FEDERATED SCHEME FOR COORDINATING THROTTLED NETWORK DATA TRANSFER IN A MULTI-HOST SCENARIO

• US 20170346754A1
• Filed: 09/01/2016
• Published: 11/30/2017
• Est. Priority Date: 05/30/2016
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Walmart Apollo, LLC (WalMart Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Wal-Mart Stores Texas LLC (WalMart Inc.)
• Inventors: Sinha, Ravi Shanker Kumar, Jolly, Puneet, Bansal, Parijat, Das, Soumyajit, Krishna, K Vamsi
• Granted Patent: US 10,587,526 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/527 Quantum based scheduling, e.g. credit or deficit based scheduling or token bank
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/1095 Replication or mirroring of data, e.g. scheduling or transport for data synchronisation between network nodes
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/51 Discovery or management thereof, e.g. service location protocol [SLP] or web services

Abstract

Embodiments relate to systems and methods that facilitate coordination amongst host devices that share network resources in order to use available bandwidth effectively. Embodiments can ensure the host devices themselves take responsibility for sending their data via shared network bandwidth, keeping access to bandwidth fair to all the host devices. Embodiments also include adapting to a continuously changing network bandwidth allocation policy for the shared network resource. In one embodiment, this includes using tokens (e.g., small chunk messages) to represent a grant to a host device to send a specified number of bytes over the network. Using a token generator module and a distributed queue, embodiments provide a unique and adaptive way to manage data transmissions among host devices within available resources.

Claims

1. A multi-host system for coordinating data transfer on a network, comprising:

a plurality of host devices communicatively coupled to the network, each of the plurality of host devices comprising;

a portion of a distributed queue, each portion of the distributed queue of one of the plurality of host devices being synched with other portions of the distributed queue of other ones of the plurality of host devices, and

a token generator module, the token generator module of one of the plurality of host devices being an active token generator module configured to generate and send at least one new token to the distributed queue such that any of the plurality of host devices that query the distributed queue receive a new token from the distributed queue, the received new token permitting a recipient host device to send data via the network in accordance with a term of the received new token.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein a term of the received new token is a value of the token, and wherein the recipient host device is permitted to send via the network an amount of data that corresponds to the value of the received new token.

3. The system of claim 2, wherein the value is a number of bytes.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein a number of new tokens generated by the active token generator module corresponds to an amount of bandwidth allocated to the plurality of host devices.

5. The system of claim 1, wherein a term of the received new token is a time unit during which the received new token must be used by the recipient host device.

6. The system of claim 5, wherein the time unit is a number of seconds.

7. The system of claim 5, wherein the distributed queue is configured to delete an unused token when the time unit associated with the unused token expires.

8. The system of claim 1, wherein a term of the received new token is a priority, and wherein the recipient host device is permitted to send data via the network if the data matches the priority.

9. The system of claim 8, wherein the priority is one of a data type or a data source.

10. The system of claim 9, wherein the data source is an application operating at least partially on the recipient host device.

11. The system of claim 1, wherein the token generator module of another one of the plurality of host devices is configured to become the active token generator module if the one of the plurality of host devices becomes unavailable.

12. A method of coordinating data transfer on a network, comprising:

generating at least one new token by an active token generator module of one of a plurality of devices communicatively coupled to the network;

holding the generated at least one new token in a queue distributed and synchronized between the plurality of devices;

requesting a new token from the queue by any of the plurality of devices that wants to send data over the network;

receiving the new token by the requesting device;

checking at least one term of the received new token; and

sending the data over the network by the requesting device in accordance with the at least one term.

13. The method of claim 12, further comprising sending the generated at least one new token from the active token generator to the queue.

14. The method of claim 12, further comprising assigning a value to the least one new token as at least one term of the token, wherein the sending further comprises sending an amount of data that corresponds to the value of the received new token.

15. The method of claim 14, wherein the value is a number of bytes.

16. The method of claim 12, further comprising:

assigning a priority to the at least one new token as at least one term of the token; and

sending the data over the network by the requesting device if the priority of the received new token corresponds to the data.

17. The method of claim 16, wherein the priority is at least one of a type of the data or a source of the data.

18. The method of claim 12, wherein the generating further comprises generating a number of new tokens that is related to an amount of bandwidth allocated to the plurality of devices and a number of the plurality of devices.

19. The method of claim 12, further comprising transferring responsibility for the generating from the active token generator module to a token generator module of another one of the plurality of devices if the one of the plurality of devices hosting the active token generator module becomes unavailable.

20. The method of claim 12, further comprising associating the at least one new token with a time unit as a term of the as at least one term of the token, wherein the at least one new token must be used by one of the plurality of devices within the time unit.

21. The method of claim 20, further comprising deleting any unused tokens when the time unit associated with the unused tokens expires.

22. The method of claim 12, wherein the sending further comprises compressing the data.