System and method for layered application server processing

• US 8,838,669 B2
• Filed: 02/05/2009
• Issued: 09/16/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 02/08/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Oracle International Corporation (Oracle Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Oracle International Corporation (Oracle Corporation)
• Inventors: Cable, Laurence Paul Gildea
• Primary Examiner(s): Nguyen, Phuoc
• Assistant Examiner(s): Belani, Kishin G
• Application Number:
  US12/366,564
• Publication Number:
  US 20090271498A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,049 Days
• Field of Search: 709/219, 709/201
• US Class Current: 709/201
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/45537 Provision of facilities of other operating environments, e.g. WINE I/O emulation G06F13/105
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/10 in which an application is distributed across nodes in the network software deployment G06F8/60; multiprogramming arrangements G06F9/46
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99931 Database or file accessing
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99932 Access augmentation or optimizing

Abstract

A system and method for layered application server processing. Embodiments of the system are particularly useful in extreme transaction processing (XTP) environments to support hundreds of thousands of simultaneous users, and perhaps millions of simultaneous transactions. Applications can be built from service components. Mashups can be performed on applications, services, and data, to create a more dynamic form of application. Data center consolidation and server virtualization techniques can be used to distribute applications over multiple machines or data centers. A horizontal Operating System (OS) fabric is then used to integrate components of the data centers in a dynamic fashion, including for example integrating portal or Service Component Architecture (SCA) components into personality profiles that can be federated over many (e.g. thousands) of Java machines and data centers. The net result is that the system can be quickly and dynamically modified or distributed over different machines and different applications, even over distances of different continents, to respond to the immediate needs of the enterprise.

Claims

1. A system for layered application server processing, comprising:

a plurality of computer servers or data centers, wherein each computer server or data center comprises a computer server hardware and a layered application server environment, including a Java virtual machine,

a server virtualization layer that abstracts the Java virtual machine from the computer server hardware,

one or more hosting engines that provide a modularized operating system instance,

a personalization layer that enables different personas to be associated with the application server environment at that computer server or data center, and

an application layer for executing Java-based software applications;

wherein personas can be selectively adopted by the application server environments at the plurality of computer servers or data centers and used to provide a server cloud that is then used by a deployed Java-based software application to execute upon and share the resources of several computer servers or data centers, including, for each computer server or data center, configuring that computer server or data center to adopt a particular persona, and

configuring the deployed software application to take advantage of the particular persona, so that processing of the deployed software application is distributed over those several computer servers or data centers which have the particular persona; and

wherein each of the computer servers or data centers resources can be utilized by peer computer servers or data centers by configuring the server cloud to make use of an underlying computer server or data center resource topology, and

dynamically allocating application runtime across the resource topology, to distribute processing capability as needed for a particular application across one or more of the peer computer servers or data centers, including dynamically moving processing capability as needed to the one or more peer computer servers or data centers, for a particular time interval.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein each of the one or more hosting engines provide an OSGi modularized operating system instance.

3. The system of claim 1, wherein each of the personas are one or more of Java Enterprise Edition or Spring.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein the plurality of computer servers or data centers personas are distributed over a plurality of different geographic locations, and wherein the Java-based software application is deployed to run within the cloud to take advantage of the particular persona, and is then processed by the plurality of computer servers or data centers in the different geographic locations having the particular persona.

5. The system of claim 4, wherein the Java-based software application deployed to run within the cloud and processed by the plurality of computer servers or data centers in the different geographic locations can be dynamically allocated to the different computer servers or data centers according to a configuration, and the available processing capability at the different geographic locations at different points in time.

6. The system of claim 1, wherein each of the peer computer servers or data centers shares applications and draws upon the resources of its peer as necessary, including wherein when one peer computer server or data center needs increased processing power to handle a set of tasks it can use the computing resources of another peer computer server or data center, if those resources are available, to help it to perform the tasks.

7. The system of claim 1, wherein the system includes one or more servers in a waiting state, so that additional servers can be used on demand to handle processor intensive tasks.

8. A method for layered application server processing, comprising the steps of:

providing a plurality of computer servers or data centers, wherein each computer server or data center comprises a computer server hardware and a layered application server environment, including a Java virtual machine,

a server virtualization layer that abstracts the Java virtual machine from the computer server hardware,

one or more hosting engines that provide a modularized operating system instance,

a personalization layer that enables different personas to be associated with the application server environment at that computer server or data center, and

an application layer for executing Java-based software applications;

wherein personas can be selectively adopted by the application server environments at the plurality of computer servers or data centers and used to provide a server cloud that is then used by a deployed Java-based software application to execute upon and share the resources of several computer servers or data centers, including, for each computer server or data center, configuring that computer server or data center to adopt a particular persona, and deploying a Java-based software application to run within the cloud, including configuring the deployed software application to take advantage of the particular persona, so that processing of the deployed software application is distributed over those several computer servers or data centers which have the particular persona; and

wherein each of the computer servers or data centers resources can be utilized by peer computer servers or data centers by configuring the server cloud to make use of an underlying computer server or data center resource topology, and

dynamically allocating application runtime across the resource topology, to distribute processing capability as needed for a particular application across one or more of the peer computer servers or data centers, including dynamically moving processing capability as needed to the one or more peer computer servers or data centers, for a particular time interval.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein each of the one or more hosting engines provide an OSGi modularized operating system instance.

10. The method of claim 8, wherein each of the personas are one or more of Java Enterprise Edition or Spring.

11. The method of claim 8, wherein the plurality of computer servers or data centers personas are distributed over a plurality of different geographic locations, and wherein the Java-based software application is deployed to run within the cloud to take advantage of the particular persona, and is then processed by the plurality of computer servers or data centers in the different geographic locations having the particular persona.

12. The method of claim 11, wherein the Java-based software application deployed to run within the cloud and processed by the plurality of computer servers or data centers in the different geographic locations can be dynamically allocated to the different computer servers or data centers according to a configuration, and the available processing capability at the different geographic locations at different points in time.

13. A non-transitory computer readable medium including instructions stored thereon which when read and executed by one or more computers cause the one or more computers to perform the steps comprising:

providing a plurality of computer servers or data centers, wherein each computer server or data center comprises a computer server hardware and a layered application server environment, including a Java virtual machine,

a server virtualization layer that abstracts the Java virtual machine from the computer server hardware,

one or more hosting engines that provide a modularized operating system instance, a personalization layer that enables different personas to be associated with the application server environment at that computer server or data center, and

an application layer for executing Java-based software applications;

wherein personas can be selectively adopted by the application server environments at the plurality of computer servers or data centers and used to provide a server cloud that is then used by a deployed Java-based software application to execute upon and share the resources of several computer servers or data centers, including, for each computer server or data center, configuring that computer server or data center to adopt a particular persona, and

deploying a Java-based software application to run within the cloud, including configuring the deployed software application to take advantage of the particular persona, so that processing of the deployed software application is distributed over those several computer servers or data centers which have the particular persona; and

wherein each of the computer servers or data centers resources can be utilized by peer computer servers or data centers by

configuring the server cloud to make use of an underlying computer server or data center resource topology, and

dynamically allocating application runtime across the resource topology, to distribute processing capability as needed for a particular application across one or more of the peer computer servers or data centers, including dynamically moving processing capability as needed to the one or more peer computer servers or data centers, for a particular time interval.

14. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 13, wherein each of the one or more hosting engines provide an OSGi modularized operating system instance.

15. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 13, wherein each of the personas are one or more of Java Enterprise Edition or Spring.

16. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 13, wherein the plurality of computer servers or data centers personas are distributed over a plurality of different geographic locations, and wherein the Java-based software application is deployed to run within the cloud to take advantage of the particular persona, and is then processed by the plurality of computer servers or data centers in the different geographic locations having the particular persona.

17. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 16, wherein the Java-based software application deployed to run within the cloud and processed by the plurality of computer servers or data centers in the different geographic locations can be dynamically allocated to the different computer servers or data centers according to a configuration, and the available processing capability at the different geographic locations at different points in time.