Abstract: Techniques are described to establish one-way public relationships. In an implementation, a service manager module is usable to configure a webpage for output to a client over a network to provide to a user of the client an indication of others users that are part of a social network of the user and have establishes one-way public relationships, respectively, with another user corresponding to an object of a social networking service available from a service provider. In addition, a relation module is configured to establish a one-way public relationship between the user of the client and the other user corresponding to the object without establishing a mutual friend relationship between the user and the other user. In an implementation, the one-way public relationship is established in response to user selection of a control that is presented on the webpage that is output at the client in conjunction with the object.

Abstract: People often trust ratings provided by those with whom they have an existing relationship more than they would trust ratings provided by strangers. A system that provides ratings can combine the ratings with information about a person's social network, in order to provide information that a person seeking the rating may find more reliable. The information provided to a person may, in some manner, differentiate between ratings that were provided by members of the person's social network and ratings that were provided by those outside of the persons' social network.

Abstract: Information aggregation techniques are described. In an implementation, a communication is received that includes an indication of a source of information associated with a non-member of the social network. Information associated with the non-member is aggregated from the source. The aggregation may be performed in response to receipt of a selection by a member of the social network service to interact with the information from the source. The aggregated information may then be presented to a member in conjunction with webpages output for interaction with the social network.

Abstract: A computer system to efficiently process packets received over a network operating in accordance with a layered protocol. The system includes logic that provides combined processing to determine whether a received packet complies with multiple requirements of the layered protocol. Combined processing determines compliance with requirements at more than one of the protocol layers of the layered protocol. If the combined processing does not verify compliance with all of the requirements of a protocol layer, those requirements may be verified in a layered fashion following the combined processing. In this way, greater efficiencies may be achieved through the combined processing of requirements from multiple protocol layers, but advantages of implementing a layered protocol in a modular fashion may still be retained.

Abstract: People often trust ratings provided by those with whom they have an existing relationship more than they would trust ratings provided by strangers. A system that provides ratings can combine the ratings with information about a person's social network, in order to provide information that a person seeking the rating may find more reliable. The information provided to a person may, in some manner, differentiate between ratings that were provided by members of the person's social network and ratings that were provided by those outside of the persons' social network.

Abstract: Techniques are described to establish one-way public relationships. In an implementation, a control is exposed that is operable to become a fan of an object within a social networking page. Responsive to operation of the control, data may be stored to establish a one-way public relationship between a user and the selected object. By establishing a one-way public relationship rather than a mutual friend relationship, the object and/or a corresponding owner of the object is not included in the user's social network and is not provided access to the user's profile, status, or other personal information. The one-way public relationship may be employed by a service provider to serve content related to the object to the user. The one-way public relationships may also be employed by the service provider to push status updates regarding the object to “fans” of the object.

Abstract: People often trust ratings provided by those with whom they have an existing relationship more than they would trust ratings provided by strangers. A system that provides ratings can combine the ratings with information about a person's social network, in order to provide information that a person seeking the rating may find more reliable. The information provided to a person may, in some manner, differentiate between ratings that were provided by members of the person's social network and ratings that were provided by those outside of the persons' social network.

Abstract: A method and system for tracking context information of a service provider and interceptors of service provider requests is provided. An interceptor modifies a portion of service provider context information to reference interceptor context information associated with a client. When the client requests a service of the service provider, the client provides the modified service provider context information along with the request. The interceptor uses the reference of the modified portion of the service provider context information to retrieve its context information. The interceptor then restores the modified portion of the service provider context information to the original unmodified portion, which the interceptor retained as part of its context information. The interceptor then forwards the request along with the original service provider context information to the service provider.

Abstract: A method and system for tracking context information of a service provider and interceptors of service provider requests is provided. An interceptor modifies a portion of service provider context information to reference interceptor context information associated with a client. When the client requests a service of the service provider, the client provides the modified service provider context information along with the request. The interceptor uses the reference of the modified portion of the service provider context information to retrieve its context information. The interceptor then restores the modified portion of the service provider context information to the original unmodified portion, which the interceptor retained as part of its context information. The interceptor then forwards the request along with the original service provider context information to the service provider.

Abstract: A method and system for tracking context information of a service provider and interceptors of service provider requests is provided. An interceptor modifies a portion of service provider context information to reference interceptor context information associated with a client. When the client requests a service of the service provider, the client provides the modified service provider context information along with the request. The interceptor uses the reference of the modified portion of the service provider context information to retrieve its context information. The interceptor then restores the modified portion of the service provider context information to the original unmodified portion, which the interceptor retained as part of its context information. The interceptor then forwards the request along with the original service provider context information to the service provider.

Abstract: Information aggregation techniques are described. In an implementation, a communication is received that includes an indication of a source of information associated with a non-member of the social network. Information associated with the non-member is aggregated from the source. The aggregation may be performed in response to receipt of a selection by a member of the social network service to interact with the information from the source. The aggregated information may then be presented to a member in conjunction with webpages output for interaction with the social network.

Abstract: Techniques are described to establish one-way public relationships. In an implementation, a control is exposed that is operable to become a fan of an object within a social networking page. Responsive to operation of the control, data may be stored to establish a one-way public relationship between a user and the selected object. By establishing a one-way public relationship rather than a mutual friend relationship, the object and/or a corresponding owner of the object is not included in the user's social network and is not provided access to the user's profile, status, or other personal information. The one-way public relationship may be employed by a service provider to serve content related to the object to the user. The one-way public relationships may also be employed by the service provider to push status updates regarding the object to “fans” of the object.

Abstract: A computer system to efficiently process packets received over a network operating in accordance with a layered protocol. The system includes logic that provides combined processing to determine whether a received packet complies with multiple requirements of the layered protocol. Combined processing determines compliance with requirements at more than one of the protocol layers of the layered protocol. If the combined processing does not verify compliance with all of the requirements of a protocol layer, those requirements may be verified in a layered fashion following the combined processing. In this way, greater efficiencies may be achieved through the combined processing of requirements from multiple protocol layers, but advantages of implementing a layered protocol in a modular fashion may still be retained.

Abstract: A new method and framework for scheduling receive-side processing of data streams received from a remote requesting client by a multiprocessor system computer is disclosed. The method receives data packets from the remote requesting client via a network and, for each data packet, applies a cryptographically secure hashing function to portions of the received data packet yielding a hash value. The method further applies the hash value to a processor selection policy to identify a processor in the multiprocessor system as a selected processor to perform receive-side processing of the data packet. The method queues the received data packet for processing by the selected processor and invokes a procedure call to initiate processing of the data packet.

Abstract: A computer system to efficiently process packets received over a network operating in accordance with a layered protocol. The system includes logic that provides combined processing to determine whether a received packet complies with multiple requirements of the layered protocol. Combined processing determines compliance with requirements at more than one of the protocol layers of the layered protocol. If the combined processing does not verify compliance with all of the requirements of a protocol layer, those requirements may be verified in a layered fashion following the combined processing. In this way, greater efficiencies may be achieved through the combined processing of requirements from multiple protocol layers, but advantages of implementing a layered protocol in a modular fashion may still be retained.

Abstract: The present invention protects against denial of service attacks on lookup or hash tables used to store state information for data transfer protocols used to transfer data between two host computers. Two hash tables are provided for holding state information, one for verified remote entities (i.e., those where the remote local address can be traced to a host), and one for unverified entities. A cryptographically secure hash is applied to packets from unverified remote entities, since these are the most likely to attempt attacks on the hash tables. The performance of the local server for packets from verified remote entities, however, is maintained.

Abstract: A unified congestion notification mechanism can detect congestion at a recipient device either directly, such as via an explicit indicator, or indirectly, such as via dropped packets. Such congestion can then be indicated to the sending device either by leveraging an existing congestion notification mechanism, including by spoofing expected communications, or by creating a new congestion notification mechanism. Additionally, modifications to lossless protocols, such as TCP/IP can adapt them for use with streaming data while still implementing the unified congestion notification mechanism by eliminating retransmissions either as a result of the retransmission timeout or as a result of information conveyed as part of the acknowledgement packets.

Abstract: People often trust ratings provided by those with whom they have an existing relationship more than they would trust ratings provided by strangers. A system that provides ratings can combine the ratings with information about a person's social network, in order to provide information that a person seeking the rating may find more reliable. The information provided to a person may, in some manner, differentiate between ratings that were provided by members of the person's social network and ratings that were provided by those outside of the persons' social network.

Abstract: A sending computing system sends a number of network packets to a receiving computing system over a specific network connection. The sending computing system monitors at least partially uncorrelated network events to extract a soft timer that schedules transmissions based on the uncorrelated network events such as feedback events (e.g., acknowledgment messages) when sending the packets using TCP. Since potentially even all of the network connections are used, the events are less correlated from the sending of packets over the specific connection. The extracted timer is then used to pace the packets being sent out over the specific connection. The packets being sent out may be marked in a way as to regulate the frequency of occurrence of the uncorrelated network events being monitored.

Abstract: A new method and framework for scheduling receive-side processing of data streams received from a remote requesting client by a multiprocessor system computer is disclosed. The method receives data packets from the remote requesting client via a network and, for each data packet, applies a mapping algorithm to portions of the received data packet yielding a mapping value. The method further applies the map value to a processor selection policy to identify a processor in the multiprocessor system as a selected processor to perform receive-side processing of the data packet. The method queues the received data packet for processing by the selected processor and invokes a procedure call to initiate processing of the data packet.