Title: A heuristic approach to network optimised mapping of a distributed resource discovery architecture

Authors: Turhan Tunali, Nur Zincir-Heywood

Addresses: International Computer Institute, Ege University, Bornova, Izmir 35100, Turkey. Faculty of Computer Science, Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia B3H 1W5, Canada

Abstract: As the Internet has grown into a tremendous collection of networks connecting millions of people, resource discovery has became an increasingly important problem. In this paper, a novel and truly distributed resource discovery architecture that utilises network information to reduce the network cost is proposed. The performance of the proposed scheme is compared via extensive simulations with that of a system which does not utilise the network information. Any client who is searching information or who wishes to put information on this system has to have access to a ||Domain Index Server (DIS)||, that is, a node on a ||Virtual Tree (VT)||. The client submits a query that contains a collection of keywords with assigned weights to DIS which compares its database to see if it can fulfill the request from the local information providers it serves. A level of relativity is assigned during this comparison. If the request involves more specific information than that of DIS, the request is forwarded to a DIS down the VT. If the request is not related to the information content that is present in the sub tree that has DIS as its root, the request is forwarded up to the parent DIS on the VT. Masking is provided so that the request does not bounce back to the originating DIS. The network information is embedded into the system to optimise the search process; that is, if the information is present on a close by DIS, the request is not forwarded to distant DISs.

Keywords: distributed resource discovery; domain index servers; information retrieval; Internet virtual trees; network optimised query forwarding.

DOI: 10.1504/IJCAT.2004.003667

International Journal of Computer Applications in Technology, 2004 Vol.19 No.1, pp.43 - 50

Published online: 08 Oct 2003 *

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