Method for buffering work requests

• US 7,366,801 B2
• Filed: 01/30/2004
• Issued: 04/29/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 01/30/2004
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Zou, Chendong, Mathrubutham, Ramani, Sathye, Adwait
• Primary Examiner(s): Kindred; Alford
• Assistant Examiner(s): Unelus; Ernest
• Application Number:
  US10/768,581
• Publication Number:
  US 20050172054A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,551 Days
• Field of Search: 710/57, 710/56, 711/3
• US Class Current: 710/52
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/00 Administration; Management

Abstract

Disclosed is a technique for buffering work requests. It is determined that a work request is about to be placed into an in-memory structure. When the in-memory structure is not capable of storing the work request, a work request ordering identifier for the work request is stored into an overflow structure. When the in-memory structure is capable of storing the work request, a recovery stub is generated for the work request ordering identifier, and the recovery stub is stored into the in-memory structure.

Claims

1. A method for buffering work requests, comprising:

determining that a work request is about to be placed into an in-memory structure for a business process, wherein the work request includes a work request ordering identifier that indicates an order in which the work request was received, a structure identifier that provides access to the work request stored in one or more transport structures, and data;

determining whether the in-memory structure is capable of storing the work request and whether one or more work request ordering identifiers are stored in an overflow structure for the business process;

in response to determining that either the in-memory structure is not capable of storing the work request or one or more work request ordering identifiers are stored in the overflow structure for the business process, storing the work request ordering identifier for the work request into the overflow structure for the business process, wherein work requests for at least one other business process that is not in an overflow state and does not have any work request ordering identifiers stored in another overflow structure for that business process are capable of being stored in an in-memory structure for that business process without interruption; and

in response to determining that the in-memory structure is subsequently capable of storing the work request having the work request ordering identifier that was stored in the overflow structure, storing the work request into the in-memory structure for the business process based on the work request ordering identifier stored in the overflow structure by;

determining that a different work request has been removed from the in-memory structure;

generating a recovery stub for the work request ordering identifier for the work request, wherein the recovery stub includes the work request ordering identifier and the structure identifier that provides access to the work request including data stored in the one or more transport structures; and

storing the recovery stub into the in-memory structure.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the in-memory structure is not capable of storing the work request when a maximum limit of work requests has been reached.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein there are multiple in-memory structures and further comprising:

determining that the maximum limit has been reached for a predetermined number of the multiple in-memory structures; and

sending one or more notifications to one or more client applications that additional work requests are not to be sent.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the in-memory structure is not capable of storing the work request when one or more work request ordering identifiers reside in the overflow structure.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein a blocking type is associated with the in-memory structure and further comprising:

when the in-memory structure is not capable of storing the work request,

if the blocking type is set to non-blocking, storing the work request ordering identifier into the overflow structure; and

if the blocking type is set to blocking, sending a notification that additional work requests are not to be sent.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the work request is sent from a publisher to a subscriber.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein the subscriber retrieves the work request from the in-memory structure.