Network communication and cost awareness

• US 9,344,335 B2
• Filed: 09/09/2011
• Issued: 05/17/2016
• Est. Priority Date: 09/09/2011
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Inventors: Khalid, Suhail, Corradini, Alexander, Ziller, Michael A., Rao, Ravi T., Thaler, David G., Ritz, Andrew J.
• Primary Examiner(s): Meky, Moustafa M
• Application Number:
  US13/229,499
• Publication Number:
  US 20130067061A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,712 Days
• Field of Search: 709200-203, 709217-227, 709/228
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/06 Resources, workflows, human or project management; Enterprise or organisation planning; Enterprise or organisation modelling
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/1421 Indication of expected costs
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0893 Assignment of logical groups to network elements
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0894 Policy-based network configuration management
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0896 Bandwidth or capacity management, i.e. automatically increasing or decreasing capacities flow or congestion control using dynamic resource allocation, e.g. in-call renegotiation, H04L47/76
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/0876 Network utilisation, e.g. volume of load or congestion level
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/16 Threshold monitoring
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/20 for managing network security; network security policies in general filtering policies H04L63/0227
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/02 based on web technology, e.g. hypertext transfer protocol [HTTP]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/34 involving the movement of software or configuration parameters network booting or remote initial program loading [RIPL] G06F9/4416
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/321 Interlayer communication protocols or service data unit [SDU] definitions; Interfaces between layers
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/237 Communication with additional data server
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/23805 Controlling the feeding rate to the network, e.g. by controlling the video pump
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/2743 Video hosting of uploaded data from client
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/44204 Monitoring of content usage, e.g. the number of times a movie has been viewed, copied or the amount which has been watched monitoring of user activities for profile generation for accessing a video database G06F16/739; protecting generic digital content where the protection is independent of the precise nature of the content G06F21/10; arrangements for monitoring the use made of the broadcast services in broadcast systems H04H60/31
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/44209 Monitoring of downstream path of the transmission network originating from a server, e.g. bandwidth variations of a wireless network arrangements for maintenance or administration in data switching networks involving bandwidth and capacity management H04L41/0896
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 21/6181 involving transmission via a mobile phone network arrangements for providing broadcast or conference services to substation in data switching networks in combination with wireless systems H04L12/189; wireless uplink channel access H04W74/004

Abstract

Network communication and cost awareness techniques are described. In one or more implementations, functionality is exposed through one or more application programming interfaces (APIs) that is accessible to a plurality of applications of the computing device to perform network communication. Data is returned to one or more of the plurality of applications regarding a cost network used to perform the network communication.

Claims

1. A method implemented by a computing device, the method comprising:

receiving, by a download manager from an application executing on the computing device through one or more application programming interfaces (APIs) of an operating system of the computing device, a request for the computing device to perform a network activity for the application;

returning, by the download manager, data to the application regarding a cost of using a network; and

performing, by the download manager, the requested network activity on behalf of the application while the application is in a suspended state.

2. A method as described in claim 1, wherein the data relates to a cost threshold associated with the network.

3. A method as described in claim 1, wherein the data relates to use of the network for the requested network activity.

4. A method as described in claim 1, wherein performing the requested network activity includes performing the requested network activity in a same security context as for the application for which the network activity is being performed.

5. A method as described in claim 1, wherein the data also includes information regarding a status of the network activity.

6. A method as described in claim 1, wherein the method further comprises:

outputting a request for authorization to exceed a threshold for the network.

7. A method as described in claim 1, wherein the method further comprises:

automatically ceasing the network activity in response to an indication that the cost of using the network is over a threshold.

8. A computing device for network communications, the computing device comprising:

a memory and a processor that are respectively configured to store and execute instructions for causing the computing device to perform operations, the operations including;

receiving, by an operating system of the computing device from an application on the computing device, a request to offload a network action from the application to the operating system;

returning, by the operating system to the application, cost information associated with use of a network; and

performing, by the operating system via the network, the requested network action on behalf of the application while the application is suspended.

9. The computing device of claim 8, wherein the cost information includes a cost threshold associated with the network.

10. The computing device of claim 8, wherein the cost information relates to use of the network for performing the network action.

11. The computing device of claim 8, wherein performing the network action includes performing the network action in a same security context as used for the application.

12. The computing device of claim 8, wherein the operations further comprise:

returning, by the operating system to the application, information regarding a status of the network action.

13. The computing device of claim 8, wherein the operations further comprise:

outputting a request for authorization to exceed a cost threshold.

14. The computing device of claim 8, wherein the operations further comprise:

automatically pausing the network activity in response to an indication that a cost threshold has been exceeded.

15. A method of offloading network communications, the method comprising:

sending, by an application executing on a computing device, a request through an interface of operating system of the computing device to offload network communications from the application;

receiving, by the application, cost information associated with use of a network for performing the network communications; and

suspending the application for at least a portion of a time period during which the network communications are being performed on behalf of the application.

16. The method of claim 15, wherein the cost information includes a cost threshold associated with the network.

17. The method of claim 15, wherein the network communications are performed with a same security context as for the application.

18. The method of claim 15, wherein the operations further comprise:

returning, by the operating system to the application, information regarding a status of the network communications.

19. The method of claim 15, wherein a request for authorization to exceed a cost threshold by the network communications is output if a cost threshold is reached.

20. The method of claim 15, wherein the network communications for the application are automatically paused if a cost threshold is reached.