Content delivery network (CDN) content server request handling mechanism
First Claim
1. A method of content delivery, comprising:
- establishing a content delivery network on behalf of participating content providers, the content delivery network managed by a content delivery network service provider and comprising a plurality of content servers and a domain name service (DNS), and wherein participating content providers identify given content to be delivered over the content delivery network;
associating a content provider domain or subdomain with a domain managed by the content delivery network service provider so that DNS queries to the content provider domain or subdomain are resolved by the content delivery network domain name service;
resolving a DNS query to the content provider domain or subdomain to an IP address associated with a given content server in the plurality of content servers, wherein the DNS query is resolved by the content delivery network domain name service using the domain managed by the content delivery network service provider in lieu of the content provider domain or subdomain;
at the given content server of the plurality of content servers in the content deliver network, receiving a request for a piece of content;
determining whether the piece of content is available to be served from the given content server in the content delivery network;
if the piece of content is available to be served from the given content server, having the given content server issue a validation request to an origin server that is authoritative for the piece of content; and
if the origin server validates the piece of content in response to the validation request, serving the piece of content from the given content server.
4 Assignments
0 Petitions
Accused Products
Abstract
To serve content through a content delivery network (CDN), the CDN must have some information about the identity, characteristics and state of its target objects. Such additional information is provided in the form of object metadata, which according to the invention can be located in the request string itself, in the response headers from the origin server, in a metadata configuration file distributed to CDN servers, or in a per-customer metadata configuration file. CDN content servers execute a request identification and parsing process to locate object metadata and to handle the request in accordance therewith. Where different types of metadata exist for a particular object, metadata in a configuration file is overridden by metadata in a response header or request string, with metadata in the request string taking precedence.
-
Citations
9 Claims
-
1. A method of content delivery, comprising:
-
establishing a content delivery network on behalf of participating content providers, the content delivery network managed by a content delivery network service provider and comprising a plurality of content servers and a domain name service (DNS), and wherein participating content providers identify given content to be delivered over the content delivery network;
associating a content provider domain or subdomain with a domain managed by the content delivery network service provider so that DNS queries to the content provider domain or subdomain are resolved by the content delivery network domain name service;
resolving a DNS query to the content provider domain or subdomain to an IP address associated with a given content server in the plurality of content servers, wherein the DNS query is resolved by the content delivery network domain name service using the domain managed by the content delivery network service provider in lieu of the content provider domain or subdomain;
at the given content server of the plurality of content servers in the content deliver network, receiving a request for a piece of content;
determining whether the piece of content is available to be served from the given content server in the content delivery network;
if the piece of content is available to be served from the given content server, having the given content server issue a validation request to an origin server that is authoritative for the piece of content; and
if the origin server validates the piece of content in response to the validation request, serving the piece of content from the given content server. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9)
-
Specification