Apparatus for sending a sequence of asynchronous messages to the same member of a clustered consumer

• US 20070162457A1
• Filed: 01/06/2006
• Published: 07/12/2007
• Est. Priority Date: 01/06/2006
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Polozoff, Alexandre, Barcia, Roland, Bhogal, Kulvir
• Granted Patent: US 7,464,121 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2209/547 Messaging middleware
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/546 Message passing systems or structures, e.g. queues
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/10 in which an application is distributed across nodes in the network software deployment G06F8/60; multiprogramming arrangements G06F9/46
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/22 Parsing or analysis of headers
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99954 Version management

Abstract

A method, apparatus and computer-usable medium for providing advanced messaging middleware functionality that is capable of handling message groups. Advanced messaging middleware (AMM) utility responds to the receipt of members of a message group by forwarding the message groups to a single consumer application of a multiple-consumer cluster application. Group messages comprise group identification (ID), and the AMM utility binds the group ID to a single consumer application. All subsequent messages of the message group are forwarded to that particular consumer application, while other messages are forwarded to other consumer applications within the application cluster. When the message group includes a number (group count) field indicating the number of messages within the message group, an aggregator component stores all members of a message group before forwarding the collected members in one sequence to the single consumer application.

Claims

1. A computer-implementable method comprising:

identifying a received message as a member of a message group;

dynamically selecting a single destination consumer application from among multiple possible destination consumer applications within a cluster application to which messages may be forwarded; and

automatically forwarding each member of the message group to the single destination consumer application selected.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein said identifying comprises parsing a header of the received message for a group identifier (ID), wherein all messages that are members of a same message group contain a same group ID within their message header and a single message that is not a part of a message group contains a null value within the header field within which group ID is stored.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein when at least a first message of the message group comprises a group count indicating a total number of members within the message group, said method further comprises:

assigning a temporary storage location to the message group on receipt of the first member of the message group;

collecting each member of the message group within the storage location assigned to that message group, wherein only members of the message group are stored within that storage location;

tracking a number of received members stored within the storage location to determine when all members of the message group have been received;

enabling the forwarding of the message group to the destination consumer application only after all members of the message group have been received; and

wherein, when the members are assigned a sequence value within their headers corresponding to a preferred order for forwarding the members to the destination consuming application, said collecting comprises mapping each received member of the message group to an in-sequence location of the storage location corresponding to the correct sequence value within the message header, wherein said forwarding transfers said members of the message group in the sequence in which said members are stored within the storage location.

4. The method of claim 2, further comprising:

when the received message does not contain a group ID, immediately forwarding the message to a destination consumer application not currently assigned to a message group; and

when the received message does contain a group ID;

parsing a header of the received message for a group count value; and

when there is no group count value with the received message or the group count value is a null value, dynamically assigning the corresponding message group with the group ID to a particular destination consumer application and immediately forwarding said received message and each subsequent message received with the same group ID to that particular consumer application.

5. The method of claim 2 further comprising:

comparing the group ID with existing group IDs associated with message groups being stored in temporary storage locations; and

when the group ID matches one of the existing group IDs, storing said message within the storage location associated with the existing group ID that matches the group ID.

6. The method of claim 4, wherein, when the received message is not a member of a message group, said method further comprises:

determining which consumer application of the multiple consumer applications within the application cluster are not currently assigned to a message group;

blocking access to any destination consumer application assigned to a message group for forwarding the members of the message group;

forwarding the received message to only an consumer application that is not currently assigned to a message group; and

when all destination consumer application have been assigned to a message group, holding the received message until one of the destination consumer applications is released from the assignment to a message group and becomes available.

7. A system comprising:

a processor;

a data bus coupled to the processor;

a memory coupled to the data bus; and

a computer-usable medium embodying computer program code, the computer program code comprising instructions executable by the processor and configured to;

identify a received message as a member of a message group;

dynamically select a single destination consumer application from among multiple possible destination consumer applications within a cluster application to which messages may be forwarded; and

automatically forward each member of the message group to the single destination consumer application selected.

8. The system of claim 7, wherein the instructions for identifying are further configured to parse a header of the received message for a group identifier (ID), wherein all messages that are members of a same message group contain a same group ID within their message header and a single message that is not a part of a message group contains a null value within the header field within which group ID is stored.

9. The system of claim 8, wherein when at least a first message of the message group comprises a group count indicating a total number of members within the message group, wherein the instructions are further configured to:

assign a temporary storage location to the message group on receipt of the first member of the message group;

collect each member of the message group within the storage location assigned to that message group, wherein only members of the message group are stored within that storage location;

track a number of received members stored within the storage location to determine when all members of the message group have been received;

enable the forwarding of the message group to the destination consumer application only after all members of the message group have been received; and

wherein, when the members are assigned a sequence value within their headers corresponding to a preferred order for forwarding the members to the destination consuming application, said instructions configured to collect are further configured to map each received member of the message group to an in-sequence location of the storage location corresponding to the correct sequence value within the message header, wherein said forwarding transfers said members of the message group in the sequence in which said members are stored within the storage location.

10. The system of claim 8, wherein the instructions are further configured to:

when the received message does not contain a group ID, immediately forward the message to a destination consumer application not currently assigned to a message group; and

when the received message does contain a group ID;

parse a header of the received message for a group count value; and

when there is no group count value with the received message or the group count value is a null value, dynamically assign the corresponding message group with the group ID to a particular destination consumer application and immediately forwarding said received message and each subsequent message received with the same group ID to that particular consumer application.

11. The system of claim 10, wherein the instructions are further configured to:

compare the group ID with existing group IDs associated with message groups being stored in temporary storage locations; and

when the group ID matches one of the existing group IDs, store said message within the storage location associated with the existing group ID that matches the group ID.

12. The system of claim 10, wherein, when the received message is not a member of a message group, the instructions are further configured to:

determine which consumer application of the multiple consumer applications within the application cluster are not currently assigned to a message group;

block access to any destination consumer application assigned to a message group for forwarding the members of the message group;

forward the received message to only an consumer application that is not currently assigned to a message group; and

when all destination consumer application have been assigned to a message group, hold the received message until one of the destination consumer applications is released from the assignment to a message group and becomes available.

13. A computer-usable medium embodying computer program code, the computer program code comprising computer executable instructions configured to:

identify a received message as a member of a message group;

dynamically select a single destination consumer application from among multiple possible destination consumer applications within a cluster application to which messages may be forwarded; and

automatically forward each member of the message group to the single destination consumer application selected.

14. The computer-usable medium of claim 13, wherein the embodied computer program code configured to identify further comprises computer executable instructions configured to parse a header of the received message for a group identifier (ID), wherein all messages that are members of a same message group contain a same group ID within their message header and a single message that is not a part of a message group contains a null value within the header field within which group ID is stored.

15. The computer-usable medium of claim 13, wherein when at least a first message of the message group comprises a group count indicating a total number of members within the message group, wherein the embodied computer program code further comprises computer executable instructions configured to:

assign a temporary storage location to the message group on receipt of the first member of the message group;

collect each member of the message group within the storage location assigned to that message group, wherein only members of the message group are stored within that storage location;

track a number of received members stored within the storage location to determine when all members of the message group have been received;

enable the forwarding of the message group to the destination consumer application only after all members of the message group have been received; and

wherein, when the members are assigned a sequence value within their headers corresponding to a preferred order for forwarding the members to the destination consuming application, said instructions configured to collect are further configured to map each received member of the message group to an in-sequence location of the storage location corresponding to the correct sequence value within the message header, wherein said forwarding transfers said members of the message group in the sequence in which said members are stored within the storage location.

16. The computer-usable medium of claim 13, wherein the embodied computer program code further comprises computer executable instructions configured to:

when the received message does not contain a group ID, immediately forward the message to a destination consumer application not currently assigned to a message group; and

when the received message does contain a group ID;

parse a header of the received message for a group count value; and

when there is no group count value with the received message or the group count value is a null value, dynamically assign the corresponding message group with the group ID to a particular destination consumer application and immediately forwarding said received message and each subsequent message received with the same group ID to that particular consumer application.

17. The computer-usable medium of claim 13, wherein, when said value is not a null value, the embodied computer program code further comprises computer executable instructions configured to:

compare the group ID with existing group IDs associated with message groups being stored in temporary storage locations; and

when the group ID matches one of the existing group IDs, store said message within the storage location associated with the existing group ID that matches the group ID.

18. The computer-usable medium of claim 16, wherein, when the received message is not a member of a message group, the embodied computer program code further comprises computer executable instructions configured to:

determine which consumer application of the multiple consumer applications within the application cluster are not currently assigned to a message group;

block access to any destination consumer application assigned to a message group for forwarding the members of the message group;

forward the received message to only an consumer application that is not currently assigned to a message group; and

when all destination consumer application have been assigned to a message group, hold the received message until one of the destination consumer applications is released from the assignment to a message group and becomes available.

19. The computer-useable medium of claim 13, wherein the computer executable instructions are deployable to a client computer from a server at a remote location.

20. The computer-useable medium of claim 13, wherein the computer executable instructions are provided by a service provider to a customer on an on-demand basis.