SYNCHRONIZATION OF RECORDS OF A TABLE USING BOOKMARKS

• US 20100057689A1
• Filed: 09/04/2008
• Published: 03/04/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 09/04/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Morisson, Oliver, Reiter, Tsvi M., Lisovaya, Julia, Nielsen, Mogens
• Granted Patent: US 7,991,737 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/217 Database tuning G06F16/2282 takes precedence; database performance monitoring G06F11/3409

Abstract

A method and system for controlling an application server in order to provide application services to clients while maintaining synchronization between records of tables of a database server. An application server retrieves records of tables and stores them locally on the application server. When a client requests some fields of a record of a table, the application server generates a bookmark that uniquely identifies the record. The bookmark may contain a table identifier and a record identifier or a query identification and an identifier of a record within the query result. The bookmark is opaque to the client and only the application server need know how to interpret its contents. When the application server provides the requested fields of the record to the client, it also provides the record bookmark to the client. When the client wants to identify the record, it uses the bookmark provided by the application server.

Claims

1. A method in an application server for identifying records of database tables, the application server interfacing with a database server that persistently stores the records of the database tables and interfacing with one or more clients, the method comprising:

receiving from the database server records of database tables, each database table having fields with field names and field values, one or more of the fields of each database table being a key field such that field values of key fields of a record of a database table uniquely identify the record within the database table;

storing locally at the application server the received records in locally stored database tables;

generating a record bookmark for each received record, the record bookmark containing a table identifier of the database table and a record identifier of the received record derived from the field values of the key fields of the received record such that a record bookmark uniquely identifies a database table and the received record within the database table and such that a record bookmark is changed when a field value of a key field of the received record changes;

sending to clients record bookmarks and field values of fields of the received records, the record bookmarks being opaque to the clients;

receiving from a client a request to modify a record of a database table, the request including a record bookmark of the record to be modified and a new field value for a field of the record;

identifying a database table and a received record from the table identifier and the record identifier of the record bookmark;

performing the requested modification to the locally stored identified record of the identified database table; and

when the requested modification results in a change to a field value of a key field of the identified record,

generating a new record bookmark for the identified record of the identified table using a changed field value; and

sending the new record bookmark to the client so that the client has the correct unique identifier of the changed record for subsequent accesses to the changed record; and

sending to the database server a request to modify the identified record of the identified database table, the request including a field value of a field of the record without sending the record bookmark

wherein the client identifies a record of a database table using the record bookmark received from the application server and does not need to be aware of the key fields of the database tables of the database.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein a request received from the client need not include field values of all key fields of a record to be modified.

3. The method of claim 1 including:

receiving a request from a client to add a record to a database table, the request including a draft bookmark that uniquely identifies the record to be added to the database table and field values of fields of the record to be added;

validating that the record can be added to the database table; and

when the validation indicates that the record can be added to the database table,

adding the record to the locally stored database table;

generating a record bookmark for the added record; and

sending to the client the record bookmark for use in subsequent accesses to the added record.

4. The method of claim 3 including:

when the validation indicates that the record cannot be added to the database table, sending to the client a validation error.

5. The method of claim 1 including storing locally a mapping of record bookmarks to their corresponding records of database tables and not providing record bookmarks to the database server.

6. The method of claim 1 including generating a temporary table with records from records of the database tables and generating temporary bookmarks to uniquely identify records of the temporary table wherein the client uses record bookmarks and temporary bookmarks without having to distinguish between them.

7. The method of claim 1 including generating a query bookmark to identify a query to be performed on a database table and to identify records resulting from the query wherein the client uses record bookmarks and query bookmarks without having to distinguish between them.

8. The method of claim 7 including:

receiving from the client a request to retrieve a record identified by a query bookmark;

executing the query of the query bookmark to generate a result table; and

sending to the client a record of the result table that is identified by the query bookmark.

9. The method of claim 1 wherein the application server includes applications that provide business processes to the clients.

10. A computing device providing an application server that provides application services to clients, the application services relating to the processing of records of a table, the table being persistently maintained by a table server, comprising:

a component that receives from the table server a record of the table, each record of the table having one or more key fields that uniquely identify the record within the table, and that stores the received record locally;

a component that generates a record bookmark for a record of the table that contains a record identifier of the record derived from field values of the key fields of the record such that a record bookmark uniquely identifies the received record within the table;

a component that sends to a client the record bookmark and field values of fields of the record wherein the record bookmark is opaque to the client;

a component that receives from the client a request to modify a record of the table, the request including a record bookmark of the record to be modified and a new field value for a field of the record; and

a component that performs the requested modification to the locally stored identified record, generates a new record bookmark based on the modification, and sends the new record bookmark to the client so that the client has the correct unique identifier for the modified record for subsequent accesses to the modified record

wherein the client identifies a record of the table using the record bookmark received from the application server and does not need to be aware of the key fields of the table.

11. The computing device of claim 10 including a component that sends to the table server a request to modify the identified record of the table, the request including a field value of a field of the record without sending the record bookmark.

12. The computing device of claim 10 wherein a request received from the client need not include field values of all key fields of a record to be modified.

13. The computing device of claim 10 including:

a component that receives a request from a client to add a record to the table, the request including a draft bookmark that uniquely identifies to the client the record to be added and including field values of fields of the record to be added; and

a component that generates a record bookmark for the record to be added and sends to the client the record bookmark for use in subsequent accesses to the added record.

14. The computing device of claim 10 including a component that generates a temporary table with records and generates temporary bookmarks to uniquely identify records of the temporary table wherein the client uses record bookmarks and temporary bookmarks without having to distinguish between them.

15. The computing device of claim 10 including a component that generates a query bookmark to identify a query to be performed on a table and to identify a record resulting from the query wherein the client uses record bookmarks and query bookmarks without having to distinguish between them.

16. The computing device of claim 15 including a component that receives from the client a request to retrieve a record identified by a query bookmark, executes the query of the query bookmark to generate a result table, and sends to the client a record of the result table that is identified by the query bookmark.

17. A computer-readable storage medium containing instructions for controlling an application server in order to provide application services to clients, the application services relating to processing records of tables of a database, the tables being persistently maintained by a database server, by a method comprising:

retrieving from the database server records from its tables and storing the retrieved records locally;

generating a record bookmark for retrieved records that contains a table identifier and a record identifier, the table identifier identifying a table of the database and the record identifier identifying a record within the identified table;

providing a retrieved record to a client along with the record bookmark for the provided record so that the client can subsequently use the record bookmark to identify the retrieved record to the application server wherein record bookmark is opaque to the client and the client does not need to be aware of fields of a provided record of a table that uniquely identify that record within the table.

18. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 17 including:

receiving a request from a client to add a record to a table, the request including a draft bookmark that uniquely identifies to the client the record to be added to the table and including field values of fields of the record to be added;

generating a record bookmark for the record to be added to the table; and

sending to the client the record bookmark for use in subsequent accesses to the added record, rather than using the draft bookmark.

19. The computer-readable storage device of claim 17 including:

generating a temporary table with records that are stored locally at the application server; and

generating a temporary bookmark to uniquely identify records of the temporary table wherein the client uses record bookmarks and temporary bookmarks without having to distinguish between them.

20. The computer-readable storage medium of claim 17 including:

generating a query bookmark to identify a query to be performed on the database and to identify records resulting from the query wherein the client uses record bookmarks and query bookmarks without having to distinguish between them.