Abstract: A solution for managing communicative interactions between network elements is described herein. A system incorporating teachings of the present disclosure may include a processor module that monitors communications between a program resident on a user machine and a server program resident on a computing device remote from the user. The processor module may be utilized to effectively reduce the processing overhead of a server program and the number of communications actually transmitted between the client program and the server program. For example, the processor module may intercept certain client or server initiated communications intended for the server or client program and process those communications internally. The results of the processing which may require an updating to all object groups which may be associated with client programs. The updating of said client programs is then executed without server program involvement.

Abstract: A data communication system and methods are disclosed. One of the methods includes receiving portions of information such as game content information. The portions are compared to a maximum transmission unit of a network, and combined if their combination is smaller than the maximum transmission unit. Combining of the information portions allows for efficient communication of the information portions. The information portions may also be divided into segments and combined with other portions for communication.

Abstract: A solution for managing communicative interactions between network elements is described herein. A system incorporating teachings of the present disclosure may include a processor module that monitors communications between a program resident on a user machine and a server program resident on a computing device remote from the user. The processor module may be utilized to effectively reduce the number of communications actually transmitted between the client program and the server program. For example, the processor module may intercept certain client initiated communications intended for the server program, process those communications without server program involvement, and respond to the client program.

Abstract: An improved method of accelerating packet transmission through a network is disclosed. More specifically, methods and systems are described for the offloading of packets transmitted in a UDP format with a ULP that allows the packets to retain characteristics of packets transmitted under the TCP format. This is useful in accelerating data transmitted in any ULP format and therefore provides a degree of flexibility previously unknown in the art. In addition, methods and systems are provided for a virtualized API which allows data to be transferred through the traditional network device if the new device is not present but directs the traffic through the new device when it is present. Also, a packet abstraction layer is disclosed which uses information from the state field to run the overlay function to map the formats of the incoming and outgoing packets into the format native to the new device.

Abstract: A network offload engine having a first buffer to store packet payloads that are received at the network offload engine until being copied to a location in a receive buffer of a host memory. An engine is programmed to copy contents of the first buffer to the location in the receive buffer of the host memory in response to meeting a first precondition. Host notification of the copy is postponed until a second precondition is met. Other embodiments are also described.

Abstract: A method and system for transmitting packets. Packets may be transmitted when a protocol control block is copied from a host processing system to a network protocol offload engine. Message information that contains packet payload addresses may be provided to the network protocol offload engine to generate a plurality of message contexts in the offload engine. With the message contexts, protocol processing may be performed at the offload engine while leaving the packet payload in the host memory. Thus, packet payloads may be transmitted directly from the host memory to a network communication link during transmission of the packets by the offload engine. Other embodiments are also described.

Abstract: Provided are a method, system, and program for managing virtual memory designated for use by a module such as a data send and receive agent. In one embodiment, virtual memory addresses intended for use by the module are designated as being within reserved portions and unreserved portions. Virtual memory addresses of the unreserved portion are mapped to physical memory to provide memory buffers which may be allocated to various users of the module in response to user requests. Virtual memory addresses in the reserved portion are not allocated to module users. The respective sizes of the reserved and unreserved portions may change, depending upon usage of the unreserved portions by the module users and needs of other modules and components of the system.

Abstract: Provided are a method, system, and program for managing memory for data transmission through a network. Virtual memory addresses of the data to be sent are provided to a sending agent. The sending agent provides to a host the virtual addresses of requested data. In response, the requested data addressed by the virtual addresses or the physical memory locations of the requested data are provided to the sending agent for sending to a destination.

Abstract: Provided are a method, system, and program for managing data transmission from a source to a destination through a network. The destination imposes a window value on the source which limits the quantity of data packets which can be sent from the source to the destination without receiving an acknowledgment of being received by the destination. In one embodiment, the source imposes a second window value, smaller than the destination window value, which limits even further the quantity of data packets which can be sent from the source to the destination without receiving an acknowledgment of being received by the destination. In another embodiment, a plurality of direct memory access connections are established between the source and a plurality of specified memory locations of a plurality of destinations.

Abstract: Provided are a method, system, and program for managing data reception processing using offload engines which may be located on a network adaptor. Data packets which become fragmented after encryption can be forwarded to a transport offload engine to be reassembled. The reassembled packets may be fed back to a security offload engine to be decrypted. The decrypted and reassembled packets may be forwarded again to the transport offload engine to extract the data payloads of the packets.

Abstract: In general, in one aspect, the disclosure describes a method of processing packets. The method includes accessing a packet at a network protocol off-load engine, allocating one or more portions of memory from, at least, a first memory and a second memory, based, at least in part, on a memory map. The memory map commonly maps and identifies occupancy of portions the first and second memories. The method also includes storing at least a portion of the packet in the allocated one or more portions.