MECHANISM FOR DISTINGUISHING BETWEEN CONTENT TO BE SERVED THROUGH FIRST OR SECOND DELIVERY CHANNELS

• US 20140189069A1
• Filed: 12/23/2013
• Published: 07/03/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 12/27/2012
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Akamai Technologies, Inc.
• Original Assignee: Akamai Technologies, Inc.
• Inventors: Gero, Charles E., Podjarny, Guy
• Granted Patent: US 9,729,605 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 709/219
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/02 based on web technology, e.g. hypertext transfer protocol [HTTP]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/566 Grouping or aggregating service requests, e.g. for unified processing
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/568 Storing data temporarily at an intermediate stage, e.g. caching

Abstract

Described herein are methods, apparatus and systems for selectively delivering content through one of two communication channels, one being origin to client and the other being from or through a CDN to client. Thus a client may choose to request content from a CDN and/or from an origin server. This disclosure sets forth techniques for, among other things, distinguishing between which channel to use for a given object, using the CDN-client channel to obtain the performance benefit of doing so, and reverting to the origin-client channel where content may be private, sensitive, corrupted, or otherwise considered to be unsuitable from delivery from and/or through the CDN.

Claims

1. A system, comprising:

a first server that modifies an HTML file by rewriting a reference to an object to include a hash for the object;

a client device that receives the modified HTML file and requests the object from a second server;

a second server that, upon receiving the request for the object from the client device, requests the object from the first server, receives a first response from the first server, and sends a second response to the client device;

the client device receiving the second response from the second server, and based on the second response, determining whether to request the object from the first server;

wherein each of the first server, second server, and client device comprises circuitry forming one or more processors and a storage device holding instructions for execution by the one or more processors.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein the first server comprises an origin server associated with a content provider and the second server comprises a proxy server operated by a content delivery network on behalf of the content provider.

3. The system of claim 1, wherein the first server further modifies the HTML file by adding a script that will execute to instruct the client device how to handle the rewritten reference to the object.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein the second server requests the object from the first server without cookies.

5. The system of claim 1, where the second server determines to send a failure code in the second response, based on any of:

(i) an unsuccessful attempt to request the object from the first server, and

(ii) determines that the hash for the object does not match a hash for content received in the first response.

6. The system of claim 5, wherein the client device'"'"'s request for the object includes a URI for the object that has the hash for the object.

7. The system of claim 1, wherein the client device requests the object from the first server, based on any of:

(i) receiving a failure code from the second server in the second response, and

(ii) receiving content potentially corresponding to the object in the second response, determining that a hash for the content does not match the hash for the object, and therefore that the content does not correspond to the object.

8. The system of claim 1, wherein the object is any of an image, a CSS file, and a script.

9. The system of claim 1, wherein the client device executes a browser application.

10. A method operative at a client device, comprising:

receiving an HTML file, the HTML file including at least one reference to an object, the at least one reference including an HTML attribute providing a hash of the referenced object;

requesting the object from a first server;

receiving a response from the first server that includes data that potentially corresponds to the object;

calculating a hash for the data;

comparing the calculated hash for the data to the hash provided in the HTML attribute for the referenced object, so as to determine whether the data corresponds to the object;

based on the comparison, determining whether to request the object from a second server.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein the second server comprises a server operated by a service provider on behalf of content providers and the first server comprises an origin server associated with a given one of the content providers.

12. The method of claim 10, the HTML file further including a script that instructs the client device how to request the referenced object.

13. The method of claim 10, further comprising, upon a determination that the calculated hash for the data matches the provided hash for the referenced object, loading the data into a client application.

14. The method of claim 10, wherein the object is any of an image, a CSS file, and a script.