Document Serving System with Immediate Failover

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Solution Overview

Problem

Document serving technologies experience latency due to batching processes, where documents are only available to users 15-30 minutes after receipt, and there is a lack of immediate failover mechanisms for document servers.

Innovation Solution

Implementing a system that allows individual document serving before batching is complete and maintains a pool of replacement document servers to ensure continuous service in case of failures, with each document server being identical to handle search queries efficiently.

Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles

VSEngineering Contradiction Analysis

1Productivity

If documents are batched before serving, then document processing is consolidated and system resources are optimized, but document availability is delayed by 15-30 minutes

Engineering Contradiction:

Improvedocument processing efficiencyVSAvoiddocument availability delay

Core Design Contradiction:

ProductivityVSLoss of time

Solution Approach 1:

The patent segments the document serving process into two independent paths: traditional batch processing for bulk documents and individual immediate serving for single documents. This segmentation allows the system to maintain batch processing efficiency while providing immediate individual document access, resolving the contradiction between processing efficiency and availability speed.

Inventive Principle:

Principle #1Segmentation

Solution Approach 2:

The system dynamically adapts its serving mode based on the document quantity and type. When a single document is received, it triggers immediate individual serving; when multiple documents are received, it batches them for consolidated processing. This dynamic behavior allows the system to optimize for both speed and efficiency depending on the workload characteristics.

Inventive Principle:

Principle #15Dynamics

2Reliability

If replacement document servers are maintained in a pool, then system reliability is improved through immediate failover, but device complexity increases

Engineering Contradiction:

Improveservice continuityVSAvoidserver management complexity

Core Design Contradiction:

ReliabilityVSDevice complexity

Solution Approach 1:

The system prepares replacement document servers in advance and maintains them in a ready state within a pool. When a server failure occurs, the replacement server is immediately activated without interruption to document serving. This preliminary preparation eliminates downtime while the automated selection and activation processes minimize manual management complexity.

Inventive Principle:

Principle #10Preliminary action

Solution Approach 2:

The system implements automated server monitoring, failure detection, and replacement activation without requiring manual intervention. The self-service mechanism automatically manages the complexity of server pool coordination, failover decisions, and service continuity, reducing the operational burden while maintaining high reliability.

Inventive Principle:

Principle #25Self-service

Data Source

PatentUS9185163B2Receiving individual documents to serve

Publication Date: 2015.11.10 MICROSOFT TECHNOLOGY LICENSING LLC

AI summary

Methods and systems for quickly serving documents are provided. Documents may be served to users, for example, in response to search query inputs. Documents may be individually communicated to a document server prior to batching the documents. By individually communicating documents to document servers, the document experiences sub-second latency before it is available to a user. The documents may also be modified individually such that real-time serving is not interrupted.