System and method for conversation based on web service addressing

• US 20070162549A1
• Filed: 01/11/2006
• Published: 07/12/2007
• Est. Priority Date: 01/11/2006
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Oracle International Corporation (Oracle Corporation)
• Original Assignee: BEA Systems Incorporated (Oracle Corporation)
• Inventors: Jin, Lei, Zotter, Brian
• Granted Patent: US 8,271,602 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 709/206
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/06 Buying, selling or leasing transactions
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/02 based on web technology, e.g. hypertext transfer protocol [HTTP]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/14 Session management for real-time applications in data packet communications networks H04L65/1066
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/142 Managing session states for stateless protocols; Signalling session states; State transitions; Keeping-state mechanisms

Abstract

Embodiments of the present invention introduces mechanisms that allow conversational Web services to have long running business transactions between multiple parties with persistent states. Web service addressing is used to exchange conversational identifiers between the client(s) who requests the service and the server who provides it. This description is not intended to be a complete description of, or limit the scope of, the invention. Other features, aspects, and objects of the invention can be obtained from a review of the specification, the figures, and the claims.

Claims

1. A system to provide conversational service, comprising:

a conversation manager operable to;

process a service request from a party, which contains a “

reply to”

address;

create a conversation and a conversation id; and

provide the conversation id to the party at the “

reply to”

address; and

said party operable to;

submit the service request to the conversation manager;

accept the conversation id from the conversation manager; and

participate in the conversation by embedding the conversation id in a conversation request to the conversation manager;

wherein all communication between the conversation manager and the party follows Web service addressing which exchanges information in a uniform format independent of underlying transport.

2. The system according to claim 1, wherein:

the web service addressing can be WS-Addressing.

3. The system according to claim 1, further comprising:

a second party operable to;

accept the conversation id contained in a construct from the conversation manager; and

participate in the conversation with the party by embedding the conversation id in its response to the conversation manager.

4. The system according to claim 3, wherein:

the construct can be an endpoint reference or a message information header.

5. The system according to claim 3, wherein:

the conversation manager operable to at least one of;

providing the conversation id to the second party in the construct;

putting the conversation to sleep while waiting for a response from the second party; and

notifying the party upon receiving the response from the second party.

6. The system according to claim 3, wherein:

the party, the second party and the conversation manager are operable to communicate asynchronously via the conversation id.

7. The system according to claim 1, further comprising:

an intermediary service operable to accept and relay information between the conversation manager and the party, wherein the intermediary service can be a Web service.

8. The system according to claim 1, wherein:

the party can be a client and or a Web service.

9. The system according to claim 1, wherein:

the conversation manager is further operable to extract the conversation id from the party'"'"'s service request.

10. The system according to claim 1, wherein:

the conversation manager is further operable to persist the conversation in memory or in a persistent store.

11. The system according to claim 1, wherein:

the conversation manager is further operable to manage the conversation via a conversational service, which can be a state machine.

12. The system according to claim 11, wherein:

the conversational service is operable to provide a plurality of methods.

13. The system according to claim 12, wherein:

the conversation manager is further operable to define access permission for the first and/or the second party to the plurality of methods of the conversational service.

14. A method to provide conversational service via Web service addressing, comprising:

submitting a service request from a party to a conversation manager, wherein the service request contains a “

reply to”

address;

processing the service request and creating a conversation and a conversation id;

providing the conversation id to the party at the “

reply to”

address;

accepting the conversation id from the conversation manager; and

participating in the conversation by embedding the conversation id in a conversation request to the conversation manager;

wherein all communication between the conversation manager and the party follows Web service addressing which exchanges information in a uniform format independent of underlying transport.

15. The method according to claim 14, further comprising:

providing the conversation id contained in a construct to a second party;

putting the conversation to sleep while waiting for a response from the second party;

accepting the conversation id in the construct from the conversation manager; and

participating in the conversation with the party by embedding the conversation id in its response to the conversation manager.

16. The method according to claim 15, further comprising at least one of:

notifying the party upon receiving the response from the second party; and

communicating among the party, the second party, and the conversation manager asynchronously via the conversation id.

17. The method according to claim 14, further comprising:

accepting and relaying information between the conversation manager and the party via an intermediary service, which can be a Web service.

18. The method according to claim 14, further comprising at least one of:

extracting the conversation id from the service request;

persisting the conversation in memory or in a persistent store;

managing the conversation via a conversational service, which can be a state machine; and

defining access permission for the party to a plurality of methods provided by the conversational service.

19. A machine readable medium having instructions stored thereon that when executed cause a system to:

submit a service request from a party to a conversation manager, wherein the service request contains a “

reply to”

address;

process the service request and create a conversation and a conversation id;

provide the conversation id to the party at the “

reply to”

address;

accept the conversation id from the conversation manager; and

participate in the conversation by embedding the conversation id in a conversation request to the conversation manager;

wherein all communication between the conversation manager and the party follows Web service addressing which exchanges information in a uniform format independent of underlying transport.

20. A system to provide conversational service via Web service addressing, comprising:

means for submitting a service request from a party to a conversation manager, wherein the service request contains a “

reply to”

address;

means for processing the service request and creating a conversation and a conversation id;

means for providing the conversation id to the party at the “

reply to”

address;

means for accepting the conversation id from the conversation manager; and

means for participating in the conversation by embedding the conversation id in a conversation request to the conversation manager;

wherein all communication between the conversation manager and the party follows Web service addressing which exchanges information in a uniform format independent of underlying transport.