Method, system, and computer product for controlling input message priority

• US 20060045096A1
• Filed: 09/01/2004
• Published: 03/02/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 09/01/2004
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Gambino, Mark, Jennings, Evan, Farmer, Jamie
• Granted Patent: US 7,519,067 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 370/395.420
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/10 Flow control; Congestion control
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/2433 Allocation of priorities to traffic types
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/2475 for supporting traffic characterised by the type of applications
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/30 in combination with information about buffer occupancy at either end or at transit nodes
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/32 by discarding or delaying data units, e.g. packets or frames
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/16 Implementation or adaptation of Internet protocol [IP], of transmission control protocol [TCP] or of user datagram protocol [UDP]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/161 Implementation details of TCP/IP or UDP/IP stack architecture; Specification of modified or new header fields

Abstract

An operating system allows assignment of an input message priority to a particular socket. This priority is used by the operating system to determine what socket'"'"'s inbound packets get discarded when the server resources are constrained. Sockets of a lower priority than another will have its inbound packets discarded before higher priority sockets. This allows an application to give selected sockets higher inbound message priority over other sockets.

Claims

1. A method of controlling input message priority, comprising:

dynamically assigning a priority to a plurality of incoming messages, the assignment being performed by a receiving system that is receiving the incoming messages;

placing the incoming messages in a storage, the storage being available for use by at least one application in the receiving system; and

managing the storage at the receiving system by using the assigned priority to identify a portion of the incoming messages in the storage to discard, when needed to make space available.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the storage is a queue associated with a Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) stack in the receiving system.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the priority has a type selected from the group including socket-level, application-level, and default-level;

wherein socket-level priority takes precedence over application-level priority and application-level priority takes precedence over default-level priority.

4. A system for controlling input message priority, comprising:

a message classification layer for assigning a priority to each incoming message, the message classification layer being interposed between network interfaces and a TCP/IP stack in an operating system at a receiving node;

a storage in the TCP/IP stack for holding a plurality of incoming messages; and

a resource manager in the operating system to discard at least one incoming message from the storage based on the assigned priority, when additional space is needed in the storage;

wherein a socket-level priority overrides any other type of priority.

5. The system of claim 4, wherein the priority type is selected from the group including:

a socket level, an application level, and a default level;

wherein socket-level priority takes precedence over application-level priority and application-level priority takes precedence over default-level priority.

6. A computer program product for controlling input message priority, the computer program product comprising:

a storage medium readable by a processing circuit and storing instructions for execution by the processing circuit for performing a method comprising;

receiving an incoming message at a receiving system;

classifying the incoming message by applying a socket-level priority, application-level priority, or system default-level priority to the incoming message, according to a specification associated with the incoming message;

determining whether a buffer in the TCP/IP stack at the receiving system has space for the incoming message; and

queuing the incoming message, after discarding at least one message in the buffer based on priority, if there was not space in the buffer;

wherein socket-level priority takes precedence over application-level priority and application-level priority takes precedence over system default-level priority.

7. The computer program product of claim 6, wherein the method further comprises:

queuing the incoming message normally, if there was space in the buffer.

8. The computer program product of claim 6, wherein discarding at least one message in the buffer based on priority further comprises:

discarding messages in the buffer that have lower priority than the incoming message, if there are a predetermined number of lower priority messages.

9. The computer program product of claim 8, wherein the method further comprises:

continuing to discard lower priority messages, until a threshold is met.