CACHING ADAPTED FOR MOBILE APPLICATION BEHAVIOR AND NETWORK CONDITIONS

• US 20120110109A1
• Filed: 10/14/2011
• Published: 05/03/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 11/01/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Seven Networks Inc
• Original Assignee: Seven Networks Inc
• Inventors: Luna, Michael, Tsõmbaljuk, Andrei
• Granted Patent: US 9,021,048 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 709/213
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 12/0866 for peripheral storage systems, e.g. disk cache
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 12/0888 using selective caching, e.g. bypass
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9574 of access to content, e.g. by caching
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/289 Intermediate processing functionally located close to the data consumer application, e.g. in same machine, in same home or in same sub-network
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/535 Tracking the activity of the user network monitoring arrangements H04L43/00; recording of computer activity G06F11/34
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/568 Storing data temporarily at an intermediate stage, e.g. caching
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/18 Information format or content conversion, e.g. adaptation by the network of the transmitted or received information for the purpose of wireless delivery to users or terminals

Abstract

Systems and methods for caching adapted for mobile application behavior and network conditions are disclosed. In one aspect, embodiments of the present disclosure include a method, which may be implemented on a system, of determining cacheability of content received for a client on a mobile device by tracking requests generated by the client at the mobile device to detect periodicity of the requests generated by the client, tracking responses received for requests generated by the client to detect repeatability in content of the responses, and/or determining whether the content received for the client is cacheable on the mobile device based on one or more of the periodicity in the requests and the repeatability in the content of the responses.

Claims

1. A method of cache management on a mobile device, the method, comprising:

using information about a request or response received for the request, the request being initiated at the mobile device, determining cacheability of the response;

in response to determining the cacheability of the response, caching the response by storing the response locally in a cache on the mobile device;

serving the response from the cache to satisfy a subsequent request;

wherein, whether the response stored in the cache on the mobile device needs to be updated is verified by polling a host server to which the request is directed, by an entity on behalf of the mobile device.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein, the cache is persisted across mobile device on/off events.

3. The method of claim 1, further comprising, collecting the information about the request or the information about the response.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein, the information includes request characteristics information associated with the request or response characteristics information associated with the response received for the request.

5. The method of claim 3, wherein, the request characteristics information includes request method or request size.

6. The method of claim 3, wherein, the request characteristics information includes periodicity information between the request and other requests generated by a same client on the mobile device.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein, periodicity is detected when the request and the other requests generated by the same client occur at a fixed rate or at a dynamic rate with a partially or wholly reproducible changing pattern.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein, cacheability can be determined if the information about the request indicates that a request body size of the request does not exceed a certain size.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein, cacheability can be determined if the information about the request indicates that the request is a GET request or POST request.

10. The method of claim 3, wherein, the response characteristics information includes an indication of transfer encoding or chunked transfer encoding is used in sending the response.

11. The method of claim 1, wherein, cacheability can be determined when transfer encoding is not used in sending the response.

12. The method of claim 3, wherein, the response characteristics information includes an associated status code of the response.

13. The method of claim 1, wherein, cacheability can be determined if the information about the response does not indicate an uncacheable status code.

14. The method of claim 3, wherein, the response characteristics information indicates response size;

wherein cacheability can be determined if the response size does not exceed a given size.

15. The method of claim 3, wherein, the response characteristics information includes response body information for the response to the request and other response to other requests generated by a same client on the mobile device.

16. The method of claim 15, wherein, the response body information for the response and the other responses are compared to prevent caching of dynamic content.

17. The method of claim 15, wherein, cacheability can be determined if the response body information for the response and the other responses include same information.

18. The method of claim 1, further comprising, verifying that the request is not directed to a blacklisted destination.

19. The method of claim 18, wherein one or more blacklisted destinations are stored in the cache on the mobile device;

wherein, the one or more blacklisted destinations are identified by address identifiers including specific URIs or patterns of identifiers including URI patterns.

20. The method of claim 1, wherein, the response is stored in the cache as a cache entry, the cached entry, in addition to the response, includes metadata having additional information regarding caching of the response.

21. The method of claim 20, wherein, the metadata is used to determine whether the response stored as the cached entry is used to satisfy the subsequent response.

22. The method of claim 20, wherein, the response is served in response to identifying a matching cache entry for the subsequent request determined at least in part using the metadata.

23. The method of claim 20, wherein, the metadata includes timing data including access time of the cache entry or creation time of the cache entry.

25. The method of claim 1, invaliding the response stored in the cache of the mobile device or removing the response from the cache of the mobile device.

26. The method of claim 1, wherein, wherein, the entity is physically distinct from the mobile device.

27. The method of claim 1, wherein, the host server is polled at a rate determined at the mobile device;

wherein, the rate is determined using request information collected for the request for which the response is cached.

28. The method of claim 27, wherein the rate is determined from averages of time intervals between previous requests generated by a client which is a same client as the client which generated the request.

29. The method of claim 1, wherein, the entity is a proxy server coupled to the mobile device and able to communicate wirelessly with the mobile device;

wherein, the proxy server polls the host server to which the request is directed at a rate determined at the mobile device, based on timing intervals between previous requests generated by a client which is a same client as the client which generated the request.

24. (canceled)

30. (canceled)

31. A method of cache management on a mobile device, the method, comprising:

determining cacheability of a response to a request initiated at the mobile device;

a response received for a request initiated at the mobile device, by storing the response locally in a cache on the mobile device;

serving the response from the cache to satisfy a subsequent request;

wherein, whether the response stored in the cache on the mobile device needs to be updated is verified by polling a host server to which the request is directed, by an entity on behalf of the mobile device;

wherein, the entity is physically distinct from the mobile device.

32. A method of cache management on a mobile device, the method, comprising:

determining cacheability of a response to a request initiated at the mobile device;

a response received for a request initiated at the mobile device, by storing the response locally in a cache on the mobile device;

serving the response from the cache to satisfy a subsequent request;

wherein, whether the response stored in the cache on the mobile device needs to be updated is verified by polling a host server to which the request is directed;

wherein, the host server is polled at a rate determined at the mobile device.