationalization context comprises locale information and a time zone identifier.

9. The system of claim 1, wherein the locale information comprises at least one of a country identifier, a language identifier and a currency identifier.

10. A method operative in a distributed computing environment having clients and a plurality of servers located across geographically dispersed boundaries, comprising:

receiving a first request from a client at a server;

receiving a second request from the client at the server, wherein the second request comprises an internationalization context for processing the first request;

extracting the internationalization context from the second request; and

processing the first request at the server using the internationalization context.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein processing the first request comprises providing the first request and internationalization context to an application to perform calculations using the internationalization context and return a result formatted according to the internationalization context.

12. The method of claim 10, further comprising sending the internationalization context from the server to at least one of the plurality of servers in the distributed computing environment.

13. The method of claim 10, wherein the internationalization context contains a country identifier.

14. The method of claim 10, wherein the internationalization context contains a language identifier.

15. The method of claim 10, wherein the internationalization context contains a time zone identifier.

16. The method of claim 10, wherein the internationalization context contains at least a locale specification and a time zone identifier.

17. The method of claim 16, wherein the locale specification comprises at least one of a country identifier, a language identifier and a currency identifier.

18. The method of claim 10, further comprising processing the first request according to a country identifier of the server if the internationalization context does not contain a country identifier.

19. The method of claim 10, further comprising processing the first request according to a universal time zone identifier if the internationalization context does not contain a time zone identifier of the client.

20. The method of claim 10, further comprising processing the first request according to a time zone identifier of the server if the internationalization context does not contain a time zone identifier.

21. A method operative in a distributed computing environment comprising a client computer and a plurality of server computers, comprising:

receiving, at one of the plurality of server computers, an internationalization context from the client computer, wherein the internationalization context contains at least a locale specification and a time zone identifier; and

processing a request from the client computer according to the internationalization context provided by the client computer.

22. The method of claim 21, wherein the internationalization context contains a country identifier.

23. The method of claim 21, wherein the client and the plurality of servers are located across geographically dispersed boundaries.

24. The method of claim 21, wherein the internationalization context contains a language identifier.

25. The method of claim 21, wherein the internationalization context contains a time zone identifier.

26. The method of claim 21, wherein the locale specification comprises at least one of a country identifier, a language identifier and a currency identifier.

28. The signal bearing medium of claim 27, wherein the internationalization context contains a country identifier.

29. The signal bearing medium of claim 27, wherein the internationalization context contains a language identifier.

30. The signal bearing medium of claim 27, wherein the internationalization context contains a time zone identifier.

31. The signal bearing medium of claim 27, wherein the internationalization context contains at least a locale specification and a time zone identifier.

32. The signal bearing medium of claim 27, wherein the locale specification comprises at least one of a country identifier, a language identifier and a currency identifier.

27. A signal bearing medium, comprising a program which, when executed, performs a method, comprising:

parsing a message from a client computer, wherein the message contains internationalization context;

extracting the internationalization context from the request; and

providing the internationalization context to an application in order to configure the application to processes a request from the client computer according to the internationalization context provided by the client computer.

33. A signal bearing medium, comprising a program which, when executed by a processor of a server configured with a default locale setting and a default time zone setting, performs a method, comprising:

parsing a first request from a client computer;

parsing a second request from the client computer, wherein the second request comprises an internationalization context containing a user specified locale specification and a time zone identifier;

extracting the client'"'"'s internationalization context from the second request; and

processing the first request at the server using the internationalization context.

34. The signal bearing medium of claim 33, wherein processing the first request comprises providing the first request and the internationalization context to an application configured to perform calculations using the internationalization context.

35. The signal bearing medium of claim 33, further comprising sending the internationalization context from the server to at least one of the plurality of servers in the distributed computing environment.

36. The signal bearing medium of claim 33, wherein the internationalization context contains a country identifier.

37. The signal bearing medium of claim 33, wherein the internationalization context contains a language identifier.

38. The signal bearing medium of claim 33, wherein the internationalization context contains a time zone identifier.

39. The signal bearing medium of claim 33, wherein the internationalization context contains at least a locale specification and a time zone identifier.

40. The signal bearing medium of claim 39, wherein the locale specification comprises at least one of a country identifier, a language identifier and a currency identifier.

41. The signal bearing medium of claim 33, further comprising processing the first request according to a country identifier of the server if the internationalization context does not contain a country identifier.

42. The signal bearing medium of claim 33, further comprising processing the first request according to a time zone identifier provided by the server if the time zone identifier of the internationalization context is set to null.

43. A computer data signal embodied in a transmission medium, comprising an internationalization context containing at least a locale specification and a time zone identifier, wherein the internationalization context configures a processor of a computer to process requests according to the internationalization context.

44. The computer data signal of claim 43, wherein the locale specification comprises at least one of a country identifier, a language identifier and a currency identifier.

46. The method of claim 45, wherein the internationalization context contains at least a locale specification and a time zone identifier.

47. The method of claim 45, further comprising sending a first main body of the first request to the thread.

48. The method of claim 47, further comprising:

attaching the internationalization context to a second main body to form a second request; and

transmitting the second request to a third computer.

49. The method of claim 48, wherein the second main body is associated with an interface, and wherein the internationalization component is not added to the interface.

50. The method of claim 45, wherein the thread comprises a legacy application thread.

51. The method of claim 45, wherein the internationalization component comprises culture sensitive information.

45. A method for transparently propagating internationalization context information, comprising:

receiving, at a first computer, a first request from a second computer, the first request including an internationalization context;

extracting the internationalization context from the first request; and

associating the internationalization context with a thread executing at the first computer.

52. A method for transparently propagating internationalization context information to an application associated with an application interface, the method comprising:

generating a main body of a request; and

attaching an internationalization context to the main body, wherein the internationalization context is not added to the application interface.

53. The method of claim 52, wherein the internationalization context contains at least a locale specification and a time zone identifier.