Method and arrangement for supressing duplicate network resources

• US 7,747,747 B1
• Filed: 05/06/2002
• Issued: 06/29/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 05/06/2002
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Apple Inc.
• Original Assignee: Apple Inc.
• Inventors: Arnold, Kevin, O'Rourke, David M.
• Primary Examiner(s): Nguyen; Thu
• Assistant Examiner(s): TRUONG, LAN DAI T
• Application Number:
  US10/141,520
• Time in Patent Office: 2,976 Days
• Field of Search: 709/223, 709/226, 709/229, 709/230
• US Class Current: 709/226
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/26 using dedicated tools for LAN [Local Area Network] management
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/5058 Service discovery by the service manager
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 47/82 Miscellaneous aspects
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/1004 Server selection for load balancing

Abstract

A duplicate suppression protocol is introduced in order to suppress duplicate entries from appearing in a list of available network resources. With the duplicate suppression protocol of the present invention, a computer that wishes to query for network resources also asks for duplicate suppression information from the responding network resources. The duplicate suppression information for a particular network resource specifies identifiers associated with that network resource for various protocols. Thus, if a particular network resource responds to more than one network resource request from a single requesting entity, that requesting entity will be able to locate duplicate network resource information. Thus, a single unified list of network resources available for various different protocols may be presented with all duplicate network resources removed.

Claims

1. A method of identifying computer network resources on a computer network and preventing network resource duplication, said method comprising:

receiving a duplicate suppression message for indicating that a network node has different identifiers in different protocols, the duplicate suppression message received from the network node across said computer network, said duplicate suppression message including;

a first identifier that identifies the network node in a first protocol; and

a second identifier that identifies the network node in a second protocol, wherein the first and second identifiers are either strings or hash values of the strings;

receiving a first network resource message from said network node, said first network resource message comprising a third identifier identifying the network node in said first protocol;

receiving a second network resource message from said network node, said second network resource message comprising a fourth identifier identifying the network node in said second protocol, wherein said second resource message does not have identical content to said first resource message; and

in order to prevent network resource duplication, comparing respectively said first and second identifiers in said duplicate suppression message with the third and fourth identifiers in the first and second network resource messages to determine that said first network resource message and said second network resource message are from a single network node.

2. The method of claim 1 further comprising creating a list of network resources, said list of network resources comprising only one entry for said network node.

3. The method of claim 1 further comprising sending a duplicate suppression request.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein said duplicate suppression request is broadcast onto said computer network.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein said broadcast comprises a limited broadcast.

6. The method of claim 5, wherein said limited broadcast comprises a multicast to a subnet.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein said first identifier comprises an alphanumeric string.

8. The method of claim 1 further comprising selecting a preferred protocol between said first protocol and said second protocol.

9. The method of claim 1 further comprising sending a first network resource request.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein:

said first network resource message comprises a string; and

said first identifier comprises a hash of said string.

11. A computer readable medium storing a computer program which when executed by at least one processor identifies computer network resources on a computer network and prevents network resource duplication, the computer program comprising:

a set of instructions for receiving a duplicate suppression message for indicating that a network node has different identifiers in different protocols, the duplicate suppression message received from the network node across said computer network, said duplicate suppression message including;

a first identifier that identifies the network node in a first protocol; and

a second identifier that identifies the network node in a second protocol, wherein the first and second identifiers are either strings or hash values of the strings;

a set of instructions for receiving a first network resource message from said network node, said first network resource message comprising a third identifier identifying the network node in said first protocol;

a set of instructions for receiving a second network resource message from said network node, said second network resource message comprising a fourth identifier identifying the network node in said second protocol, wherein said second resource message does not have identical content to said first resource message; and

a set of instructions for comparing respectively said first and second identifiers in said duplicate suppression message with the third and fourth identifiers in the first and second network resource messages to determine that said first network resource message and said second network resource message are from a single network node in order to prevent network resource duplication.

12. The computer readable medium of claim 11, wherein the computer program further comprises a set of instructions for creating a list of network resources, said list of network resources comprising only one entry for said network node.

13. The computer readable medium of claim 11, wherein the computer program further comprises a set of instructions for sending a duplicate suppression request.

14. The computer readable medium of claim 11, wherein said duplicate suppression request is broadcast onto said computer network.

15. The computer readable medium of claim 14, wherein said broadcast comprises a limited broadcast.

16. The computer readable medium of claim 15, wherein said limited broadcast comprises a multicast to a subnet.

17. The computer readable medium of claim 11, wherein said first identifier comprises an alphanumeric string.

18. The computer readable medium of claim 11, wherein the computer program further comprises a set of instructions for selecting a preferred protocol between said first protocol and said second protocol.

19. The computer readable medium of claim 11, wherein the computer program further comprises a set of instructions for sending a first network resource request.

20. The computer readable medium of claim 11, wherein:

said first network resource message comprises a string; and

said first identifier comprises a hash of said string.

21. The computer readable medium of claim 11, wherein the medium is a computer recordable medium.

22. A duplicate suppression system for identifying resources on a computer network and preventing network resource duplication, said system comprising:

a computer network resource identified by a first name in a first protocol and a second name in a second protocol different than the first; and

a computer for receiving from the computer network resource;

a) a duplicate suppression message for indicating that the resource is identified by the first name in the first protocol and the second name in the second protocol, the duplicate suppression message including (i) a first identifier that identifies the network node in the first protocol and (ii) a second identifier that identifies the network node in the second protocol, wherein the first and second identifiers are either strings or hash values of the strings;

b) a first network response message comprising a third identifier identifying the network node in the first protocol; and

c) a second network response message comprising a fourth identifier identifying the network node in the second protocol,

wherein said computer compares respectively said first and second identifiers in said duplicate suppression message to determine whether said second network response message and said first network response message are redundant in order to prevent network resource duplication.

23. The system of claim 22, wherein said computer broadcasts over said computer network:

a) a duplicate suppression request for soliciting duplicate suppression responses identifying network resources by different names in different protocols;

b) a first network resource request for said first protocol; and

c) a second network resource request for said second protocol.

24. The system of claim 23, wherein said computer network resource receives said duplicate suppression request, said first request, and said second request.

25. A method of identifying network resources on a computer network and preventing duplicate network resources, said method comprising:

from a network node, receiving a first message that includes a first identifier that is an identification of the network node for a first protocol;

from the network node, receiving a second message that includes a second identifier that is an identification of the network node for a second protocol, wherein said first and second identifiers are different;

sending a duplicate suppression request across the computer network;

from the network node, receiving a duplicate suppression message, said duplicate suppression message comprising third and fourth identifiers that provide the identification of the network node respectively in the first and second protocols;

using said third and fourth identifiers in the duplicate suppression message to determine that the first and second identifiers are for the same network node; and

storing only one of the first and second identifiers as an entry for the network node in a list of network resources in order to prevent network resource duplication.

26. The method of claim 25, wherein the first identifier is stored, wherein the first protocol is preferred over the second protocol.

27. A computer readable medium storing a computer program which when executed by at least one processor identifies network resources on a computer network and prevents network resource duplication, the computer program comprising:

a set of instructions for receiving, in a first message from a network node, a first identifier that provides an identification of the network node for a first protocol;

a set of instructions for receiving, in a second message from the network node, a second identifier that provides an identification of the network node for a second protocol, wherein said first and second identifiers are different;

a set of instructions for sending a duplicate suppression request across the computer network;

a set of instructions for receiving a duplicate suppression message from the network node across said computer network, said duplicate suppression message comprising third and fourth identifiers that provide the identification of the network node respectively in the first and second protocols;

a set of instructions for using said third and fourth identifiers in the duplicate suppression message to determine that the first and second identifiers are for the same network node;

a set of instructions for determining which of the first protocol and the second protocol is a preferred protocol; and

a set of instructions for storing one of the first identifier and the second identifier that is an identification of the network node in the preferred protocol as an entry for the network node in a list of network resources in order to prevent network resource duplication.

28. The computer readable medium of claim 27, wherein said computer program further comprises:

a) a set of instructions for sending a first network resource request for said first protocol across the network;

b) a set of instructions for sending a second network resource request for said second protocol across the network.

29. The computer readable medium of claim 27, wherein the computer program further comprises a set of instructions for determining that the first identifier and the second identifier are identifiers of the same network node.

30. The computer readable medium of claim 27, wherein the medium is a computer recordable medium.