Director Agent Hand-Off Protocol for Server Farm Scalability
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Solution Overview
Problem
Traditional server farm architectures face inefficiencies in resource usage and scalability due to the need for maintaining multiple network connections and redundant content forwarding within the server farm, leading to increased costs and limited capacity.
Innovation Solution
Implementing a director agent and server agent with a specialized hand-off protocol that enables intelligent routing of content requests to the appropriate server with minimal network connection overhead, allowing for direct server return and eliminating redundant internal traffic by transferring and transforming TCP connection states between the director and server agents.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Productivity
If traditional server farm architecture maintains multiple network connections for content forwarding, then content delivery functionality is ensured, but resource usage efficiency deteriorates and scalability is limited
Solution Approach 1:
The patent extracts the TCP connection state from the director and transfers it to the server. This allows the server to directly handle content delivery without requiring the director to maintain redundant connections, thereby eliminating wasted resources while preserving content delivery functionality.
Solution Approach 2:
The hand-off protocol acts as an intermediary mechanism that enables state transfer between director and server. This protocol facilitates the transition of connection ownership, allowing efficient resource utilization without compromising the ability to deliver content.
2Ease of operation
If redundant content forwarding through directors is implemented, then connection management is simplified, but bandwidth requirements increase and internal traffic is duplicated
Solution Approach 1:
The patent extracts the content forwarding function from the director to the server. By transferring TCP connection state, the server assumes responsibility for content delivery, eliminating redundant forwarding through the director and reducing internal bandwidth consumption.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent introduces a new dimension of connection state management by implementing state transfer across different network layers. The hand-off protocol operates at a higher abstraction level, enabling the server to directly assume connection ownership without requiring continuous director mediation for content forwarding.
3Adaptability or versatility
If multiple network connections are maintained for each content request, then routing flexibility is improved, but device complexity and operational overhead increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent extracts the burden of maintaining multiple connections from the director. By transferring connection state to the server, the director can focus on initial routing decisions while the server handles subsequent content delivery, reducing operational overhead while preserving routing flexibility through intelligent initial routing.
Data Source
AI summary
Some embodiments provide a director agent, a server agent, and a specialized hand-off protocol for improving scalability and resource usage within a server farm. A first network connection is established between a client and the director agent in order to receive a content request from the client from which to select a server from a set of servers that is responsible for hosting the requested content. A second network connection is established between the server agent that is associated with the selected server and a protocol stack of the selected server. The first network connection is handed-off to the server agent using the specialized hand-off protocol. The server agent performs network connection state parameter transformations between the two connections to create a network connection through which content can be passed from the selected server to the client without passing through the director.