Messaging bridge that facilitates communication with a mainframe environment

• US 7,418,711 B1
• Filed: 04/28/2003
• Issued: 08/26/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 04/28/2003
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Sprint Communications Company LP (Deutsche Telekom AG)
• Original Assignee: Sprint Communications Company LP (Deutsche Telekom AG)
• Inventors: Liu, Qi, Lee, Wing, Yang, Kenny
• Primary Examiner(s): Zhen; Li B
• Application Number:
  US10/424,622
• Time in Patent Office: 1,947 Days
• Field of Search: 719/313, 719/314, 709/223
• US Class Current: 719/314
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/544 Buffers; Shared memory; Pipes

Abstract

A system for communication between a mainframe environment and a Java environment. The system can consist of a mainframe messaging system resident in the mainframe environment having an outbound and an inbound queue, a Java messaging system resident in the Java environment having an outbound and an inbound queue, and an intermediate messaging system coupled to the outbound and inbound queues of the mainframe messaging system and coupled to the outbound and inbound queues of the Java messaging system. The Java environment may be a J2EE environment. The mainframe messaging system may be an MQSeries messaging system and the Java messaging system may be a JMS messaging system. The outbound queue of the mainframe messaging system may communicate only messages directed to the Java environment and the inbound queue of the mainframe messaging system may communicate only messages directed from the Java environment.

Claims

1. A system, operation using at least one processor, for communication between a mainframe environment and a client environment comprising:

a mainframe messaging system resident in the mainframe environment configured to communicate messages with the client environment through a sole outbound queue and a sole inbound queue, wherein the sole outbound queue is the only queue for sending messages from the mainframe messaging system to the client environment, and wherein the sole inbound queue is the only queue for receiving messages at the mainframe messaging system from the client environment;

a plurality of client messaging systems resident in the client environment, each of the client messaging systems communicates messages through a corresponding set of queues comprising a sole outbound queue and a sole inbound queue, wherein each of the client messaging systems is configured to send messages to the sole outbound queue and receive messages from the sole inbound queue in the corresponding set of queues;

an intermediate messaging system coupled to the sole outbound queue and the sole inbound queue of the mainframe messaging system and coupled to each of the corresponding set of queues of the client messaging systems, wherein the intermediate messaging system prevents direct communication between the mainframe messaging system and the client messaging systems; and

an administrative interface coupled to the intermediate messaging system that is configured to perform message tracing, monitoring, logging, create status reports, and manage individual queues,

wherein the intermediate messaging system is configured to communicate messages between the plurality of client messaging systems and the mainframe messaging system, and wherein the intermediate messaging system exclusively communicates messages with the sole inbound queue and the sole outbound queue of the mainframe messaging system.

2. The system of claim 1 wherein the intermediate messaging system is only coupled to the mainframe messaging system of the mainframe environment through the sole inbound from the client environment and the sole outbound queue to the client environment.

3. The system of claim 1 wherein the sole outbound queue of the mainframe messaging system communicates all messages directed to all environments outside the mainframe environment and the sole inbound queue of the mainframe messaging system communicates all messages directed from all environments outside the mainframe environment.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein the intermediate messaging system is configured to determine which client messaging system each message on the sole outbound queue of the mainframe messaging system should be delivered.

5. The system of claim 4, wherein the intermediate messaging system is configured to send each message to the sole inbound queue of the determined client messaging system.

6. The system of claim 5, wherein the intermediate messaging system is configured to receive messages from the sole outbound queues of the plurality of client messaging systems and to send the received messages to the sole inbound queue of the mainframe messaging system.

7. The system of claim 1, wherein the intermediate messaging system is configured to act in the manner of a firewall.

8. The system of claim 1, wherein the intermediate messaging system is configured to wrap messages received from client messaging systems in diverse messaging environments such that the messaging systems in the diverse messaging environments send messages in their normal manner.

9. A method for communicating between a mainframe environment and a-client environment comprising:

generating a message from an application in the mainframe environment directed to an application in the client environment;

placing the message in a mainframe messaging system;

sending the message with the mainframe messaging system to an outbound queue of the mainframe messaging system, wherein the outbound queue of the mainframe messaging system is the sole outbound queue from the mainframe messaging system to the client environment;

receiving the message by an intermediate messaging system, wherein the intermediate messaging system exclusively receives messages from the outbound queue of the mainframe messaging system, and wherein the intermediate messaging system prevents direct communication between the mainframe messaging system and the client environment;

consuming the message by the intermediate messaging system from the outbound queue of the mainframe messaging system; and

sending the message to a single inbound queue out of a plurality of inbound queues, wherein each of the plurality of inbound queues corresponds with only one client messaging system that is coupled to the intermediate messaging system;

consuming the message from the single inbound queue by a client messaging system corresponding to the single inbound queue, wherein the client messaging system is coupled to the application in the client environment;

delivering the message with the client messaging system corresponding to the single inbound queue to the application in the client environment; and

performing message tracing, monitoring, logging, create status reports, and manage individual queues with the intermediate messaging system.

10. The method of claim 9 wherein the mainframe messaging system is a different type of messaging system than the client messaging system.

11. The method of claim 9 wherein the intermediate messaging system consumes all messages from the outbound queue of the mainframe messaging system and distributes the messages to a corresponding client messaging system.

12. The method of claim 9, further comprising:

determining the single inbound queue that corresponds to the client messaging system coupled to the application in the client environment.

13. The method of claim 9, further comprising:

performing functions of a firewall with the intermediate messaging system.

14. A method for communicating between a client environment and a mainframe environment comprising:

generating a plurality of messages from applications in the client environment to an application in the mainframe environment;

placing messages from each application in a corresponding client messaging system of a plurality of client messaging systems;

each client messaging system sending a portion of the messages to a sole outbound queue;

receiving the messages from the plurality of client messaging systems through a plurality of the sole outbound queues with an intermediate messaging system;

consuming the messages on the plurality of the sole outbound queues with the intermediate messaging system;

directing the messages to an inbound queue of a mainframe messaging system, wherein the inbound queue of the mainframe messaging system is the sole inbound queue from the client environment to the mainframe messaging system, wherein the intermediate messaging system exclusively sends messages to the inbound queue of the mainframe messaging system, and wherein the intermediate messaging system prevents direct communication between the mainframe messaging system and the client environment;

delivering the message to the mainframe application with the mainframe messaging system; and

performing message tracing, monitoring, logging, creating status reports, and managing individual queues with the intermediate messaging system.

15. The method of claim 14 wherein the client messaging system is a different type of messaging system than the mainframe messaging system.

16. The method of claim 14 wherein the inbound queue on the mainframe messaging system is for receiving all messages directed from environments outside the mainframe environment toward the mainframe environment.

17. The method of claim 14, further comprising:

performing functions of a firewall with the intermediate messaging system.

18. The method of claim 17, further comprising:

wrapping messages that are received from the outbound queues of a portion of the client messaging systems.