US 6,205,464 B1 · System for building optimal commit trees in a distributed transaction processing system

Abstract

A system and method for reducing message traffic during two phase commitment in a distributed transaction processing system. Transactional objects manage transactions in a distributed system. A coordinator object is responsible for ensuring data consistency by enforcing atomic transaction changes. Any change to one or more resources by a transaction is either made at all or none of the resources. Distributed transactions use interposition to create subordinate coordinator for domains other than the primary domain. Each subordinate coordinator controls transaction commitment of all resources within that domain via a single message sequence per coordinator. Dynamic registration of subordinate coordinator resources ensures that the subordinate coordinator is not added to the commit tree of the root coordinator unless it has recoverable resources. Dynamic registration minimizes the size of the commit tree thereby minimizing the number of messages transmitted during commitment processing.

Claims8

Dependent claims

A method for coordinating resource modification transaction requests to reduce message traffic in a computer implemented transaction processing system, the transaction processing system operating on one or more processors each having a plurality of resources that can be changed by said transaction processing system, the method comprising the steps of:

receiving a transaction request to modify one or more of said plurality of resources and assigning said transaction a global identifier;
creating a first coordinator for controlling modification of said one or more resources;
importing said transaction request to a plurality of subordinate transaction manager domains containing resources, said domains being organized as a hierarchy of superior and subordinate transaction manager domains, by creating a subordinate coordinator for each of said domains for controlling modification of said one or more resources in said domain, and encapsulating said global identifier, and a reference to a superior domain to which the subordinate domain is hierarchically related;
dynamically registering said subordinate coordinators with the coordinator of said superior domain only when the subordinate coordinator is coordinating resources that are modifiable by a transaction;
sending a transaction messages from superior coordinators only to registered, directly subordinate coordinators, thereby reducing message traffic.

2 more elements

A transaction processing system for updating computer resources in one or more computer systems interconnected by a communications network, said computer systems having at least one processor and memory, the system comprising:

means for receiving a transaction;
means for assigning a global identifier to said transaction;
means for creating a global coordinator for ensuring that the transaction updates all affected resources or none;
means for communicating said transaction to other transaction domains in others of said processors for update of locally contained resources, said transaction domains being organized as a hierarchy of superior and subordinate transaction domains;
means for creating a subordinate controller in each of said others of said processors, said subordinate controller controlling resources in said subordinate transaction domain, said subordinate controller encapsulating the global identifier and a reference to a superior domain to which the subordinate domain is hierarchically related;
means for dynamically registering said subordinate controllers with the coordinator of said superior domain only when the resources of said subordinate coordinator are modifiable by a transaction, said superior coordinator communicating only with said registered subordinates thereby reducing message traffic.

3 more elements

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.

System for building optimal commit trees in a distributed transaction processing system

Life of this patent

System for building optimal commit trees in a distributed transaction processing system

Life of this patent

Abstract

Claims8