Performing an action in response to a file system event

• US 7,921,076 B2
• Filed: 12/15/2004
• Issued: 04/05/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 12/15/2004
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Oracle International Corporation (Oracle Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Oracle International Corporation (Oracle Corporation)
• Inventors: Hoang, Thuvan, Sedlar, Eric, Tarachandani, Asha, Jain, Namit, Idicula, Sam, Murthy, Ravi, Agarwal, Nipun
• Primary Examiner(s): Le; Debbie
• Assistant Examiner(s): Mobin; Hasanul
• Application Number:
  US11/014,502
• Publication Number:
  US 20060129584A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,302 Days
• Field of Search: None
• US Class Current: 707/609
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/10 File systems; File servers
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/542 Event management; Broadcasting; Multicasting; Notifications

Abstract

A method and apparatus for performing an action in response to a file system event is provided. According to one aspect, sets of “event listeners” are associated with a file hierarchy and/or the nodes thereof. Each event listener contains a set of “event handlers.” Each event handler corresponds to a separate type of event that may occur relative to the file hierarchy'"'"'s nodes. When an event is going to occur relative to the hierarchy or a node thereof, all event listeners that are associated with that hierarchy/node are inspected to determine whether those event listeners contain any event handlers that correspond to the event'"'"'s type. Those event handlers that correspond to the event'"'"'s type are placed in an ordered list of event handlers to be invoked. As the event handlers in the list are invoked, programmatic mechanisms that correspond to those event handlers are executed to perform customized user-specified actions.

Claims

1. A method comprising:

a server detecting that a file system event has occurred or is going to occur relative to a node within a file system; and

in response to the server detecting that the file system event has occurred or is going to occur relative to the node, the server performing steps comprising;

determining that a first specified condition and a second specified condition are associated with the file system event in a configuration file;

in response to determining that the first specified condition and the second specified condition are associated with the file system event in the configuration file, reading, from the configuration file, data that defines the first specified condition and the second specified condition;

determining whether the first specified condition and the second specified condition are satisfied;

wherein determining whether the first specified condition and the second specified condition are satisfied comprises;

evaluating a first path-based expression that is specified in the configuration file as a part of said first specified condition, wherein the first path-based expression evaluates to either true or false; and

evaluating a second path-based expression that is specified in the configuration file as part of said second specified condition, wherein the second path-based expression evaluates to either true or false;

determining that the first specified condition is satisfied, but the second specified condition is not satisfied;

in response to determining that the first specified condition is satisfied, performing a first user-specified action that is associated with the first specified condition in the configuration file;

wherein a second user-specified action is associated with the second specified condition in the configuration file, and wherein the second user-specified action is different from the first user-specified action;

wherein the method is performed by one or more computing devices.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein determining whether the first specified condition and the second specified condition are satisfied is not based on any information that is a target of any operation that caused or will cause the file system event.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the configuration file reflects that the first user-specified action is to be performed in response to an occurrence of the file system event relative to the node specifically rather than any other node in the file system, and wherein the configuration file additionally reflects at least one other action that is to be performed in response to an occurrence of another event relative to any unspecified node in the file system rather than a specified node.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the configuration file is an extensible markup language (XML) file, and wherein the first specified condition is in the XML file between two pre-condition XML tags.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein the first path-based expression is specified in the XML file between two XPath tags that occur in between the two pre-condition XML tags.

9. The method of claim 7, wherein the XML file specifies a namespace that is indicated between the two pre-condition XML tags.

21. The method of claim 1, wherein evaluating a first path-based expression comprises determining that a node exists at a specified path.

4. A method comprising:

detecting that a particular type of file system event has occurred or is going to occur relative to a node within a file system;

in response to detecting that the particular type of file system event has occurred or is going to occur relative to the node, determining three or more event handlers that are associated with the particular type of file system event as specified in a configuration file;

determining an invocation order of the three or more event handlers that ace is specified in the configuration file; and

invoking at least one of the three or more event handlers according to the invocation order, wherein the at least one of the three or more event handlers changes the invocation order of at least one other of the three or more event handlers to an order that differs from the invocation order that is specified in the configuration file;

wherein the method is performed by one or more computing devices.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein at least one of the three or more event handlers removes one or more event handlers from the three or more event handlers that are to be invoked.

6. The method of claim 4, further comprising:

invoking at least one of the three or more event handlers according to the invocation order after at least one of the three or more event handlers has changed the invocation order.

10. The method of claim 4, wherein the configuration file is an extensible markup language (XML) file that specifies the invocation order by listing, for each of the three or more event handlers, a corresponding XML tag;

wherein the corresponding XML tags are listed in an order that reflects the invocation order.

11. A non-transitory computer-readable storage that stores instructions which, when executed by one or more processors, cause the one of more processors to perform the steps of:

a server detecting that a file system event has occurred or is going to occur relative to a node within a file system; and

in response to the server detecting that the file system event has occurred or is going to occur relative to the node, the server performing steps comprising;

determining that a first specified condition and a second specified condition are associated with the file system event in a configuration file;

in response to determining that the first specified condition and the second specified condition are associated with the file system event in the configuration file, reading, from the configuration file, data that defines the first specified condition and the second specified condition;

determining whether the first specified condition and the second specified condition are satisfied;

wherein determining whether the first specified condition and the second specified condition are satisfied comprises;

evaluating a first path-based expression that is specified in the configuration file as a part of said first specified condition, wherein the first path-based expression evaluates to either true or false; and

evaluating a second path-based expression that is specified in the configuration file as a part of said second specified condition, wherein the second path-based expression evaluates to either true or false;

determining that the first specified condition is satisfied, but the second specified condition is not satisfied;

in response to determining that the specified condition is satisfied, performing an action that is specified in the configuration file.

12. The computer-readable storage of claim 11, wherein determining whether the first specified condition and the second specified condition are satisfied is not based on any information that is a target of any operation that caused or will cause the file system event.

13. The computer-readable storage of claim 11, wherein the configuration file reflects that the first user-specified action is to be performed in response to an occurrence of the file system event relative to the node specifically rather than any other node in the file system, and wherein the configuration file additionally reflects at least one other action that is to be performed in response to an occurrence of another event relative to any unspecified node in the file system rather than a specified node.

14. The computer-readable storage of claim 11, wherein the configuration file is an extensible markup language (XML) file, and wherein the first specified condition is in the XML file between two pre-condition XML tags.

15. The computer-readable storage of claim 14, wherein the first path-based expression is specified in the XML file between two XPath tags that occur in between the two pre-condition XML tags.

16. The computer-readable storage of claim 14, wherein the XML file specifies a namespace that is indicated between the two pre-condition XML tags.

22. The computer-readable storage of claim 11, wherein evaluating a first path-based expression comprises determining that a node exists at a specified path.

17. A non-transitory computer-readable storage that stores instructions which, when executed by one or more processors, cause the one of more processors to perform the steps of:

detecting that a particular type of file system event has occurred or is going to occur relative to a node within a file system;

in response to detecting that the particular type of file system event has occurred or is going to occur relative to the node, determining three or more event handlers that are associated with the particular type of file system event as specified in a configuration file;

determining an invocation order of the three or more event handlers that are is specified in the configuration file; and

invoking at least one of the three or more event handlers according to the invocation order, wherein the at least one of the three or more event handlers changes the invocation order of at least one other of the three or more event handlers to an order that differs from the invocation order that is specified within the configuration file.

18. The computer-readable storage of claim 17, wherein at least one of the three or more event handlers removes one or more event handlers from the three or more event handlers that are to be invoked.

19. The computer-readable storage of claim 17, wherein the steps further comprise:

invoking at least one of the three or more event handlers according to the invocation order after at least one of the three or more event handlers has changed the invocation order.

20. The computer-readable storage of claim 17, wherein the configuration file is an extensible markup language (XML) file that specifies the invocation order by listing, for each of the two or more event handlers, a corresponding XML tag;

wherein the corresponding XML tags are listed in an order that reflects the invocation order.