Identifying information services and schedule times to implement load management

• US 20070150595A1
• Filed: 12/23/2005
• Published: 06/28/2007
• Est. Priority Date: 12/23/2005
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Ge, Liang, Azera, Frederic, Acton, Colin, Cho, Wei Wei, Bhorania, Aayaz, Husak, Stephen
• Application Number:
  US11/318,050
• Publication Number:
  US 20070150595A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 709/226
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/62 Establishing a time schedule for servicing the requests

Abstract

Identifying a location and download schedule of web services. Responsive to a request from the application program, the system generates a list of the web services available to an application program along with locations and schedule times associated with the web services. The schedule times implement load management of the web services. The application program accesses the web services at the identified locations at the determined schedule times.

Claims

1. A computerized method comprising:

receiving a request from an application program for one or more locations providing web services;

generating a list of the web services corresponding to the received request;

identifying the requested locations as a function of the generated list of the web services;

determining a schedule time associated with each of the identified locations to effectuate load management at the identified locations; and

sending information including the identified locations, the generated list of the web services, and the determined schedule times to the application program, wherein the application program accesses the web services at the identified locations at the determined schedule times.

2. The computerized method of claim 1, further comprising formatting the information according to a metadata download protocol, wherein the formatted information comprises a common header and further comprises the identified locations, the generated list of the web services, and the determined schedule times as objects.

3. The computerized method of claim 1, wherein identifying the requested locations comprises identifying the requested locations based on one or more of the following in the received request:

client type, client version, client identifier, country code, language identifier, test key, time zone, original equipment manufacturer of a computing device executing the application program, and a model of the computing device executing the application program.

4. The computerized method of claim 1, further comprising generating a security token based on the received request prior to sending the identified locations, the generated list of the web services, and the determined schedule times to the application program.

5. The computerized method of claim 1, further comprising logging the received request.

6. The computerized method of claim 1, wherein the schedule time defines one or more of the following:

a start time, a duration, download delta days, refresh hours, retry count, back off minimum, and back off maximum.

7. The computerized method of claim 1, further comprising validating the list of the web services based on a schema, said schema defining supported countries, supported languages, supported client versions, and the latest package version.

8. The computerized method of claim 1, wherein determining the schedule time associated with each of the identified locations comprises determining the schedule time based on a download window start time identified by the application program.

9. The computerized method of claim 1, wherein one or more computer-readable media have computer-executable instructions for performing the computerized method recited in claim 1.

10. A system comprising:

a memory area storing a service list having a plurality of service entries, each of said service entries comprising a location of a web service and a download schedule associated therewith; and

a processor configured to execute computer-executable instructions for;

receiving, from an application program, attributes associated with the application program;

filtering the service list to generate a list of services available to the application program based on the received attributes; and

sending the generated list of services to the application program.

11. The system of claim 10, further comprising means for determining and providing a list of web services available to the application program.

12. The system of claim 10, wherein the download schedule defines one or more of the following:

a start time, a duration, download delta days, refresh hours, retry count, back off minimum, and back off maximum.

13. The system of claim 10, further comprising a data structure representing a schema to validate the service list stored in the memory area, said schema defining supported countries, supported languages, supported client versions, and the latest package version.

14. The system of claim 10, wherein the processor is further configured to execute computer-executable instructions for formatting the generated list of services according to a metadata download protocol to create objects.

15. The system of claim 10, wherein the processor is further configured to execute computer-executable instructions for filtering the service list based on one or more of the following:

client type, client version, client identifier, country code, language identifier, time zone, original equipment manufacturer of a computing device executing the application program, and a model of the computing device executing the application program.

16. One or more computer-readable media having computer-executable components, said components comprising:

an interface component for receiving a request from an application program for one or more locations providing web services;

a services component for generating a list of the web services corresponding to the received request;

a location component for identifying the requested locations as a function of the generated list of the web services and for determining a schedule time associated with each of the identified locations to effectuate load management at the identified locations; and

a protocol component for formatting the identified locations, the generated list of the web services, and the determined schedule times according to a metadata download protocol to create formatted objects, wherein the interface component sends the formatted objects along with a common header to the application program, and wherein the application program accesses the web services at the identified locations at the determined schedule times.

17. The computer-readable media of claim 16, further comprising a security component for generating a security token based on the received request prior to sending the identified locations, the generated list of the web services, and the determined schedule times to the application program.

18. The computer-readable media of claim 16, wherein the schedule time defines one or more of the following:

a start time, a duration, download delta days, refresh hours, retry count, back off minimum, and back off maximum.

19. The computer-readable media of claim 16, further comprising a data structure representing a schema to validate the list of the web services, said schema defining supported countries, supported languages, supported client versions, and the latest package version.

20. The computer-readable media of claim 16, wherein the location component identifies the requested locations based on one or more of the following in the received request:

client type, client version, client identifier, country code, language identifier, time zone, original equipment manufacturer of a computing device executing the application program, and a model of the computing device executing the application program.