Method and apparatus for web caching

• US 6,990,526 B1
• Filed: 05/22/2001
• Issued: 01/24/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 05/22/2000
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Pointred Technologies
• Original Assignee: Pointred Technologies
• Inventors: Zhu, Michael
• Primary Examiner(s): DINH, KHANH Q
• Application Number:
  US09/863,550
• Time in Patent Office: 1,708 Days
• Field of Search: 709/201, 709/204, 709/225, 709/228, 709/227, 709/203, 709/224, 709/220, 707/3, 707/201, 711/141, 711/124, 713/166, 713/163, 705/8, 705/10
• US Class Current: 709/227
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9574 of access to content, e.g. by caching
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/123 received data contents, e.g. message integrity
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/1408 by monitoring network traffic monitoring network traffic per se H04L43/00
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/288 Distributed intermediate devices, i.e. intermediate devices for interaction with other intermediate devices on the same level
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/561 Adding application-functional data or data for application control, e.g. adding metadata
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/564 Enhancement of application control based on intercepted application data
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/5682 Policies or rules for updating, deleting or replacing the stored data

Abstract

A method and apparatus for web caching is disclosed. The method and apparatus may be implemented in hardware, software or firmware. Complementary cache management modules, a coherency module and a cache module(s) are installed complementary gateways for data and for clients respectively. The coherency management module monitors data access requests and or response and determines for each: the uniform resource locator (URL) of the requested web page, the URL of the requestor and a signature. The signature is computed using cryptographic techniques and in particular a hash function for which the input is the corresponding web page for which a signature is to be generated. The coherency management module caches these signatures and the corresponding URL and uses the signatures to determine when a page has been updated. When, on the basis of signature comparisons it is determined that a page has been updated the coherency management module sends a notification to all complementary cache modules. Each cache module caches web pages requested by the associated client(s) to which it is coupled. The notification from the cache management module results in the cache module(s) which are the recipient of a given notice updating their tag table with a stale bit for the associated web page. The cache module(s) use this information in the associated tag tables to determine which pages they need to update. The cache modules initiate this update during intervals of reduced activity in the servers, gateways, routers, or switches of which they are a part. All clients requesting data through the system of which each cache module is a part are provided by the associated cache module with cached copies of requested web pages.

Claims

1. A system for caching of data for a plurality of clients coupled to at least one data source with data resources each identified by a corresponding uniform resource locator (URL);

and the system comprising;

at least one cache module coupled to selected clients among the plurality of clients to cache data resources requested by the selected clients along with corresponding URLs, and the at least one cache module responsive to update messages identifying URLs of data resources requiring an update, to tag cached copies of the data resources identified in the update messages with a “

stale”

tag to indicate a lack of coherency between the cached copies and originals of the data resources in the at least one data source;

a coherency management module coupled to the at least one data source to monitor data resource copies supplied by the at least one data source in response to requests by the selected clients and to send to the at least one cache module the update messages identifying each URL for which successive requested copies of the corresponding data resource differ from one another;

wherein the at least one cache module includes a first cache module coupled to a first set of selected clients among the plurality of clients and a second cache module coupled to a second set of selected clients among the plurality of clients; and

wherein further the coherency management module includes;

a logger to maintain a log table which correlates the first cache module with the URLs requested by the first set of selected clients and the second cache module with the URL'"'"'s requested by the second set of selected clients;

a signature generator to generate a digital signature for each data resource copy supplied by the at least one data source in response to requests by the first and the second sets of selected clients;

a signature cache to cache the digital signatures generated by the signature generator along with corresponding URLs and to tag with the stale tag each URL for which successive digital signatures for the corresponding data resource differ from one another; and

an updater to send update messages to a corresponding one of the first and second cache module associated with URLs in the log table for which the corresponding signature in the signature cache includes the stale tag and the updater to remove the corresponding stale tags from the signature cache upon sending the update messages.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein the at least one cache module further comprises:

an update fetcher to fetch an update from the at least one data source of cached copies tagged with a “

stale”

tag.

3. The system of claim 1, wherein the at least one cache module further comprises:

an update scheduler to schedule data resource updates to correspond with an availability of the at least one cache module; and

an update fetcher responsive to a data resource update scheduled by the update scheduler to fetch updates from the at least one data source of cached copies of the data resources marked with the “

stale”

tag.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein the coherency management module further comprises:

a signature generator to generate a digital signature for each data resource copy supplied by the at least one data source in response to requests by the selected clients;

a signature cache to cache the digital signatures generated by the signature generator along with corresponding URLs, and to tag with the stale tag each URL for which successive digital signatures for the corresponding data resource differ from one another; and

an updater to send update messages to the at least one cache module for those digital signatures with corresponding URLs tagged with the stale tag and to remove the corresponding stale tags from the signature cache upon sending the update messages.

5. The system of claim 4, wherein the digital signature comprises a hash of the corresponding data resource.

6. The system of claim 1, wherein the data resource comprises a web page.

7. The system of claim 1, with coherency management module located within at least one of a server, a gateway, a router and a switch, coupled to the data source.

8. The system of claim 1, wherein the at least one cache module comprises a plurality of cache modules each coupled to corresponding ones of the plurality of clients and each responsive to the update messages from the coherency management module to tag with the stale tag the corresponding cached copies of the data resources identified in the update messages.

9. A method for caching data for a plurality of clients coupled to at least one data source with data resources each identified by a corresponding uniform resource locators (URL);

and the method comprising the acts of;

caching the data resources together with corresponding URLs requested by the selected clients among the plurality of clients;

generating update messages identifying in the requests from the selected clients each URL for which successive requested copies of the corresponding data resource supplied by the at least one data source differ from one another, wherein the generating act further comprises the acts of;

creating a digital signature for each data resource copy supplied by the at least one data source in response to requests from the selected clients;

caching the digital signatures created in the creating act together with a corresponding URL;

labeling with the “

stale”

tag each corresponding URL for which successive digital signatures cached in the act of caching digital signatures differ from one another;

producing update messages identifying each URL labeled with a stale tag in the act of labeling; and

removing the stale tags from the URLs identified in the update messages produced in the aci of producing; and

tagging with a “

stale”

tag the cached copies of the data resources cached in the caching act and identified in the update messages generated in the generating act, and with the stale tag indicating a lack of coherency between the tagged cached copy and corresponding original of the data resource in the at least one data source.

10. The method of claim 9, further comprising the act of:

fetching from the at least one data source updated copies of data resources cached in the caching act and tagged in the tagging act with a stale tag.

11. The method of claim 9, further comprising the acts of:

scheduling data resource updates; and

fetching in response to a data resource update scheduled in the scheduling act, updated copies from the at least one data source of data resources cached in the caching act and tagged in the tagging act with a stale tag.

12. The method of claim 9, wherein each digital signature created in the act of creating comprises a hash of the corresponding data resource copy.

13. The method of claim 9, wherein the caching act further comprises the act of:

storing the cached data resources together with corresponding URLs at discrete locations each associated with a corresponding subset of the selected clients among the plurality of clients.

14. The method of claim 13, wherein the generating act further comprises the acts of:

maintaining a log table which correlates each discrete location of cached data resources with the URLs requested by the corresponding subset of the selected clients associated with each discrete location;

creating a digital signature for each data resource copy supplied by the at least one data source in response to requests from the first and the second sets of selected clients;

caching the digital signatures created in the creating act together with a corresponding URL;

labeling with the “

stale”

tag each corresponding URL for which successive digital signatures cached in the act of caching digital signatures differ from one another;

producing update messages which identify URLs labeled with a stale tag in the act of labeling;

targeting update messages produced in the act of producing to the discrete locations using the log table maintained in the act of maintaining to correlate each URL identified in the update messages with at least one of the discrete locations; and

removing the stale tags from the URLs identified in the update messages produced in the act of producing.

15. The method of claim 9, wherein the data resource comprises a web page.

16. Computer software, tangibly embodied in a computer-readable medium for caching data for a plurality of clients coupled to at least one data source with data resources each identified by a corresponding uniform resource locators (URL);

and the software comprising instructions to perform the following operations;

caching the data resources together with corresponding URLs requested by the selected clients among the plurality of clients;

generating update messages identifying in the requests from the selected clients each URL for which successive requested copies of the corresponding data resource supplied by the at least one data source differ from one another, wherein the generating act further comprises the acts of;

creating a digital signature for each data resource copy supplied by the at least one data source in response to requests from the selected clients;

caching the digital signatures created in the creating act together with a corresponding URL;

labeling with the “

stale”

tag each corresponding URL for which successive digital signatures cached in the act of caching digital signatures differ from one another;

producing update messages identifying each URL labeled with a stale tag in the act of labeling;

removing the stale tags from the URLs identified in the update messages produced in the act of producing; and

tagging with a “

stale”

tag the cached copies of the data resources cached in the caching act and identified in the update messages generated in the generating act, and with the stale tag indicating a lack of coherency between the tagged cached copy and corresponding original of the data resource in the at least one data source.

17. The software of claim 16, further comprising instructions for:

fetching from the at least one data source, updated copies of data resources cached in the caching act and tagged in the tagging act with a stale tag.

18. The software of claim 16, further comprising instructions for:

scheduling data resource updates; and

fetching in response to a data resource update scheduled in the scheduling act, updated copies from the at least one data source of data resources cached in the caching act and tagged in the tagging act with a stale tag.