Method and approach to hosting versioned web services

• US 8,037,025 B2
• Filed: 03/29/2010
• Issued: 10/11/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 07/06/2007
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: GlobalFoundries, Inc.
• Original Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
• Inventors: Lam, Linh Hue, Fang, Ru, Vignola, Christopher P, Frank, David C, Fong, Liana Liyow
• Primary Examiner(s): Hashemi; Sana Al
• Application Number:
  US12/749,303
• Publication Number:
  US 20100185902A1
• Time in Patent Office: 561 Days
• Field of Search: 707/795, 707/796, 707/802, 707/637, 707/638
• US Class Current: 707/638
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/02 based on web technology, e.g. hypertext transfer protocol [HTTP]

Abstract

A method for hosting versioned web services includes steps of: receiving a request from a service requestor, the request comprising version metadata; parsing the request; extracting the version metadata from the parsing step; and locating a target implementation version using the version metadata. If the target implementation version is located, the method proceeds by dynamically routing the versioned request to the target implementation version.

Claims

1. A method for hosting versioned web services, comprising steps of:

using an information processing device for producing;

a description of service interface characteristics of a web service, wherein the service interface characteristics include operations, parameters, results, and behavior of the interface;

an implementation version for supporting an interface version, said implementation version comprising version metadata describing the supported interface version supported and any set of other compatible supported interface versions; and

a service proxy for a version group, wherein the service proxy is a local gateway to a collection of implementation versions of the web service and provides a target destination for service interface requests for all versions of the web service;

receiving a service interface request from a service requestor, the request comprising;

version metadata describing a supported interface version and any set of other compatible supported interface versions for the web service, wherein said supported interface version describes and applies to a service interface operations, parameters, and results of the web service;

parsing the service interface request;

extracting the version metadata from the parsing step;

invoking a version management controller, through its version mapping application program interface, to determine a correct target and to parse the service request;

dynamically mapping the supported interface version from the extracted version metadata to a implementation target version at a target destination; and

dynamically routing the service interface request to the target destination.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein the locating step comprises:

invoking a version selection algorithm to select the target implementation version; and

receiving from the version selection algorithm a service context and the implementation version corresponding to the request.

3. The method of claim 1 wherein the step of dynamically routing comprises routing the service interface request through a service bus to an endpoint of the target implementation version.

4. The method of claim 2 further comprising steps of:

creating a new version group member when a new implementation version of a service is installed;

and adding its version metadata to an existing hosting configuration to preserve configuration settings, wherein said configuration settings are used for mapping.

5. The method of claim 4 further comprising a step of adding attributes comprising a contract version, an implementation version, and its associated implementation endpoint, and tunable parameters comprising an active interface set, a version state, and a default indicator to the version metadata.

6. The method of claim 5 wherein the version metadata can be extended to comprise other attributes.

7. The method of claim 6 wherein the version metadata comprises time-based version routing parameters.

8. The method of claim 6 wherein the attributes can be modified to control system version selection behavior.

9. The method of claim 1 further comprising a step of:

returning an error to the service requestor if the target implementation version is not located.

10. The method of claim 1 wherein the steps are performed at runtime.

11. A computer program product tangibly embodied on a computer readable storage medium and comprising code that, when executed by an information processing apparatus, enables a computer to:

provide a description of service interface characteristics of a web service;

provide an implementation version for supporting an interface version said implementation version comprising version metadata describing the supported interface version supported and any set of other compatible supported interface versions; and

provide a service proxy for a version group, wherein the service proxy is a local gateway to a collection of implementation versions of the web service and provides a target destination for service interface requests for all versions of the web service;

receive a request from a service requestor, the request comprising version metadata describing a supported interface version and any set of other compatible supported interface versions for the web service, describes and applies to a service interface operations, parameters, and results of the web service;

parse the service interface request;

extract the version metadata from the parsing step;

invoke a version management controller, through its version mapping application program interface, to determine a correct target and to parse the service request;

dynamically map the supported interface version from the extracted version metadata to a implementation target version at a target destination;

and dynamically route the service interface request to the target destination.

12. A method for providing a service for routing versioned service requests, the method comprising steps of:

receiving a service interface request from a service requestor, the request comprising;

version metadata describing a supported interface version and any set of other compatible supported interface versions for the web service, wherein said supported interface version describes and applies to a service interface operations, parameters, and results of the web service;

providing a description of service interface characteristics of a web service;

providing an implementation version for supporting an interface version, said implementation version comprising version metadata describing the supported interface version supported and any set of other compatible supported interface versions; and

providing a service proxy for a version group, wherein the service proxy is a local gateway to a collection of implementation versions of the web service and provides a target destination for service interface requests for all versions of the web service;

parsing the service interface request;

extracting the version metadata from the parsing step;

invoking a version management controller, through its version mapping application program interface, to determine a correct target and to parse the service request;

dynamically mapping the supported interface version from the extracted version metadata to a implementation target version at a target destination; and

dynamically routing the service interface request to the target destination.

13. The service of claim 12 further comprising a step of:

dynamically routing the service interface request to the target destination.