Identity-based distributed computing for device resources

• US 9,886,309 B2
• Filed: 06/28/2002
• Issued: 02/06/2018
• Est. Priority Date: 06/28/2002
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Inventors: Alles, David, Moore, George M.
• Primary Examiner(s): BLAIR, DOUGLAS B
• Application Number:
  US10/187,221
• Publication Number:
  US 20040003112A1
• Time in Patent Office: 5,702 Days
• Field of Search: 709226, 709229, 726 5
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 9/5011 the resources being hardware resources other than CPUs, Servers and Terminals
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/303 Terminal profiles
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/306 User profiles
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/51 Discovery or management thereof, e.g. service location protocol [SLP] or web services
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/329 in the application layer [OSI layer 7]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 9/40 Network security protocols

Abstract

A system, method and related data structures for discovering and describing computing resources available at various computing devices, and for exposing those resources as services that are addressable by software applications. The data describing the resources is arranged according to an identity-based schema. The computing resources may include, for example, storage capacity, bandwidth, processing power, input methods and mechanism, and rendering methods. The method and system are identity-based, whereby a user (with an identity) has access to the distributed resources commensurate with that identity.

Claims

1. A method comprising:

discovering, at a first computing device, a resource located at a second computing device;

communicating a request to the second computing device to employ the resource located at the second computing device;

communicating identity information to the second computing device to enable the second computing device to determine whether the first computing device has access to the resource based on the identity information;

receiving data from the second computing device when the second computing device approves access to the resource by the first computing device, the data including resource information associated with the resource at the second computing device formatted according to a resource-based schema understood by the first computing device, the resource-based schema being organized by resource and including information about the second computing device that corresponds to respective resources;

interpreting the data to access the resource located at the second computing device; and

executing a process, at the first device, using the resource of the second computing device.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein the first computing device uses the resource until the second computing device disables access to the resource by the first computing device.

3. The method of claim 2 further comprising informing the second computing device that the first computing device no longer needs to use the resource effective to cause the second computing device to disable the access to the resource.

4. The method of claim 1 wherein the identity information corresponds to credentials.

5. The method of claim 4 wherein the credentials are provided by an authentication service.

6. The method of claim 1 wherein the resource of the second computing device comprises a processing resource, a storage resource, a memory resource, or a bandwidth resource.

7. The method of claim 1 wherein executing the process comprises accessing a web page at a remote server using bandwidth of the second computing device.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein the second computing device acts as a proxy to the remote server for the first computing device.

9. The method of claim 7 wherein bandwidth from the second computing device to the remote server is greater than bandwidth from the first computing device to the remote server.

10. A method for sharing resources between computing devices, comprising:

receiving a request from a first computing device at a second computing device to employ a resource located at the second computing device, the request including identity information associated with the first computing device, the identity information including a first credential provided by an authentication service;

determining, by the second computing device, whether the first computing device is permitted to access the resource based on the identity information, the determining the access comprising validating the first credential;

sending, by the second computing device, resource information associated with the resource to the first computing device responsive to determining that the first computing device is permitted to access the resource, the resource information formatted according to a resource-based schema understood by the first computing device, the resource-based schema being organized by resource and including information about the second computing device in relation to respective resources;

allowing, by the second computing device, the first computing device to access the resource to execute a process by employing the resource; and

dynamically monitoring the resource to determine whether the resource is exhausted for the request.

11. The method of claim 10 further comprising determining that the resource is no longer available to the first computing device when a time limit to access the resource by the first computing device expires.

12. The method of claim 10 wherein the resource located at the second computing device comprises a processing resource, a storage resource, a memory resource, or a bandwidth resource.

13. The method of claim 10 wherein allowing the first computing device to access the resource to execute the process by employing the resource further comprises allowing the first computing device to access a web page at a remote server using bandwidth of the second computing device.

14. The method of claim 13, wherein the second computing device acts as a proxy to the remote server for the first computing device.

15. The method of claim 13 wherein bandwidth from the second computing device to the remote server is greater than bandwidth from the first computing device to the remote server.