Patent Document

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS 
       [0001]    This application is a continuation of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 11/076,609, filed on Mar. 10, 2005, which application is incorporated herein by reference in its entirety. 
     
    
     BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 
       [0002]    1. Field of the Invention 
         [0003]    The present invention relates to a method, system, and program for processing requests transmitted using a first communication directed to an application that uses a second communication protocol. 
         [0004]    2. Description of the Related Art 
         [0005]    A server machine may host a Hypertext Transport Protocol (HTTP) server application to process HTTP requests from HTTP clients on a port. The server machine may also provide access to non-HTTP applications and services on ports other than the port used for HTTP requests. The complexity of managing a firewall having multiple ports increases as the number of ports increases. Further, maintaining multiple ports open on a server machine subjects the server machine to additional points of access to hackers and other security threats. 
       SUMMARY 
       [0006]    Provided are a method, system, and program for processing requests transmitted using a first communication directed to an application that uses a second communication protocol. A request is received from a client over a network in a first communication protocol. A determination is made as to whether the request includes an identifier of an application indicated in a data structure. A socket is processed that enables communication between the application identified by the identifier in response to determining that the identifier included in the request is indicated in the data structure. The socket is provided to the application associated with the requested resource to enable the application to communicate with the client over the network using a second communication protocol. 
     
    
     
       BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS 
         [0007]      FIG. 1  illustrates an embodiment of a network computing environment. 
           [0008]      FIG. 2  illustrates an embodiment of an entry for a registered application. 
           [0009]      FIGS. 3 ,  4 , and  5  illustrate an embodiment of operations to process client requests in a server. 
       
    
    
     DETAILED DESCRIPTION 
       [0010]    In the following description, reference is made to the accompanying drawings which form a part hereof and which illustrate several embodiments of the present invention. It is understood that other embodiments may be utilized and structural and operational changes may be made without departing from the scope of the present invention. 
         [0011]      FIG. 1  illustrates a network computing environment including a server machine  2  and client machine  4  that communicate over a network  6 . There may be multiple client machines  4  that communicate over the network  6  with the server machine. The client machine  4  includes a client application  8  that intends to communicate with a server application  10 . The client-server application may comprise a database application, backup storage management program, or other client-server applications known in the art. To initiate communication with the server application, the client application  8  generates a Hypertext Transport Protocol (HTTP) request  12  and communicates this request using the HTTP protocol. However, following this initial HTTP request  12 , subsequent communication between the client application  8  and server application  10  involves the use of an application layer communication protocol known in the art other than HTTP, such as Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP), Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP), File Transfer Protocol (FTP), Telnet, and any TCP/IP based interaction between the client application  8  and server application  10 . The server machine  2  and client machine  4  also use a transport layer protocol, network layer protocol, and data link layer protocol to communicate over the network. The application layer enables common communication of application services for the application  10 ,  12  processes and provides semantic conversion between associated application processes. 
         [0012]    The server machine  2  includes one or more ports  14   a ,  14   n , where the ports  14   a ,  14   b  represent physical connections on one or more network adaptors (not shown), and a memory  14 . The memory  14  includes the application(s)  10 , a listener port  16 , an HTTP server  18 , communication sockets  20 , and an application registry  22 . The listener port  16  comprises a program that monitors one port, e.g.,  14   a , for inbound communications in the HTTP protocol directed to the HTTP server  18 . The HTTP server  18  handles HTTP requests and provides responses to requests. The communication sockets  20  comprise a programming construct used to send and receive information over a network connection, e.g., 6. When listening on a port, the application  10  accepts a connection by receiving a socket from the listener port  16  when an inbound connection is made. Similarly, when the client application  8  wants to create a connection to a remote program, e.g., application  10 , the client application  8  creates a socket, specifying the target address and port number and opens the socket to create the connection. After the client application or server application closes the connection the socket is gone and the next inbound connection on the port will return a new socket for the program to use for the connection. There may be one socket  20  for each server application  10  having an active communication link with one client application  8  in one client machine  4  over the network  6 . The socket  20  may maintain information such as the client machine  4  network address, e.g., an Internet Protocol (IP) address, the transport layer protocol, e.g., TCP, and a port  14   a ,  14   n  number. In this way, the server application  10  uses the socket  20  to direct communications to the client application  8 . The socket  20  enables communication between the server  10  and client  8  applications over the network  6  using an application layer protocol other than HTTP, i.e., the application layer protocol used for the initial communication. 
         [0013]    The client machine  4  may comprise a computational device known in the art, such as a server, desktop computer, workstation, mainframe, hand held computing device, telephony device, etc. capable of communicating over the network  6  with the server machine  2 . The server machine  2  may comprise a suitable server system known in the art to manage backup messages from multiple systems. The network  6  may comprise one or more networks known in the art, such as a Wide Area Network (WAN), Local Area Network (LAN), Storage Area Network (SAN), wireless network, the Internet, and Intranet, etc. 
         [0014]    In one embodiment, the applications  10  may comprise legacy applications that utilize older legacy application layer protocols that are not handled by the HTTP server  18 . 
         [0015]      FIG. 2  illustrates an entry  50  in the application registry  22  maintained for each application  10  communicating using an application layer protocol other than HTTP. The entry  50  includes a Uniform Resource Identifier (URI)  52  of the application  10 , i.e., the application  10  name and a call back function  12  that may be called with the socket  20  to handoff the request from the client application  8  to initiate communication with the server application  10 . 
         [0016]      FIG. 3  illustrates operations performed by the client application  8  to initiate communication with the server application  10 . To initiate (at block  100 ) operations to communicate with a server application  10 , the client application  8  generates (at block  102 ) a request  12  (GET or POST) in a first communication protocol (e.g., HTTP) to initiate communication with the server application  10  over the network  6 . The HTTP request  12  includes an identifier (e.g., URI) identifying the target server application  10 . As discussed, although the client application  8  and server application  10  may communicate using an application layer protocol other than HTTP, such as a legacy application layer protocol, the initial communication request  12  comprises an HTTP request  12 . If the initial HTTP request  12  is processed successfully at the server machine  2 , then the client application  8  receives (at block  104 ) a response from the server application  10  in a second communication protocol, i.e., an application layer protocol other than HTTP. This non-HTTP application layer protocol is used during subsequent communications between the client  8  and server  10  applications during the session initialized with the HTTP request  12 . 
         [0017]      FIG. 4  illustrates an embodiment of operations performed in the server machine  2  to establish a connection between one server application  10  and the client application  8  which use a communication protocol, i.e., application layer protocol, other than HTTP (i.e., the application layer protocol used to establish the initial link). At block  150 , the listener port  16  monitors, on a monitor thread, one port, e.g.,  14   a , for requests to the applications  10  and the HTTP server  18 . Upon receiving (at block  152 ) a client request, e.g., HTTP request  12 , in the first communication (application layer) protocol, the listener port  16  determines (at block  154 ) whether there is a registered function  50  ( FIG. 2 ) for the application identified in the request in a data structure, i.e., the application registry  22 . If not, then the request is processed as a normal HTTP request by a first communication protocol, e.g., (HTTP), server. Such requests are not intended for one of the application  10 . If (at block  154 ) the HTTP request  12  includes a registered application identifier in the application registry  22 , then an additional thread may be spawned (at block  158 ) to process the request from the client application  8  initiating the HTTP request  12 . By spawning an additional thread, the main thread on which the listener port  16  executes can return to listening on the port  14   a ,  14   b  for an additional connection. In an alternative embodiment, threading may not be used, and then the server application  10  can only handle one connection at a time. The spawned thread further provides (at block  160 ) the generated socket  20  to the server application  10  identified in the request. In one embodiment, the generated socket  20  may be provided to the application  10  to enable the application to respond to the request by calling the registered call-back function  52  with the socket to enable the application  10  identified in registry entry  50  (at field  54 ) to communicate with the client machine  4  over the network  6  using a second communication (application layer protocol) different from the first communication protocol, e.g., HTTP. 
         [0018]    This socket enables the client  8  and server  10  applications to communicate through the same port  14   a  used by HTTP requested directed to the HTTP server  18  even though the client  8  and server  10  applications do not use the HTTP protocol to communicate and intend to bypass the HTTP server  18 . By spawning a new thread, in one embodiment, the monitor thread executing the listener port  16  to monitor the port  14   a  is not burdened with having to perform the operations of generating the thread and calling the application  10  to handle communication with the requesting client application  8 . In response to being invoked by the call back function, the server application  10  may transmit (at block  162 ) a response to the HTTP request using the second communication protocol, such as an application layer protocol other than HTTP. After this response, the client  8  and server  10  applications communicate through the sockets  20  established for application communication, which on the server side is socket  20 . 
         [0019]      FIG. 5  illustrates operations performed by the listener port  16  to register an entry  50  ( FIG. 2 ) for the application  10  in the application registry  22 . Upon the listener port  16  receiving (at block  200 ) a registration of a call back address and identifier (e.g., URI) for an application  10 , the listener port  16  adds (at block  202 ) to the application registry  22  an application registry entry  50  having the identifier, e.g., URI, of the application  10  and the call back function that the listener port  16  may use to pass the socket  20  to the application  10  to use to communicate with the client application  8  initiating the request using any other TCP/IP based application layer protocol. 
         [0020]    In one embodiment, the use of HTTP as the initial protocol allows Web services extensions to be applied to existing TCP/IP protocols because they are “tunneled” under the initial HTTP request. For example, the Web Services (WS) Security specification extension is used to authenticate the caller or WS-Policy to route the request to the appropriate web server application server based on quality of service or other criteria. Web Services extension requests, such as WS Security extensions may be transported using the HTTP protocol and the socket handling the communication with the application initiating the Web Services request is handed to the Web services application to enable the Web Services application on the server to communicate directly with the client initiating the Web Services request using a different communication protocol, such as Simple Object Access Protocol (SOAP) messaging. 
         [0021]    Described embodiments provide techniques to enable a server having legacy applications and a protocol server, such as an HTTP server, handling requests for more current applications to use the same port for both the legacy (non-HTTP) and non-legacy (HTTP) application requests. 
       Additional Embodiment Details 
       [0022]    The described operations may be implemented as a method, apparatus or article of manufacture using standard programming and/or engineering techniques to produce software, firmware, hardware, or any combination thereof. The term “article of manufacture” as used herein refers to code or logic implemented in hardware logic (e.g., an integrated circuit chip, Programmable Gate Array (PGA), Application Specific Integrated Circuit (ASIC), etc.) or a computer readable medium, such as magnetic storage medium (e.g., hard disk drives, floppy disks, tape, etc.), optical storage (CD-ROMs, optical disks, etc.), volatile and non-volatile memory devices (e.g., EEPROMs, ROMs, PROMs, RAMs, DRAMs, SRAMs, firmware, programmable logic, etc.). Code in the computer readable medium is accessed and executed by a processor. The code in which preferred embodiments are implemented may further be accessible through a transmission media or from a file server over a network. In such cases, the article of manufacture in which the code is implemented may comprise a transmission media, such as a network transmission line, wireless transmission media, signals propagating through space, radio waves, infrared signals, etc. Thus, the “article of manufacture” may comprise the medium in which the code is embodied. Additionally, the “article of manufacture” may comprise a combination of hardware and software components in which the code is embodied, processed, and executed. Of course, those skilled in the art will recognize that many modifications may be made to this configuration without departing from the scope of the present invention, and that the article of manufacture may comprise any information bearing medium known in the art. 
         [0023]    In the described embodiments, the first communication protocol comprised HTTP and the second communication protocol comprised an application layer protocol other than HTTP. In alternative embodiments the first communication protocol may comprise a communication protocol other than HTTP and the second communication protocol may comprise HTTP. 
         [0024]    In the described embodiments, the first and second communication protocols comprised application layer protocols. In alternative embodiments, the first and second communication protocols may comprise an Open Systems Interconnection Reference Model (OSI Model) layer other than the application layer, such as one of the presentation layer, session layer, transport layer, network layer, data link layer, and physical layer. 
         [0025]    The illustrated operations of  FIGS. 3-5  show certain events occurring in a certain order. In alternative embodiments, certain operations may be performed in a different order, modified or removed. Moreover, steps may be added to the above described logic and still conform to the described embodiments. Further, operations described herein may occur sequentially or certain operations may be processed in parallel. Yet further, operations may be performed by a single processing unit or by distributed processing units. 
         [0026]    The foregoing description of various embodiments of the invention has been presented for the purposes of illustration and description. It is not intended to be exhaustive or to limit the invention to the precise form disclosed. Many modifications and variations are possible in light of the above teaching. It is intended that the scope of the invention be limited not by this detailed description, but rather by the claims appended hereto. The above specification, examples and data provide a complete description of the manufacture and use of the composition of the invention. Since many embodiments of the invention can be made without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention, the invention resides in the claims hereinafter appended.

Technology Category: 5