Akamai Technologies, Inc.

Speedera Networks, Inc.

Vikas Garg

Eric Sven-Johan Swildens

Richard David Day

Anoop Kailasnath Tewari

Zaide Edward Liu

Zaide “Edward” Liu

A method and mechanism for a distributed on-demand computing system. The system automatically provisions distributed computing servers with customer application programs. The parameters of each customer application program are taken into account when a server is selected for hosting the program. The system monitors the status and performance of each distributed computing server. The system provisions additional servers when traffic levels exceed a predetermined level for a customer's application program and, as traffic demand decreases to a predetermined level, servers can be un-provisioned and returned back to a server pool for later provisioning. The system tries to fill up one server at a time with customer application programs before dispatching new requests to another server. The customer is charged a fee based on the usage of the distributed computing servers.

Content delivery network for RFID devices

A secure streaming content delivery system provides a plurality of content servers connected to a network that host customer content that can be cached and/or stored, e.g., images, video, text, and/or software. The content servers respond to requests for customer content from users. The invention load balances user requests for cached customer content to the appropriate content server. A user makes a request to a customer's server/authorization server for delivery of the customer's content. The authorization server checks if the user is authorized to view the requested content. If the user is authorized, then the authorization server generates a hash value using the authorization server's secret key, the current time, a time-to-live value, and any other information that the customer has configured, and embeds it into the URL which is passed to the user. A content server receives a URL request from the user for customer content cached on the content server. The request is verified by the content server creating its own hash value using the customer server's secret key, the current time, a time-to-live value, and any other related information configured for the customer. If the hash value from the URL matches the content server's generated hash value, then the user's request is valid and within the expiration time period and the content server delivers the requested content to the user.

Secure content delivery system

Distributed on-demand computing system

A secure streaming content delivery system provides a plurality of content servers connected to a network that host customer content that can be cached and/or stored, e.g., images, video, text, and/or software. The content servers respond to requests for customer content from users. The invention load balances user requests for cached customer content to the appropriate content server. A user makes a request to a customer's server/authorization server for delivery of the customer's content. The authorization server checks if the user is authorized to view the requested content. If the user is authorized, then the authorization server generates a hash value and embeds it into the URL which is passed to the user. A content server receives a URL request from the user for customer content cached on the content server. The request is verified by the content server.

A scalable domain name system with persistence and load balancing receives requests from client DNS servers or other DNS servers. Each DNS server is associated with a subset of the DNS groups in the network and the invention checks to see if the client DNS server is part of the DNS group that the DNS server is authoritative. If the DNS server is not authoritative for the client DNS server's group, then the request is forwarded to the proper DNS server. The receiving DNS checks to see if a persistent response is required for the request. If a persistent response is required, the appropriate IP address is returned to the requestor. If a persistent response is not required, the load, availability, and latency of the content servers are used to determine the proper content server's address to return to the requestor.

Scalable domain name system with persistence and load balancing

A scalable domain name system with persistence and load balancing receives requests from client DNS servers or other DNS servers. Each DNS server is associated with a subset of the DNS groups in the network and the invention checks to see if the client DNS server is part of the DNS group that the DNS server is authoritative. If the DNS server is not authoritative for the client DNS server's group, then the request is forwarded to the proper DNS server. Otherwise, the invention checks a persistence table to see if a persistent response is required for the request. If a persistent response is required, the appropriate IP address entry in the table is returned to the requestor. If a persistent response is not required, the invention determines the load, availability, and latency of the content servers from information stored in a latency table to determine the proper content server's address to return to the requestor. The DNS server sends any responses to forwarded requests to the client DNS server. When more than one DNS server is authoritative for an overlapping DNS group, the invention ensures that the persistence and latency tables are synchronized with any other DNS servers. The invention also allows the persistence and latency tables to be located on a set of table servers within the network. Another aspect of the invention allows the DNS server that a request is forwarded to, to respond directly to the client and the client is redirected to the DNS server.

Growing community of inventors

Madison, WI, United States of America

Vikas Garg