Method and apparatus for a client connection manager

• US 7,991,870 B1
• Filed: 10/31/2007
• Issued: 08/02/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 08/15/2002
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Digi International Inc.
• Original Assignee: Digi International Inc.
• Inventors: Allred, Curtis M., Schwartz, Elliot
• Primary Examiner(s): Bruckart; Benjamin R
• Application Number:
  US11/981,311
• Time in Patent Office: 1,371 Days
• Field of Search: 709/223
• US Class Current: 709/223
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0654 using network fault recovery ring fault isolation or reconfiguration in loop networks without recovery actions by a network management system H04L12/437
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/0823 Errors, e.g. transmission errors
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 61/2564 for a higher-layer protocol, e.g. for session initiation protocol [SIP]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 61/2567 for reachability, e.g. inquiring the address of a correspondent behind a NAT server
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/02 for separating internal from external traffic, e.g. firewalls
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/0209 Architectural arrangements, e.g. perimeter networks or demilitarized zones
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/029 Firewall traversal, e.g. tunnelling or, creating pinholes
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/14 Session management for real-time applications in data packet communications networks H04L65/1066
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/142 Managing session states for stateless protocols; Signalling session states; State transitions; Keeping-state mechanisms
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/145 avoiding end of session, e.g. keep-alive, heartbeats, resumption message or wake-up for inactive or interrupted session
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/2895 Intermediate processing functionally located close to the data provider application, e.g. reverse proxies
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/563 Data redirection of data network streams
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/568 Storing data temporarily at an intermediate stage, e.g. caching
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/14 Multichannel or multilink protocols
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/16 Implementation or adaptation of Internet protocol [IP], of transmission control protocol [TCP] or of user datagram protocol [UDP]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/161 Implementation details of TCP/IP or UDP/IP stack architecture; Specification of modified or new header fields
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/163 In-band adaptation of TCP data exchange; In-band control procedures

Abstract

A method and apparatus for a connection manager have been disclosed. By providing for persistent connections with clients, the connection manager allows for servers to communicate with clients, which would otherwise be inaccessible.

Claims

1. A method comprising:

establishing a connection;

maintaining the connection in an active state, or a non-active state selected from the group consisting of inactive, and sleep;

establishing a connection state table wherein the connection state table is a plurality of tables, at least one table for an active connection, and at least one table for a non-active connection;

spawning a low priority thread to search at least one of the plurality of tables; and

reviving a non-active connection.