JPH06197151A - Association management method - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To efficiently use communication resources by eliminating the generation of a state incapable of establishing new association from factors such as the lack of system resources or the like while utilizing an overhead reducing function at the time of an association establishment processing by a conventional association management method. CONSTITUTION:A communication processor 1 provided with the management function of the association for realizing end-end communication by using a logical communication path called the association selects the releasable association from the unused association held inside the communication processor 1 by a releasable association selecting means 9 provided in an association management part 6. Then, by releasing the association in an unused state selected just now by an unused association releasing means 10, the association is established.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to an association management method in a communication processing device for realizing end-to-end communication by using a logical communication path called an association.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art Conventionally, in a communication processing device for executing a specific task by a plurality of application programs (application programs: APs) communicating with each other using a logical communication path called an association as a medium. , This association has the following attributes. 1) Communication address of own system (hereinafter, simply referred to as own address). 2) Communication address of the partner system (hereinafter simply referred to as partner address). 3) Application program type that uses association (hereinafter simply referred to as AP type). 4) Individual attributes between specific application programs (hereinafter simply referred to as individual attributes). These attributes are individually assigned to each association. For this assignment,
It is determined at the stage of establishing a usable association for each particular application program.

FIG. 8 is a block diagram showing a conventional communication processing device. The application program 20 is an application program that executes a specific task by an operator or the like.
It is a program. The communication processing device 21 includes a communication procedure unit 22 that executes communication with another system, and an association management unit 26 that manages each association used in communication with another system. Association establishing means 24 in the communication procedure unit 22
Receives the request from the application program 20 and establishes the association. Then, the established association is combined with the corresponding application program 20 in the association management unit 26. In this way, the data transmission / reception means 23 executes the data communication between the application programs by using the association just combined,
The application program 20 completes the work. Further, when the execution of the application program 20 is completed, the association release processing means 25 releases the association with the application program and releases the used association.
Furthermore, the association management unit 26 assigns an available association management element, which will be described in detail later, to the used association released as described above,
It comprises an unused association management means 28 for managing an established unused association.

[0004] To establish the association, A regarding the establishment of the lower communication connection and the association is used.
It involves an operation of negotiating with each other such as P type and individual attribute. For this reason, when the application programs start communication with each other, the overhead of establishing an association (excessive work amount, overload accompanying it) has been a problem. To solve this problem, at the stage where the application program has completed execution, even after the association has been disconnected from the used association, this association is not released and is retained as an unused association. At the stage when the association is needed, take out the association from this unused association,
A method of assigning to the application program has been devised.
This method is being studied as a functional element of a distributed transaction processing protocol, which is one of OSI (International Standard Network Architecture for Open System Interconnection) protocol, which is standardized by ISO (International Organization for Standardization). Has been. (INTAP Journal N
(See o.20)

[0005]

Conventionally, the maximum number of associations that can be established in a system in which computers are connected one-to-one and the number of associations used between specific application programs can be determined. Since it is possible to know, it is possible to manage unused associations as the number of associations holding this. (See Fig. 9) However, as the system becomes more decentralized,
It is becoming difficult to determine in advance the number of partner systems connected to the own system and the number of application programs operating in each system. (Refer to FIG. 10) Then, it is extremely difficult for the application program operating on the server of the client / server system to know the number of application programs on the client connected at the same time and the maximum number of associations used between the application programs. Difficult to do. Even if the maximum number of associations to be used between the server and the client could be determined, this number will be a very large value, and securing system resources to manage all of these will make the system resource efficient. Will be significantly reduced. Also, in such a system, if an unused association is simply retained for reuse, an association establishment request from a remote system other than the remote system connected by the currently stored association will occur. When there is an unused association, due to factors such as lack of system resources or an excessive number of manageable associations, it becomes impossible to establish an association, and connection with the application program occurs. Also becomes impossible, and the situation occurs that the business cannot be executed. (See Figure 11)

In order to solve the above-mentioned problems, the present invention makes it impossible to establish a new association due to a problem such as a shortage of system resources while utilizing the overhead reduction function at the time of association establishment processing by the conventional association management method. It is an object of the present invention to provide an association management method capable of efficiently using communication resources by eliminating the occurrence of the above.

[0007]

The present invention realizes end-to-end communication by using a logical communication path called an association, holds an established yet unused association, and reuses an association. In a communication processing device having an association management function such as determination or allocation of, by the control of the association management unit provided in the communication processing device,
Monitoring the existence status of the association management resource, appropriately selecting a releasable unused association from among the unused associations held in the communication processing device, and subsequently releasing the selected unused association. Then, the association management method is characterized in that the association can be established.

[0008]

According to the association management method of the present invention, an association that has been once established and then is in an unused state is not released but is retained for reuse, and
The held association is appropriately released at a timing set in advance for each system. As a result, when a new association establishment request is issued, the overhead at the time of association establishment is reduced and the shortage of association management resources is prevented. Then, even in the case of a random association establishment request, quick and flexible response is realized.

[0009]

DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS First, end-to-end communication is direct communication performed between computers connected one-to-one and between specific application programs. Hereinafter, embodiments of the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the drawings. Figure 1
FIG. 6 is a configuration diagram showing a communication processing device using the association management method of the present invention. Application program 11
Is a program that executes a specific task by an operation of an operator or the like, and is connected to the communication procedure unit 2 in the communication processing apparatus 1. The communication procedure unit 2 executes communication with another system, and uses an association establishing unit 4 and an association releasing unit 5 for respectively establishing and releasing an association, and communication between application programs using the established association. And a data transmission / reception means 3 for executing. In addition, the communication processing device 1 is provided with an association management unit 6 that manages associations. Then, the association management unit 6 associates usable association management elements, which will be described in detail later, with actual associations.
And an unused association management means 8 for managing an established unused association, and a releasable association selection for selecting a releasable association from the already established unused associations when there is no usable association. It comprises means 9 and unused association releasing means 10 for releasing the selected releasable association.

First, a method of managing associations in the communication processing device 1 will be described. FIG. 2 is an explanatory diagram showing the relationship between the association and the communication processing device. The association is managed by using the three types of association management elements in the association management unit 6. These association management elements include
It has specific information indicating the state of each element. However, the specific information referred to here is information that identifies whether the association is established or not established, and information that identifies whether the association is used or not by the application program 11. There is. Further, specifically, the three types of associations are as follows. 1) An element that manages an association that has already been established and that the application program is using as a communication path (application program combined). : Established in-use association management element (AE1) 2) An element that manages an association that has been established but is not used by an application program. : Established unused association management element (AE2) 3) Element that manages an association that is not established and is naturally not used by the application program (application program unbound). : Unestablished unused association management element (AE3)

Next, an actual association management method will be introduced. The association bound to the application program 11 is bound to the established in-use association management element (AE1). Then, when the application program 11 finishes the business process and the association with the association becomes unnecessary, the established in-use association management element (AE1) changes the element state to the unused state in the unused association management means 8. Changed to become an established unused association management element (AE2). The established unused association management elements (AE2) thus created are queued and managed by the unused association queue (AQ) in the order in which they are in the unused state. The queuing here means to manage the established unused association management elements (AE2) that are in an unused state by connecting them in a chain. If the association release described later is included, the established unused association management element (AE2) is managed on a first-in first-out basis.

Next, the application program 1 in the own system
1 or the flow of processing in the communication processing device 1 when an association establishment request is issued from the partner system will be described with reference to FIG. First, when the communication procedure unit 2 in the communication processing device 1 receives an association establishment request from the outside (A1), it issues an association establishment instruction to the association establishing means 4 (A
2). Then, the association establishing means 4 receiving this instruction requests the association assigning means 7 in the association managing section 6 to assign usable association management elements (A3). Upon receiving this, the association allocating means 7 secures the currently usable association. However, the association management element allocation processing in the association management unit 6 will be described later. At this time, if there is already established and usable association, the unused association management means 8 delivers the target element to the association allocation means 7 (A
4). The association management element thus secured is sent to the association establishing means 4 (A5). Then, in the association establishing means 4,
The state (AE1 to AE3) of the sent element is checked, and if it is an unestablished association, an association establishing process is executed (A6).

Next, the flow of the association management element allocation processing in the association management unit 6 will be described. FIG. 3 is a flowchart showing the flow of the association allocation process. First, the association allocation means 7 checks whether or not there is an established unused association management element (AE2) corresponding to the association to be allocated (step 1). Here, if the established unused association management element (AE2) exists, the established in-use association management element (AE1) that is the element that is using the element (AE2).
To (step 2). On the contrary, when the established unused association management element (AE2) does not exist, the association allocating means 7 similarly checks whether or not the unestablished unused association management element (AE3) exists (step 3). as a result,
Unestablished Unused Association Management Element (AE
If 3) exists, the element (AE3) is determined to be in use (step 4). If the element (AE3) does not exist as a result of step 3, the releasable association selecting means 9 instructed by the association allocating means 7 is currently using the established unused association management element (AE2). A releasable element that does not exist is selected (step 5), and released by the previously used association releasing means 10 (step 6). In this way, the association management element that is in use in steps 2 and 4 is returned to the communication procedure unit 2 (step 7), and the process is ended.

Further, in the case of this association management element allocation processing, the unused association is always released when the association is established from the time when the unestablished association management element does not exist. However, this means that the overhead of executing the establishment and release of the association at the same time is required when the association is established, which leads to a decrease in communication efficiency. Therefore, in the present invention, the unused association releasing means 10 is provided in the association management unit 6 to appropriately release the unused associations.

Next, a specific example of a processing method for releasing an association in an unused state will be described below. First processing method: Association release processing by periodic activation timer This is because the association management unit 6 has a periodic activation timer that gives notifications at fixed time intervals, and associations that have not been used for more than the preset time in each system. Is a method of selecting and releasing. FIG. 4 is a flowchart showing the flow of the association release process when the periodic activation timer is used. When the operation of the communication processing device 1 is started, the periodic start timer is activated at the same time. The periodic activation timer notifies the association management unit 6 at every preset fixed time t (periodic activation timer value). Then, in the association management unit 6 that has received the notification, the unused association release unit 10 starts the release processing of the unused association. The unused association management means 10 determines whether or not there is an association that has been unused for a certain period of time at the time of receiving the notification from the periodic activation timer (step 11). The used association is released (step 12).
Naturally, this operation is repeated during the operation of the communication processing device 1.

FIG. 5 is an explanatory diagram showing the relationship between the time and the association when the periodic start timer is used.
Next, the relationship between the association state and the association release process will be described with reference to FIG. Associations # 1 to # 5 are associations that have not been established or used at the time when the communication processing device 1 starts operation. Here, the associations # 1 and # 2 are at time 1, the associations # 3 and # 4 are at time 3, and are in the established / in-use state.
Consider the case where 2, # 1, # 3, and # 4 are in the established / unused state. In this case, when the periodic start timer notification is received at time 7, by the determination in step 11 of FIG.
Since the association # 2 is in the unused state for a fixed time T (here, triple of the periodic activation timer: 3t), the association # 2 is released. Similarly, at time 9, association # 3 is released. Further, the association management element corresponding to the released association can be assigned to another association. As a specific example, at time 8, association # 2 is established as an association different from the one established at time 1.

Second processing method: Release processing of association by limit value This is to set an upper limit value (limit value) for the number of established associations, and when the number of established associations exceeds this upper limit value, it is not The used association release process is executed to release some or all of the associations that have the longest unused time among the unused associations. At this time, by setting a lower limit value on the number of established associations, guards are provided so that a certain number or more of associations are not released. FIG. 6 is a flow chart showing the flow of the association release processing when the limit value is used. In the second processing method, first, when the association allocation process is performed in accordance with the association establishment request, the association allocation unit 7 issues an association release notification to the unused association release unit 10. The unused association releasing means 10 that has received this notification determines whether or not the number of currently established associations exceeds the upper limit value set in advance and managed by the association management unit 6 (step 21). As a result of the judgment, if the upper limit is exceeded, it is checked whether or not there is an unused association in the established associations (step 2).
2). When the existence is confirmed, the association with the longest unused time is selected from these unused associations and released (step 23). Then, the process of step 23 is repeated until the number of established associations reaches a preset lower limit value (step 24) or there are no unused associations.

FIG. 7 is an explanatory diagram showing the relationship between the time and the number of established associations when the limit value is used.
In FIG. 7, x represents that a plurality of association establishment requests have arrived at the same time, and y represents that the number of unused associations is not sufficient to reduce the number of established associations to the lower limit value. . In other words,
This FIG. 7 shows the state of management by the normal limit value, and when the preset upper limit value is exceeded, that is, even when a plurality (x) of association establishment requests occur simultaneously (time i), the association is It shows that it is possible to avoid the state where the establishment is impossible.
The upper limit in the second processing method does not prevent the establishment of association. That is, when there are no unused associations, the maximum number of associations defined in the communication processing device 1 can be established.

Further, as the third processing method, it is possible to combine the above-mentioned first processing method and second processing method. That is, the association release process by the periodic activation timer is performed when the number of established associations is between the upper limit value and the lower limit value shown in the second processing method. By adopting this third processing method, when there are no unused associations enough to reduce the number of established associations to the lower limit when the number of established associations reaches the upper limit in the second processing method. However, the association release process will be continuously executed until the lower limit value is reached. In addition, when the number of established associations is below the lower limit value, it is possible to prevent the association release processing by the unnecessary periodic activation timer from being executed.

The association release process described so far is executed asynchronously with the association establishment process, and does not deteriorate the overhead reduction function during the association establishment process.

[0021]

As described in detail above, according to the association management method of the present invention, an association that has been once established and is in an unused state thereafter is retained for reuse without being released. , By releasing the held association as needed at the preset timing, it is possible to prevent the shortage of association management resources when a new association establishment request is made and to prevent overhead at the time of association establishment. It is now possible to respond quickly and flexibly to random association establishment requests. As a result, the efficiency of communication processing and use of communication resources can be improved.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a configuration diagram showing a communication processing device that performs an association management method of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is an explanatory diagram showing a relationship between an association and a communication processing device.

FIG. 3 is a flowchart showing a flow of association assignment processing.

FIG. 4 is a flowchart showing a first processing method.

FIG. 5 is an explanatory diagram showing a first processing method.

FIG. 6 is a flowchart showing a second processing method.

FIG. 7 is an explanatory diagram showing a second processing method.

FIG. 8 is a configuration diagram showing a conventional communication processing device.

FIG. 9 is an explanatory diagram showing a case where the number (N) of partner systems connected to the own system can be determined.

FIG. 10 is an explanatory diagram showing a case where the number (N) of partner systems connected to the own system cannot be determined.

FIG. 11 is an explanatory diagram showing a state in which an association cannot be established.

[Explanation of symbols]

 DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 communication processing unit 2 communication procedure unit 4 association establishing unit 6 association management unit 7 association allocating unit 8 unused association managing unit 9 releasable association selecting unit 10 unused association releasing unit 11 application program

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. An association management function for realizing end-to-end communication by using a logical communication path called an association, holding an established and unused association, and determining or allocating an association for reuse. In the communication processing device having, an association management unit provided in the communication processing device monitors the existence status of association management resources, and an association that is releasable from unused associations held in the communication processing device. An association management method characterized by appropriately selecting, releasing the unused association that has just been selected, and enabling the establishment of the association.