JPH1146192A - Method for preparing broadcast list - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To minimize the number of entries of tables that perform management and to reduce processing time that accompanies user information change by making users who have the same group pattern register only one entry on a broadcast pattern table. SOLUTION: A group table entry to which a user u belongs is updated to 'new' (S3). Next, the u is eliminated from a right field of an entry of a member table for each group that is included in 'old' but is not included in the 'new', and the u is added to a right field of an entry of a member table for each group that is included in the 'new' but is not included in the 'old' (S4). Next, it is retrieved whether the group pattern of the 'new' appears as a left field of a broadcast pattern table (S5). Further, if the group pattern of the 'new' does not exist yet, an item in which a left field is 'new' and a sum set of member tables is a right field is registered on a broadcast pattern table (S6).

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a computer communication for packetizing and transmitting data between user terminals by using a network, wherein each user terminal belongs to a plurality of groups and a predetermined user belonging to the same group. The present invention relates to a broadcast list creation method in the case of group communication in which communication can be performed only between terminals.

Conventionally, a plurality of terminals are connected by a network,
A system for communicating data in a packet format has been constructed. Group communication refers to the virtual setting of a group consisting of a specific group of users on such a physically single network, and the packetization of data only between users belonging to the same group. This is a system that enables transmission and reception.

This will be described with reference to the drawings. FIG. 1 is a diagram showing a configuration of a group communication system, in which 11 is a plurality of user terminals used for communication by a user, 12 is a network for transmitting packets, 13 is a management server for managing user information, and 14 is a management server. This is a group communication processing device that performs a packet filtering process of passing packets only between users belonging to the same group and discarding packets between users not belonging to the same group.

In group communication, each user can belong to a plurality of groups at the same time. The management server manages a belonging group table indicating the correspondence between the identifier of each user and the identifier of the group to which the user belongs. For example, the belonging group table in the case of the group configuration as shown in FIG. 2 is as shown in FIG. This belonging group table indicates that a user having user identifiers 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5 has a group identifier A, B and C
This indicates that they belong to the groups of identifiers A, A + B + C, A + B, C, and C, respectively (user 6 will be described later).

When a packet contains information for identifying a group, the broadcast packet is transmitted only to users belonging to the group. The user set (broadcast pattern) transmitting the broadcast packet in that case is obtained using an entry in the member table indicating the correspondence between the group and its constituent users. FIG. 3B shows the member table in the case of FIG. That is, groups A, B and C are each user 1+
It can be seen that it is composed of 2 + 3, 2 + 3 and 2 + 4 + 5.

However, in the case of an Ethernet frame or the like, since the group information is not included in the frame header, a broadcast packet is transmitted to all users belonging to all groups to which the source user belongs. Therefore, the broadcast pattern is a union of member table entries for all groups to which the source user belongs.

FIG. 4A shows a broadcast list of the group communication processing apparatus in the case of FIG. This distribution list is used when the group communication processing device receives a broadcast packet from each of the users 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5.
1 to send this, 0 to not send
And the distribution list as a whole is n × n (n
Is the number of users). In this figure, for example, when a broadcast packet is transmitted from the user 1, this is transmitted by the group communication processing device to the user 1,
Indicates that it is sent to 2 and 3.

Conventionally, a management server calculates a broadcast pattern for all users, stores and manages this as a broadcast pattern table, and notifies the group communication processing apparatus of the broadcast pattern table as it is. On the basis of this, the group communication processing device creates and registers a broadcast list. For example, the broadcast pattern table in the case of FIG. 2 is as shown in FIG.

A case where the group information managed by the management server is changed in such a group configuration will be described. When the belonging group information is changed, when the existing user further joins another group,
There are four cases in which an existing user withdraws from some of the groups, a new user joins, and an existing user withdraws from the network system. When the belonging group information is changed in this way, the management server needs to update the belonging group table, the member table, and the broadcast pattern table.

FIG. 5 is a diagram showing an operation flow of an update procedure of the broadcast pattern table by the management server when the group information of the user u is changed.
In FIG. 5, in step 1, the group information of the user u before the change is stored as “old”. In step 2, the changed group information of the user u is set to "ne
w ”. In step 3, the entry of the belonging group table of the user u is updated to "new".
In step 4, the user u is deleted from the right column of the member table entry of each group that is included in “old” but not “new”, and is included in “new” but not in “old” The user u is added to the right column of the entry of the member table of each group not included. In step 5, it is checked whether or not the broadcast pattern has been changed for all the users due to the change of the group to which u belongs, and if so, the entry of the broadcast pattern table is updated.

In this case, as shown in FIG. 2, for example, when the user 6 newly joins because he belongs to the group A, the belonging group table shown in FIG.
6A, the member table in FIG. 3B is updated to FIG. 6B, and the broadcast pattern table in FIG. 4B is updated to FIG. 6C.

Therefore, the management server always needs a storage area for the broadcast pattern table in proportion to the square of the number of users, and when changing user information due to a new user subscription or the like, the number of broadcast patterns corresponding to the number of users is required. Since it is necessary to check and change entries in the table, it has been difficult to efficiently create a broadcast list in a large-scale group communication system in terms of time and memory space.

As described above, in the conventional broadcast list creation method, broadcast communication is performed by group communication in which each user can belong to a plurality of groups at the same time even when group information is not included in a packet. However, it was necessary for the management server to create, manage, and change a broadcast pattern table having a size proportional to the square of the number of users.

[0014]

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION An object of the present invention is to reduce the number of table entries to be created and managed as much as possible to reduce the storage capacity for tables and to reduce the amount of table changes when user information is changed. Another object of the present invention is to reduce the processing time associated with a change in user information and to enable the construction of a larger-scale group communication system.

[0015]

According to the broadcast list creating method of the present invention, in order to achieve the above object, a management server
Creation and management of, as user information, one or both of a member group table indicating a correspondence between a user identifier and a group identifier group to which the user belongs and a member table indicating a correspondence between the group identifier and a user identifier group (group pattern) belonging thereto. One or both of the management server and the group communication processing device create and manage a broadcast pattern table indicating the correspondence between the group pattern of the broadcast packet and the destination user identifier group (broadcast pattern). Therefore, for a user having the same group pattern, only one entry is registered in the broadcast pattern table.

The broadcast list creating method according to the present invention further includes a belonging group table managed by the management server when the belonging group information of the user is changed due to a new joining or leaving of the user or a change of the belonging group. And / or updates the list for the user for the member table. For the broadcast pattern table managed by one or both of the management server and the group communication processing device, this group is set only when the group pattern of the user does not exist. A new entry for the pattern is newly registered, and an entry for the group pattern including the group to which the user belongs is updated. Thus, for a user having the same group pattern, only one entry is added to the broadcast pattern table. Even if you register There.

According to the method of the present invention, since users having the same belonging group pattern share an entry of the broadcast pattern table, the storage amount for the broadcast pattern table can be reduced. It is possible to reduce the amount of change of the broadcast pattern table due to the user information change, and to shorten the user information update processing time.

[0018]

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS Next, embodiments of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings. FIG. 7 is a flowchart illustrating a method for changing the broadcast pattern table by changing the group information of the user u according to the embodiment of the present invention.

In FIG. 7, at step 1, the group information of the user u before the change is stored as “old”. In step 2, the post-change group information of the user u is stored as "new". In step 3, the user u's belonging group table entry is set to "new".
Update to In step 4, u is deleted from the right column of the entry of the member table of each group that is included in “old” but not included in “new”, and is included in “new” but included in “old” Is added to the right column of the entry in the member table of each group.

In step 5, it is searched whether the "new" group pattern appears as the left column of the broadcast pattern table. If the group pattern of "new" does not yet exist, in step 6, the left column is set to "new", and the corresponding broadcast pattern, that is, the union of the member tables for all the groups of "new" is set to the right column. Register the item in the broadcast pattern table.

In step 7, the user u is selected from the right column of the broadcast pattern table item, which has a left column including the group of "old" but not including the group of "new" at all.
In step 8, the user u is added to the right column of the broadcast pattern table item having a left column that includes the group of "new" but does not include the group of "old" at all.

In this case, when a new user joins, "old" can be processed as an empty set, so that processing can be performed based on a similar operation flow without redundant operations. Also, when a user leaves the system, "new" can be processed as an empty set, and similarly, processing can be performed based on a similar operation flow without redundant operations.

In the broadcast pattern table created based on such an operation flow, users having the same group pattern share the same item and have only one item. In particular, when there are many users belonging to only one group, the number of items is significantly reduced as compared with the conventional method, so that the size of the broadcast pattern table becomes extremely small. The number of items in the broadcast pattern table according to the present invention does not exceed the number of users even in the worst case.

After the management server creates or changes the broadcast pattern table, it creates or changes a broadcast list based on the table, notifies the group communication processing device of the change, and the group communication processing device updates the broadcast list. Browse to handle broadcast packets. FIG. 8 shows a broadcast pattern table in the embodiment of the present invention in a group configuration as shown in FIG. When comparing the broadcast pattern table of FIG. 8 with FIG. 6C based on the conventional method, the latter has six items, whereas the former according to the present invention has two items reduced to four items.

When the group communication processing apparatus according to the present invention creates or changes a broadcast list, a combination of the broadcast pattern table of FIG. 8 and the belonging group table of FIG. 6A or the broadcast pattern of FIG. The destination of the broadcast packet from each user is determined by the combination of the table and the member table of FIG.

In the case of the former combination, for example, the user 3
6A, it is found from the belonging group table of FIG. 6A that the belonging group is “A, B”, and from the “A, B” column of FIG. 8, the broadcast pattern is “1, 2, 3, 6 ". In the case of the latter combination, for example, for the user 3, a group in which the user identifier “3” is described in the right column of the member table in FIG. 6B is searched to obtain “A” and “B”. Thus, it is determined from the column "A, B" in FIG. 8 that the broadcast pattern is "1, 2, 3, 6".

Although the above description has been made using the user identifier and the group identifier, examples of the user identifier include a user number, a MAC address used in an Ethernet frame header, an IP address used in an IP packet header, a bridge, VPI / VCI indicating a port number in a switch such as a router and an ATM virtual circuit
Examples of group identifiers include group numbers, network addresses used in IP routing, subnetwork addresses and CIDR block addresses, port numbers in switches such as bridges and routers, and VPI / VCI indicating ATM virtual circuits. These can be used in the present invention.

Also, in the example described above, only the group pattern is written in the right column of the belonging group table. However, a pointer to the broadcast pattern table is added to this, and the process of obtaining the broadcast pattern from the user identifier is made more efficient. It is also possible to do this.

Although the broadcast pattern in the broadcast list has been described as including the calling user, the broadcast list is created when the broadcast pattern table is notified to the group communication processing apparatus or from the broadcast pattern table. At that time,
For each item, a process excluding the sending user, that is, a process of changing the diagonal elements of the broadcast pattern table, which is a symmetric matrix, from 1 to 0 is added to the broadcast pattern of the broadcast list. It can be a system that does not include users.

Also, in the example described above, the management server creates and manages a broadcast pattern table, creates and modifies a broadcast list, and then notifies the group communication processing device of the broadcast list. In addition to this, a method in which both the management server and the group communication processing device create and manage both a broadcast pattern table and a broadcast list, or
The management server creates and manages the broadcast pattern table,
The group communication processing device creates both a broadcast pattern table and a broadcast list using the information to be notified,
The management method, or the management server creates and manages the broadcast pattern table, and the group communication processing device creates and manages the broadcast list using the information to be notified from now on, or only the group communication processing device It can also be executed by a method of creating and managing both the broadcast pattern table and the broadcast list.

[0031]

As described above, according to the present invention,
In a group communication system which can belong to a plurality of groups and does not include information for identifying a group in a packet, a broadcast list representing a group of users transmitting a broadcast packet using a broadcast pattern table smaller than that of the conventional method. Can be created, so that the processing time can be reduced.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a diagram showing a configuration of a group communication system.

FIG. 2 is a diagram illustrating an example of a group configuration.

FIG. 3 is a diagram illustrating an example of a belonging group table and a member table.

FIG. 4 is a diagram showing an example of a broadcast list and a broadcast pattern table.

FIG. 5 is a diagram showing an operation flow of a procedure for updating a broadcast pattern table by the management server when the belonging group information of the user u is changed.

FIG. 6 is a diagram showing an example of a belonging group table, a member table, and a broadcast pattern table after being changed when a new subscriber joins;

FIG. 7 is a diagram showing an operation flow of a procedure for updating a broadcast pattern table by the management server when the group information of the user u is changed according to the method of the present invention.

FIG. 8 is a diagram showing an example of a broadcast pattern table according to the method of the present invention.

[Explanation of symbols]

 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 User identifier A, B, C Group identifier 11 User terminal 12 Network for transmitting packets 13 Management server 14 Group communication processing device

Claims (2)

[Claims] 1. A terminal provided for each user, a management server for managing user information, and a group communication processing device for passing communication packets only between users belonging to the same group, wherein each user has a MAC address or an IP address. Etc., each group has a group identifier consisting of a group number or a network address, etc., each user belongs to one or more groups, and the group communication processing device according to the user information managed by the management server. To enable communication only between users belonging to the same group, and for the case where the group communication processing device receives a broadcast packet and broadcasts it to users belonging to one or more groups to which the source user belongs , Group table or member table In a method for creating and managing a broadcast list indicating a correspondence between a source user and a destination user group from a broadcast pattern table and a broadcast pattern table, the management server includes a user Identifiers and their group identifiers (group patterns)
Creates and manages one or both of a belonging group table and a member table indicating the correspondence between the group identifier and the group of user identifiers belonging to the group, and one or both of the management server and the group communication processing device broadcast. Creates and manages a broadcast pattern table that shows the correspondence between the group pattern for the packet and the destination user identifier group (broadcast pattern). For users with the same group pattern, the broadcast pattern table A method for creating a broadcast list, which comprises registering only one entry. 2. When the belonging group information of a user is changed due to a new joining or leaving of the user, a change of the belonging group, etc., the belonging group table and / or the member table managed by the management server are not related to the user. Is updated, and for a broadcast pattern table managed by one or both of the management server and the group communication processing device, an entry for this group pattern is newly registered only when the group pattern of the user does not exist, 2. The method according to claim 1, further comprising: updating an entry for a group pattern including a group to which the user belongs, thereby registering only one entry in the broadcast pattern table for users having the same group pattern. Distribution list work described in Method.