Apparatus for selectively copying at least portions of messages in a distributed computing system

• US 7,937,497 B2
• Filed: 05/31/2007
• Issued: 05/03/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 05/31/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Red Hat, Inc. (International Business Machines Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Red Hat, Inc. (International Business Machines Corporation)
• Inventors: Little, Mark Cameron
• Primary Examiner(s): Harrell; Robert B
• Application Number:
  US11/809,829
• Publication Number:
  US 20080301286A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,433 Days
• Field of Search: 709/203, 709/206, 709/238
• US Class Current: 709/246
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/1402 Saving, restoring, recovering or retrying
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/3636 by tracing the execution of the program
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/366 using diagnostics G06F11/0703 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/546 Message passing systems or structures, e.g. queues

Abstract

A method and apparatus for using a persistent message store in a distributed computing system having a service oriented architecture. A message is detected that is transmitted from a message producer to a message consumer in the distributed computing system having the service oriented architecture. A determination is made as to whether the message should be copied based on at least one predetermined criterion. A copy of the message is generated if the message is to be copied. The copy of the message is stored in the persistent message store.

Claims

1. A method for a service oriented architecture, comprising:

detecting, by a computing device executing a content based router, a message that is transmitted from a message producer to a message consumer in a distributed computing system having a service oriented architecture;

determining whether the message has a specified priority;

determining whether there is an agreement with the message producer for copying messages generated by the message producer;

determining whether there are any message copying restrictions, based at least in part on the agreement; and

if the message has the specified priority, and there is an agreement with the message producer for copying messages, and there are message copying restrictions, performing the following;

identifying, based on a predetermined criterion, portions of the message that are not to be copied;

generating a copy of the message that does not include the portions of the message that are not to be copied; and

sending the copy of the message that does not include the portions of the message that are not to be copied to a persistent message store for storage, wherein the portions of the message that are not to be copied are not stored.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

receiving a request from a requestor to view the copy of the message; and

presenting the copy of the message to the requestor.

3. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

transforming the message from a first format to a second format, the first format understandable to the message producer and the second format understandable to the message consumer, wherein the copy of the message is stored in one of the first format and the second format.

4. The method of claim 1, further comprising searching for the message in the persistent message store based on at least one of a message header, a message context and a message body.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein determining whether the message is to be copied includes analyzing the message with a rules engine that applies one or more rules.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the message producer is at least one of a client and a service, and the message consumer is at least one of a client and a service.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the distributed computing system includes an enterprise service bus for transmitting the message.

8. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

adding information to the copy of the message indicating that the portions of the message that are not to be copied are not included in the copy of the message.

9. The method of claim 8, further comprising:

adding additional information to the copy of the message identifying a reason why the portions of the message were not included in the copy.

10. A non-transitory machine-accessible storage medium including data that, when accessed by a machine, cause the machine to perform a method for a service oriented architecture, comprising:

detecting, by a computing device executing a content based router, a message that is transmitted from a message producer to a message consumer in a distributed computing system having a service oriented architecture;

determining whether the message has a specified priority;

determining whether there is an agreement with the message producer for copying messages generated by the message producer;

determining whether there are any message copying restrictions, based at least in part on the agreement; and

if the message has the specified priority, and there is an agreement with the message producer for copying messages, and there are message copying restrictions, performing the following;

identifying, based on a predetermined criterion, portions of the message that are not to be copied;

generating a copy of the message that does not include the portions of the message that are not to be copied; and

sending the copy of the message that does not include the portions of the message that are not to be copied to a persistent message store for storage, wherein the portions of the message that are not to be copied are not stored.

11. The non-transitory machine-accessible storage medium of claim 10, the method further comprising:

receiving a request from a requestor to view the copy of the message; and

presenting the copy of the message to the requestor.

12. The non-transitory machine-accessible storage medium of claim 10, the method further comprising:

transforming the message from a first format to a second format, the first format understandable to the message producer and the second format understandable to the message consumer, wherein the copy of the message is stored in one of the first format and the second format.

13. The non-transitory machine-accessible storage medium of claim 10, the method further comprising searching for the message in the persistent message store based on at least one of a message header, a message context and a message body.

14. The non-transitory machine-accessible storage medium of claim 10, wherein determining whether the message is to be copied includes analyzing the message with a rules engine that applies one or more rules.

15. The non-transitory machine-accessible storage medium of claim 10, wherein the message producer is at least one of a client and a service, and the message consumer is at least one of a client and a service.

16. The non-transitory machine-accessible storage medium of claim 10, wherein the distributed computing system includes an enterprise service bus for transmitting the message.

17. A distributed computing system, comprising:

a computing device executing instructions for a content based router, networked to a message producer and a message consumer, wherein the instructions cause the computing device to;

intercept a message generated by the message producer;

determine whether the message has a specified priority;

determine whether there is an agreement with the message producer for copying messages generated by the message producer;

determine whether there are any message copying restrictions, based at least in part on the agreement; and

perform the following if the message has the specified priority, and there is an agreement with the message producer for copying messages, and there are message copying restrictions;

identify, based on a predetermined criterion, portions of the message that are not to be copied;

generate a copy of the message that does not include the portions of the message that are not to be copied; and

send the copy of the message that does not include the portions of the message that are not to be copied to a persistent message store for storage, wherein the portions of the message that are not to be copied are not stored.

18. The distributed computing system of claim 17, further comprising:

the persistent message store, coupled with the computing device, to store the copy of the message, wherein the persistent message store further to receive a request from a requestor to view the copy of the message, and to present the copy of the message to the requestor.

19. The distributed computing system of claim 17, further comprising the instructions to cause the computing device to transform the message from a first format to a second format, the first format understandable to the message producer and the second format understandable to the message consumer.

20. The distributed computing system of claim 17, wherein the message producer is at least one of a client and a service, and the message consumer is at least one of a client and a service.

21. The distributed computing system of claim 17, wherein the distributed computing system further comprises:

an enterprise service bus to transmit the message.

22. The distributed computing system of claim 17, further comprising:

the persistent message store, coupled with the computing device, to store the copy of the message, wherein the persistent message store is searched for the message based on at least one of a message header, a message context and a message body.

23. The distributed computing system of claim 17, wherein the computing device includes a rules engine and one or more rules to determine whether the message is to be copied.