Patent ID: 7139790

Claim:
In a distributed system including a plurality of redundant components, a method for leader election by a first redundant component, comprising: multicasting age information, wherein the age information includes a duration of time on-line, particular to the first redundant component to all other components in the plurality of redundant components, the age information relating to one or more criteria according to which a currently-active leader component is to be determined; receiving age information from each other component in the plurality of redundant components particular to each component and relating to the one or more criteria according to which the currently-active leader component is to be determined; and determining whether the first redundant component is the currently-active leader component by comparing the age information particular to the first redundant component with the age information received from each of the redundant components, wherein if the first redundant component determines that it is not the currently-active leader component, the first component knows one of the components in the plurality of redundant components is the currently-active leader component.