Routing information within an adaptive routing architecture of an information retrieval system

• US 5,937,168 A
• Filed: 05/30/1997
• Issued: 08/10/1999
• Est. Priority Date: 05/30/1997
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Hanger Solutions, LLC (IP Investments Group LLC)
• Original Assignee: BellSouth Corporation (AT&T, Inc.)
• Inventors: Dibrell, Audrey, Anderson, David J., Busayapongchai, Senis, Anderson, Dewey Charles
• Primary Examiner(s): Lintz, Paul R.
• Assistant Examiner(s): Colbert, Ella
• Application Number:
  US08/866,228
• Time in Patent Office: 802 Days
• Field of Search: 707/3, 707/4, 395/377, 395/800.27, 395/200.68, 711/149, 711/100
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 15/17 using an input/output type connection, e.g. channel, I/O port
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/63 Routing a service request depending on the request content or context
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 370/912 Packet communications
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99933 Query processing, i.e. searching

Abstract

After an origination module (OM) receives information, a packet is transmitted to a routing architecture (RA) for routing to a destination module (DM) designated by the router packet. The RA interprets the router packet and adaptively routes the router packet to the DM so that the router packet is quickly processed by the DM. If the DM'"'"'s queue is empty and the DM is not processing any other packets, the RA places the router packet in the queue and the DM reads its queue to process the router packet. If there is another router packet being processed by the DM, the RA adapts by placing the router packet in the queue. Once processing of the other router packet is complete, the DM processes the router packet in the queue. If there is already another router packet pending within the DM'"'"'s queue, the RA adapts by creating another DM in memory to process the router packet. If the router packet is not processed by the DM within a predetermined amount of time, the RA adapts by sending an interrupt to cancel processing within the DM and ensure that the router packet is next to be processed. Elements corresponding to the router packet'"'"'s data components may be rearranged to an optimized order when adaptively routing the router packet. In the optimized order, processing of the router packet is made quicker.

Claims

1. A method for routing information between an origination module and a destination module using a routing achitecture within an information retrieval system, the method comprising the steps of:

receiving the information;

formatting the information into a router packet, by providing that a first part of the router packet includes data from the information;

transmitting the router packet to the routine architecture;

aid

causing the router architecture to adaptively route the router packet to the destination module based upon a status of the destination module by

(1) checking the status of the destination module by determining if another router packet is waiting to be processed by the destination module;

(2) if another router packet is waiting to be processed, then creating an additional destination module as a created module that is a software module in a multithreaded software environment executing on a single processor of the information retrieval system; and

(3) routing the router packet to the created module.

2. A method for routing information between an origination module and a destination module using a routing architecture within an information retrieval system, the method comprising the steps of:

receiving the information;

formatting the information into a router packet, by providing that a first part of the router packet includes data from the information;

transmitting the router packet to the routing architecture; and

causing the routing architecture to adaptively route the router packet to the destination module based upon a status of the destination module by

(1) checking the status of destination module by determining if another router packet is waiting to be processed by the destination module;

(2) if another router packet is waiting to be processed, then creating an additional destination module as a created module that is a software module dedicated to one of a plurality of processors within the information retrieval system; and

(3) routing the router packet to the created module.

3. A method for routing information between an origination module ad a destination module using a routing architecture within an information retrieval system, the method comprising the steps of:

receiving the information;

formatting the information into a router packet, by providing that first part of the router packet includes data from the information;

transmitting the router packet to the routing architecture; and

causing the routing architecture to adaptively route the router packet to the destination module based upon a status of the destination module by causing the destination module to process the router packet, at the latest, after expiration of a threshold period by routing the router packet to a designated position within a queue associated with the destination module.

4. A method for routing information between an origination module and a destination module using a routing architecture within an information retrieval system, the method comprising the steps of;

receiving the information;

formatting the information into a router packet, by

(i) provide that a first part the router packet includes data from the information;

(ii) providing that a second part of the router packet includes a destination designation corresponding to the destination module;

(iii) providing that a third part of the router packet includes an origination designation corresponding to the origination module receiving the information; and

(iv) providing that a fourth part of the router packet includes an action designation corresponding to a desired action to be performed by the destination module on the data;

transmitting the route packet to the routing architecture; and

causing th routing architecture to adaptively route the router packet to the destination module based upon a status of the destination module.

5. A method for routing information between an origination module and a destination module using a routing architecture within an information retrieval system, the method comprising the steps of:

receiving the information by the origination module, the information having a plurality of elements;

creating a data packet using the elements within the information;

formatting a router packet from the information, by

(i) providing that a first part of the router packet includes a destination designation corresponding to the destination module,

(ii) providing that a second part of the router packet includes an origination designation corresponding to the origination module receiving the information,

(iii) providing that a third part of the router packet includes the data packet, and

(iv) providing that a fourth part of the router packet includes an action designation corresponding to a desired action to be performed by the destination module using the elements from the information;

after formatting, transmitting the router packet to the routing architecture;

causing the routing architecture to determine the destination module; and

causing the routing architecture to adaptively route the router packet to a queue corresponding to the destination module based upon a status of the destination module.

6. The method of claim 5, wherein the step of formatting the router packet further comprises:

providing that a fifth part of the router packet includes a size designation corresponding to a size of the router packet; and

providing that a sixth part of the router packet includes a packet sequence number referencing an association of the router packet to a group of router packets.

7. The method of claim 5, wherein the step of creating the data packet comprises arranging the elements into an initial order.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein the step of causing the routing architecture to adaptively route the router packet comprises:

checking the status of the destination module by determining if the destination module is a search engine; and

if the destination module is the search engine, then arranging the initial order of the elements to an optimized order of the elements and routing the elements in the optimized order to the destination module.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein the step of arranging the initial order of the elements to the optimized order comprises:

(1) determining a number of records in a database that correspond to one of the elements;

(2) repeating the determining step for others of the elements; and

(3) arranging the initial order of the elements into the optimized order of the elements based upon the number of records respectively corresponding to each element.

10. The method of claim 9, wherein step (3) comprises arranging the initial order into the optimized order wherein a first of the elements in the optimized order has a smallest number of records respectively corresponding to each element.

11. The method of claim 5, wherein the step of causing the routing architecture to adaptively route the router packet further comprises:

(1) determining if another router packet is in the queue;

(2) if another router packet is in the queue, then creating an new module in memory, the new module being a copy of the destination module; and

(3) routing the router packet to the new module.

12. The method of claim 11, wherein step (2) further comprises providing the new module as a software module in a multithreaded software environment executing on a single processor of the information retrieval system.

13. The method of claim 11, wherein step (2) further comprises providing the new module as a software module dedicated to one of a plurality of processors within the information retrieval system.

14. The method of claim 5, wherein the step of causing the routing architecture to adaptively route the router packet further comprises:

(1) placing the router packet in a first position within the queue;

(2) if the router packet is not processed by the destination module within a threshold period, then sending an interrupt to the destination module; and

(3) causing the destination module to process the router packet by changing the first position of the router packet within the queue.

15. The method of claim 14 further comprising the step, after step (2), of causing the destination module to cancel any processing activity being currently performed by the destination module.

16. The method of claim 15, wherein the changing step comprises placing the router packet in a second position within the queue, the second position designating the router packet to be the next to be processed by the destination module.

17. A method for routing information between an origination module and a destination module using a routing architecture within an information retrieval system, the method comprising the steps of:

receiving the information by the origination module, the information having a plurality of elements;

creating a data packet using the elements within the information;

formatting a router packet from the information, by

(i) providing that a first part of the router packet includes a destination designation corresponding to the destination module,

(ii) providing that a second part of the router packet includes an origination designation corresponding to the origination module receiving the information,

(iii) providing that a third part of the router packet includes the data packet, and

(iv) providing that a fourth part of the router packet includes an action designation corresponding to a desired action to be performed by the destination module using the elements from the information;

after formatting the router packet, transmitting the router packet to the routing architecture;

causing the routing architecture to determine the destination module;

causing the routing architecture to determine if another router packet is in a queue corresponding to the destination module;

placing the router packet in a first position within the queue;

if another router packet is in the queue, then creating an additional destination module in memory and routing the router packet to the additional destination module;

if the router packet is not processed by the destination module within a threshold period, then sending an interrupt to the destination module; and

causing the destination module to process the router packet by changing the first position of the router packer within the queue.

18. The method of claim 17 further comprising, after the step of sending the interrupt, the step of causing the destination module to cancel its current processing activity.

19. The method of claim 17, wherein the step of creating the data packet comprises arranging the elements into an initial order.

20. The method of claim 19 further comprising the step of, if the destination module is the search engine, then arranging the initial order of the elements to an optimized order of the elements and routing the elements in the optimized order to the destination module.

21. The method of claim 20, wherein the arranging step comprises the steps of:

(1) determining a number of records in a database that correspond to one of the elements;

(2) repeating the determining step for each of the elements; and

(3) arranging the initial order into the optimized order wherein a first of the elements in the optimized order has a smallest number of records respectively corresponding to each element.