Abstract: Systems and methods to enable administrators to incentivize one or both of particular in-game user behaviors and particular in-game user activities via group agreements that govern user groups within an online game are disclosed.

Abstract: A system and method are provided which facilitate peer-to-peer collaborative network monitoring. The system deploys a network-monitoring agent on a device and discovers peer devices on a same local network absent of receiving a cloud-orchestrated instruction. Responsive to successful direct communication with a server, the device obtains a configuration file, which indicates network metrics to be monitored and a condition associated with a network metric. Responsive to unsuccessful direct communication, the device obtains the configuration file via a peer device. The device monitors the indicated network metrics. If the condition is met, the system performs a predetermined action. Responsive to successful direct communication, the device transmits data associated with the monitored metrics and the action.

Abstract: Embodiment of the present invention include a method, system and computer program product for a data processing system for QoS based planning in a Web services aggregation. The system can include Web service aggregation and coordination logic configured to identify accessible Web services in a registry and to arrange an aggregation of the Web services for invocation responsive to requests received from communicatively coupled clients over a computer communications network. The system further can include QoS planning logic coupled to the Web service aggregation and coordination logic. The QoS planning logic can be enabled to measure both the individual performance of the Web services in an aggregation of Web services and also the cumulative performance of the aggregation of Web services.

Abstract: The network fault manager described herein may include one or more processors configured to detect alarms. For example, the one or more processors may periodically sample rates at which similar events that relate to occurrences on a network arrive, compare the periodically sampled rates to a first threshold, and determine whether a preexisting alarm exists. In response to a number of the periodically sampled rates that exceeded the first threshold within a preceding time window exceeding a second threshold and the preexisting alarm not existing, the one or more processors may assert a first alarm. Otherwise, if the number of periodically sampled rates that exceeded the first threshold within the preceding time window exceeds the second threshold but the preexisting alarm does exist, the one or more processors may maintain the preexisting alarm for a predetermined time period.

Abstract: A system, method and computer program product for use in a server cluster having plural server nodes implementing a server tier in a client-server computing architecture in order to determine which of two or more partitioned server subgroups has a quorum. A determination is made of relative priorities of the subgroups and a quorum is awarded to the subgroup having a highest relative priority. The relative priorities are determined by policy rules that evaluate comparative server node application state information. The server node application state information may include one or more of client connectivity, application priority, resource connectivity, processing capability, memory availability, and input/output resource availability, etc. The policy rules evaluate the application state information for each subgroup and can assign different weights to different types of application state information. An interface may be provided for receiving policy rules specified by a cluster application.

Abstract: Gateway routers for real-time networks have the ability to collect delay, loss, and jitter statistics on a per-connection basis. It is possible to use this information not only to monitor the quality of individual voice calls and other real-time connections, but also to evaluate the overall performance of the underlying network. This paper describes a method for monitoring and managing the performance of a real-time data network that supports voice, video and other real-time services. In the described embodiments, the RTCP mechanisms of RTP for sender and receiver reporting be used to relay performance information to one or more network monitoring sites for analysis and interpretation. In addition, gateway routers are organized and managed within a hierarchy that allows the monitoring function to localize it view of network conditions within the hierarchy; and the monitoring of network performance can occur on various time scales.

Abstract: A method and system is provided to enhance user presence management to enable the federation of rich media sessions. The method is implemented on a system and includes a presence manager server receiving a notification of user activity of one or more users taking place on one or more participating ecosystem sites in a participant ecosystem. The method further includes processing the user activity of the one or more users based on preferences of the one or more participating ecosystem sites established during a registration process and stored in a preference repository. The method further includes sending a notification of the user activity of the one or more users to the one or more participating ecosystem sites in the participant ecosystem to enable the participating ecosystem sites to at least one of communicate the user activity of the one or more users to one or more users and maintain a session of the one or more users.

Abstract: A Web/Internet based toll-free network management tool that enables customers of telecommunications network providers to modify the configuration of their toll-free networks via a Web/Internet-based graphical user interface. The tool provides customers Web/Internet access to toll-free call routing plans and associated routing plan details via a secure Web/Internet-based connection, and additionally provides a customer with the ability to specify implementation of a specific call routing plan for a toll-free number at a predetermined time, and the ability to re-configure an existing call routing plan. Additionally, the tool enables a roll-back of a particular call-routing plan or call plan detail to a prior configuration at a user-specified time.

Abstract: A system and method for determining file system data integrity. In one embodiment, the system includes a storage device configured to store data and a file system configured to manage access to the storage device, to store plurality of files, to store a respective signature of each of the plurality of files, and to compare a respective signature of a given file against a corresponding validation signature. In one specific implementation, the system further includes a validation signature inventory including a plurality of validation signatures, and the file system is further configured to validate a particular file by retrieving a corresponding particular validation signature from the validation signature inventory and comparing the corresponding particular validation signature against the respective signature of the particular file. In another specific implementation, the file system is further configured to store the corresponding validation signature of the given file in a write-once storage attribute.

Abstract: A memory buffer facilitates log catchup for online operations. Certain designated areas of memory are allocated for one or more buffers for use during online operations (e.g., reorganization, create index, etc.). Concurrent update activities to the target object write informational records into the one or more buffers. If the buffers become full, the informational records may be written to logs for persistent storage. After online operations finish building all or a suitable portion of the shadow object, log catchup is performed by first applying activities in the informational records from the buffer and thereafter applying activities from logs, if necessary. The invention helps solve the drawbacks of log catchup since the buffer contains only the information related to the target shadow object. Also it does not involve physical I/Os, as these records are all in memory.

Abstract: The present invention provides for a configuration tool that during configuration of a message server assists a user in registering, transferring, maintaining a domain name and/or automatically configuring a message system in accordance therewith. The configuration tool guides the user through a series of inquiries, and based on the user input utilizes a list of registrars for registering a new domain name, configuring the system in accordance with an existing domain name, or transferring an existing domain name to a registrar within the list. The system then automatically configures the messaging server and other systems accordingly. Further, the system is configured to update a DNS for dynamic IP addresses corresponding to a domain name by periodically having the server send connection request to itself. This identifies when IP addresses associated with the domain name have changed, and thus the server may initiate the update of the DNS records.

Abstract: A computer-implemented method and system is disclosed in which a network-based interaction environment includes a plurality of peer-to-peer nodes being able to communicate directly with each other using a peer-to-peer protocol and a peer-to-peer client application, the plurality of peer-to-peer nodes including a first peer-to-peer client and a second peer-to-peer client, a first peer-to-peer client application running on the first peer-to-peer client to maintain persistent buddy information on the first peer-to-peer client, the persistent buddy information including a buddy list identifying trusted peer-to-peer nodes of the plurality of peer-to-peer nodes, and a second peer-to-peer client application running on the second peer-to-peer client to maintain persistent reputation information on the second peer-to-peer client, the persistent reputation information including information related to the reputation of the first peer-to-peer client in the network-based interaction environment.

Abstract: Method and apparatus for computing the processing delay of a terminal running a system of one or more adaptive applications, each adaptive application consisting of a set of executable tasks sharing system resources, the set of execution tasks having execution times depending on a particular adaptation level, the method including the steps of: modelling the adaptation of each adaptive application as an adaptation process having steady-state probability distribution representing the fraction of time spent by the application in a particular adaptation level; modelling execution time variations of tasks in each application, for a particular adaptation level, by a random variable of arbitrary and known probability distribution; modeling a system-wide computation by a state process for capturing transitions of executing tasks as the tasks currently use or contend for the shared system resources, the state process being characterized as a stochastic process; calculating a stationary distribution .pi..sup.

Abstract: A method, system and computer program product for managing and deploying physical and virtual environments across multiple hardware platforms. A single unit, referred to herein as a cloud construction block, contains both the hardware and software components used to build a cloud computing environment. By having such a single unit contain both the hardware and software components needed to build a cloud computing environment, the user no longer needs to purchase and integrate different hardware and software components. Furthermore, the cloud construction block contains modular pieces of hardware, such as compute hardware, memory hardware, storage hardware and network hardware, that are integrated with management software configured to manage both the hardware and the cloud computing environment in a seamlessly integrated package. Since there is a single management system, the management software allows the user to manage the modular pieces of hardware via a single user interface.

Abstract: Provided are methods and systems for detecting deception in computer-mediated communications that can include (i) parsing digital text to identify processable language-action cues in the digital text, (ii) automatically analyzing, using a computing device and using a machine learning-based classifying algorithm, the processable language-action cues to produce respective probabilities of the digital text including the deceptive content, where the machine learning-based classifying algorithm is trained with training data including (A) training language-action cues from digital data indicating response information known to be deceptive and digital data indicating response information known to be truthful and (B) respective predictor weights associated with the training language-action cues, and (iii) displaying a histogram on a user display device, where the histogram indicates, over a period of time, frequencies of the respective probabilities of the digital text including the deceptive content.

Abstract: A computationally implemented method includes, but is not limited to: soliciting, based at least in part on a hypothesis that links one or more objective occurrences with one or more subjective user states and in response at least in part to an incidence of at least one subjective user state associated with a user, at least a portion of objective occurrence data including data indicating incidence of at least one objective occurrence; and acquiring the objective occurrence data including the data indicating incidence of at least one objective occurrence. In addition to the foregoing, other method aspects are described in the claims, drawings, and text forming a part of the present disclosure.

Abstract: An imaging platform may determine whether an image file stored on a client device is a current version of the image file, and may identify, based on determining that the image file on the client device is not the current version of the image file, the current version of the image file in an image file store. The imaging platform may determine, based on identifying the current version of the image file and based on one or more properties associated with a network connection of the client device, a bandwidth allocation for transmitting the current version of the image file to the client device. The imaging platform may transmit, to the client device, a mapping table associated with the current version of the image file, and may transmit, based on the bandwidth allocation and based on the mapping table, the current version of the image file to the client device.

Abstract: In a distributed cloud environment, a collecting agent deployed external to a kernel of a compute host collects network data packets describing various raw events communicated between compute instances of the distributed cloud environment and metadata associated with the events from various sources. The collecting agent communicates the metadata to a cloud service where it may be stored. The collecting agent communicates the packets to a stream processor that is decoupled from the collecting agent. The stream processor processes the packets in a stateful manner to generate a set of time series data. The time series data is communicated to the cloud application, where a set of enhanced time series data is generated by merging the time series data with the metadata in a distributed manner. A topology map describing the compute instances of the distributed cloud environment is then generated based on the set of enhanced time series data.

Abstract: Network appliances can use packet processing pipeline circuits to implement network rules for processing network packet flows by configuring the pipeline's processing stages to execute specific policies for specific network packets in accordance with the network rules. Trace reports that indicate network rules implemented at specific processing stages can be more informative than those indicating policies implemented by the processing stages. A method implemented by a network appliance can store network rules for processing network flows by the processing stages of a packet processing pipeline circuit. The method can produce a trace report in response to receiving a trace directive for one of the network flows wherein one of the processing stages has applied a network rule to a network packet in one of the network flows. The trace report can indicate the network rule in association with the processing stage and the network flow.

Abstract: A method, system and program product for monitoring resources servicing a business transaction is provided. The method includes providing a transaction manager that monitors a business transaction serviced by one or more resources, with each of the resources and the transaction manager having a protocol stack configured to send and receive load-monitoring headers in protocol messages. The method further includes specifying, in a protocol request header in a protocol request message, collection of performance metrics for a resource, collecting, by the resources, the performance metrics specified in the protocol request message and sending the performance metrics collected to the transaction manager, in a protocol response header in a protocol response message. Further, the method includes pre-configuring with policies the protocol stack on a subset of the resources, such that the pre-configured resources can act as monitoring agents on behalf of peer resources and send alerts to a resource manager.