Method, system and program product for managing the flow of data between senders and receivers of a computing environment

• US 6,633,919 B1
• Filed: 11/18/1999
• Issued: 10/14/2003
• Est. Priority Date: 11/18/1999
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Marcotte, Scott Thomas
• Primary Examiner(s): Luu, Le Hien
• Assistant Examiner(s): WILLETT, STEPHAN F
• Application Number:
  US09/442,910
• Time in Patent Office: 1,426 Days
• Field of Search: 709/201, 709/229, 709/230, 709/237, 709/226
• US Class Current: 709/237
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/10 File systems; File servers
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/01 Protocols
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/06 specially adapted for file transfer, e.g. file transfer protocol [FTP]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/329 in the application layer [OSI layer 7]

Abstract

Throughput of a request (e.g., a write request) is enhanced by allowing a receiver of the request to reply to the request before fully receiving the entire request. This reduces the delay between the time that the receiver completes a request and the time that the sender sees that the request is finished, and allows other requests to be forwarded prior to completion of the first request. The other requests that are forwarded, however, are processed in the order of receipt. Additionally, any errors that occur in a request after the reply is sent is forwarded to the sender of the request, even though the reply has previously been sent.

Claims

1. A method of managing a flow of data between a file server and a client of a computing environment, said method comprising:

receiving, by a file server of said computing environment, a portion of a request sent by a client of said computing environment;

forwarding from said file server to said client a reply indicating receipt of said request, said forwarding being performed prior to fully receiving said request;

wherein said receiving comprises receiving a plurality of requests from the client, said portion of the request being a portion of one request of the plurality of requests; and

said method further comprises maintaining request delivery order at the file server using an ordering queue associated with a file system of the computing environment to reserve a place for the request notwithstanding said forwarding from the file server to the client of the reply indicating receipt of the request at the file server prior to fully receiving said request, said reply causing the client to send another request of the plurality of requests.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising receiving more of said request by said file server, wherein said receiving of more of said request is performed substantially in parallel with said forwarding of said reply.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein said forwarding is performed prior to calling a file system usable in writing data of said request to one or more storage media.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein said method further comprises providing at least two requests of said plurality of requests to the file system of said computing environment in order of receipt of said at least two requests.

5. The method of claim 4, further comprising placing at least two representations of said at least two requests on said ordering queue, prior to said forwarding to enable said providing of said at least two requests in order to said file system.

6. The method of claim 5, further comprising removing at least one representation of said at least two representations from said ordering queue, when at least one request corresponding to said at least one representation has been processed.

7. The method of claim 4, wherein said providing comprises allowing one request of said at least two requests to be processed by said file system, while one or more other requests of said at least two requests wait to be processed.

8. The method of claim 7, further comprising determining which request of said at least two requests is to be processed.

9. The method of claim 7, further comprising processing at least one request of said one or more other requests subsequent to at least initiating processing of said one request allowed to be processed by said file system.

10. The method of claim 9, wherein said processing comprises initiating said at least one request, subsequent to determining said one request allowed to be processed is complete.

11. The method of claim 10, further comprising saving any errors of said one request allowed to be processed, wherein one or more of the any saved errors is reportable to said at least one request.

12. The method of claim 1, further comprising providing one or more errors relating to said request to said client subsequent to forwarding said reply.

13. The method of claim 1, wherein said client is remote from said file server.

14. A system of managing a flow of data between a file server and a client of a computing environment, said system comprising:

a file server of said computing environment adapted to receive a portion of a request sent by a client of said computing environment;

said file server being further adapted to forward to said client a reply indicating receipt of said request, the forwarding being performed prior to fully,;

receiving said request;

wherein said file server is adapted to receive a plurality of requests from the client, said portion of the request being a portion of one request of the plurality of requests; and

wherein said file server is further adapted to maintain request delivery order using an ordering queue associated with a file system of the computing environment to reserve a place for the request notwithstanding forwarding from the file server to the client of the reply indicating receipt of the request at the file server prior to fully receiving the request, said reply causing the client to send another request of the plurality of requests.

15. The system of claim 14, further comprising said file server being adapted to receive more of said request, wherein the receiving of more of said request is performed substantially in parallel with the forwarding of said reply.

16. The system of claim 14, wherein the forwarding is performed prior to calling a file system usable in writing data of said request to one or more storage media.

17. The system of claim 14, wherein said system further comprises means for providing at least two requests of said plurality of requests to the file system of said computing environment in order of receipt of said at least two requests.

18. The system of claim 17, further comprising means for placing at least two representations of said at least two requests on said ordering queue, prior to the forwarding to enable the providing of said at least two requests in order to said file system.

19. The system of claim 18, further comprising means for removing at least one representation of said at least two representations from said ordering queuq, when at least one request corresponding to said at least one representation has been processed.

20. The system of claim 17, wherein said means for providing comprises means for allowing one request of said at least two requests to be processed by said file system, while one or more other requests of said at least two requests wait to be processed.

21. The system of claim 20, further comprising means for determining which request of said at least two requests is to be processed.

22. The system of claim 20, further comprising means for processing at least one request of said one or more other requests subsequent to at least initiating processing of said one request allowed to be processed by said file system.

23. The system of claim 22, wherein said means for processing comprises means for initiating said at least one request, subsequent to determining said one request allowed to be processed is complete.

24. The system of claim 23, further comprising means for saving any errors of said one request allowed to be processed, wherein one or more of the any saved errors is reportable to said at least one request.

25. The system of claim 14, further comprising means for providing one or more errors relating to said request to said file server subsequent to forwarding said reply.

26. The system of claim 14, wherein said client is remote from said file server.

27. At least one program storage device readable by a machine, tangibly embodying at least one program of instructions executable by the machine to perform a method of managing a flow of data between a file server and a client of a computing environment, said method comprising:

receiving, by a file server of said computing environment, a portion of a request sent by a client of said computing environment;

forwarding from said file server to said client a reply indicating receipt of said request, said forwarding being performed prior to fully receiving said request;

wherein said receiving comprises receiving a plurality of requests from the client, said portion of the request being a portion of one request of the plurality of requests; and

said method further comprises maintaining request delivery order at the file server using an ordering queue associated with a file system of the computing environment to reserve a place for the request notwithstanding said forwarding from the file server to the client of the reply indicating receipt of the request at the file server prior to fully receiving said request, said reply causing the client to send another request of the plurality of requests.

28. The at least one program storage device of claim 27, wherein said method further comprises receiving more of said request by said file server, wherein said receiving of more of said request is performed substantially in parallel with said forwarding of said reply.

29. The at least one program storage device of claim 27, wherein said forwarding is performed prior to calling the file system usable in writing data of said request to one or more storage media.

30. The at least one program storage device of claim 27, wherein said method further comprises providing at least two requests of said plurality of requests to the file system of said computing environment in order of receipt of said at least two requests.

31. The at least one program storage device of claim 30, wherein said method further comprises placing at least two representations of said at least two requests on an ordering queue, prior to said forwarding to enable said providing of said at least two requests in order to said file system.

32. The at least one program storage device of claim 31, wherein said method further comprises removing at least one representation of said at least two representations from said ordering queue, when at least one request corresponding to said at least one representation has been processed.

33. The at least one program storage device of claim 30, wherein said providing comprises allowing one request of said at least two requests to be processed by said file system, while one or more other requests of said at least two requests wait to be processed.

34. The at least one program storage device of claim 33, wherein said method further comprises determining which request of said at least two requests is to be processed.

35. The at least one program storage device of claim 33, wherein said method further comprises processing at least one request of said one or more other requests subsequent to at least initiating processing of said one request allowed to be processed by said file system.

36. The at least one program storage device of claim 35, or wherein said processing comprises initiating said at least one request, subsequent to determining said one request allowed to be processed is complete.

37. The at least one program storage device of claim 35, wherein said method further comprises saving any errors of said one request allowed to be processed, wherein one or more of the any saved errors is reportable to said at least one request.

38. The at least one program storage device of claim 27, wherein said method further comprises providing one or more errors relating to said request to said client subsequent to forwarding said reply.

39. The at least one program storage device of claim 27, wherein said client is remote from said file server.