ON-DEMAND REPLICATION IN A CONTENT MANAGEMENT SYSTEM

• US 20080016129A1
• Filed: 07/13/2006
• Published: 01/17/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 07/13/2006
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: EDLUND, STEFAN BENGT, LEHMAN, TOBIN JON, RUVOLO, JOANN
• Granted Patent: US 8,498,961 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 707/204
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/275 Synchronous replication

Abstract

The system and method of the present invention provide for automatic on-demand replication in a replication cluster of content management servers. A replication manager of a content management server receives newly created, modified, and deleted application item types along with their associated physical tables and automatically forwards the received application item types on-demand to the replication managers of other content management servers of the replication cluster.

Claims

1. A system performing automatic on-demand replication within a replication cluster of content management servers, each content management server comprising:

a content management application dynamically performing at least one of the creation, modification and deletion of an application item type;

a schema manager handling at least one of the creation, modification, and deletion of at least one physical table associated with the application item type; and

a replication manager receiving the application item type and associated physical table, and automatically forwarding said received application item type on-demand to replication managers of other content management servers within the replication cluster.

2. The system of claim 1, each content management server further comprising a capture agent wherein said replication manager informs said capture agent of new application item types.

3. The system of claim 2 wherein said replication manager deregisters deleted application item types and associated physical tables with said capture agent.

4. The system of claim 2, each content management server further comprising an apply agent wherein said replication manager additionally informs said apply agent of new application item types.

5. The system of claim 4 wherein said capture agent communicates with apply agents of other content management servers of the replication cluster.

6. The system of claim 5 wherein said capture agent captures updates to a database that are recorded in a change log and automatically forwards said updates on-demand to the apply agents of said other content management servers of the replication cluster.

7. The system of claim 6 wherein said apply agent directly applies updates received from capture agents of said other content management servers of the replication cluster to said database.

8. The system of claim 6 wherein said apply agent invokes a runtime manager to apply updates received from capture agents of other content management servers of the replication cluster to said database.

9. The system of claim 1, further comprising a network wherein said network is a LAN, WAN or SAN.

10. A method of performing automatic on-demand replication within a replication cluster of content management servers, a content management server of the replication cluster executing the following steps:

dynamically performing at least one of the creation, modification, and deletion of an application item type;

handling at least one of the creation, modification and deletion of at least one physical table associated with the application item type; and

automatically forwarding said application item type on-demand to other content management servers of the replication cluster.

11. The method of claim 10 further comprising the step of informing a capture agent of new application item types, wherein a replication manager informs said capture agent of the new application item types upon receiving them.

12. The method of claim 11 further comprising the step of deregistering deleted application item types and associated tables with said capture agent, wherein said replication manager performs said deregistering upon receiving deleted application item types.

13. The method of claim 12 further comprising the step of informing an apply agent of new application item types wherein said replication manager informs said apply agent of the new application item types upon receiving them.

14. The method of claim 13 further comprising the steps of:

capturing updates to a database which are recorded in a change log;

automatically forwarding said updates on-demand to other content management servers of said replication cluster; and

applying updates that are received from said other content management servers of said replication cluster to said database;

wherein the capture agent captures updates to said database that are recorded in said change log and automatically forwards said updates on-demand to apply agents of said other content management servers of the replication cluster.

15. The method of claim 14 wherein said apply agent directly applies updates received from capture agents of said other content management servers of the replication cluster directly to said database.

16. The method of claim 14 wherein said apply agent invokes a runtime managers to apply updates received from capture agents of said other content management servers of the replication cluster to said database.

17. The method of claim 14 wherein schema changes to a database resulting from the addition, modification and deletion of application item types are recorded in said change log wherein the recorded changes are captured by said capture agent and automatically forwarded on-demand to apply agents of said other content management servers of the replication cluster, and wherein said apply agent passes schema changes that are received from capture agents of said other content management servers of the replication cluster to a schema manager.

18. The method of claim 14 wherein schema changes to a database resulting from the addition, modification, and deletion of application item types are automatically forwarded on-demand by a replication manager to replication managers of said other content management servers of said replication cluster.

19. The method of claim 10 wherein said content management servers of a replication cluster communicate over a network wherein said network is a LAN, WAN or SAN.

20. An article of manufacture comprising a computer usable medium having computer readable program code embodied therein which implements automatic on-demand replication within a replication cluster of content management servers, said medium comprising:

computer readable program code aiding at least one of the dynamic creation, modification, and deletion of an application item type;

computer readable program code aiding in at least one of the creation, modification and deletion of at least one physical table associated with the application item type; and

computer readable program code aiding in automatically forwarding said application item type on-demand to other content management servers of the replication cluster.