OTS 1.1 NO IDEA Avatar
  1. OMG Issue

OTS11 — asynchronous responses

  • Key: OTS11-1
  • Legacy Issue Number: 5431
  • Status: open  
  • Source: Red Hat ( Mark Little)
  • Summary:

    Currently the core of the Additional Structuring Mechanisms for the OTS (aka
    Activity Service) assumes synchronous responses from participants (Actions)
    at the instigation of the coordinator messages (generated by the SignalSet).
    As we have found in several recent studies and other work on extended
    transactions (e.g., the OASIS BTP) there are good reasons why participants
    may want to asynchronously send "responses" to messages the coordinator
    hasn't yet generated. For example, in a two-phase protocol, a participant
    may be able to spontaneously prepare and send the coordinator the relevant
    Outcome.

    In the current spec. this isn't possible directly. Obviously there are
    tricks that could be played with another-level-of-indirection (e.g., enlist
    a "cacheing" participant with the coordinator that the real Action enlists
    with and this receives [and stores] any spontaneous responses). However,
    even this doesn't really address the entire problem since the response the
    Action sent (the Outcome) is made with respect to a presumed specific Signal
    that the coordinator sent. So, what if the coordinator doesn't send that
    Signal?

    Having this as part of the core will help us to continue to support a wide
    range of coordination/extended transaction protocols.

  • Reported: OTS 1.0 — Mon, 17 Jun 2002 04:00 GMT
  • Updated: Wed, 11 Mar 2015 11:15 GMT