Subject: error handling

From: David Bourget <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 03 Mar 1998 17:48:35 -0500

Hi,

I'm almost flooding this mailing list these days, but I've got a
puzzling question :

What happen if there is an error in the last message of a transaction
happing over HTTP ? The last message, maybe a delivery note, is supposed
to close the transaction so the server will not be waiting for a
confirmation before commiting the changes made in the transaction. This
mean that at this point the transaction cannot be rolled back. But if
the last message is all garbage, then our customer is in trouble. What
is the solution provided by the OTP to this problem ?

thank you,
David

---

From: "Smith, Chris " <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 10 Mar 2000 14:08:02 -0500

At some point, the client will determine that there is a problem,
either because some evidence of an unacceptable reply exists, or
because a timeout expires.

In both cases, the client is permitted to resubmit the original
request. (Keep in mind that the client does not know whether or
not the original was even received by the server.)

At the server side, the receipt of identical requests is supposed
to result in the return of the original corresponding reply. Thus,
even if the server has processed the request once already, the
response can be retrieved a second time without difficulty. (A
corollary to this is that the server is expected to check all
inbound requests to see if they are duplicates of previous requests.)

Over the most common transport, HTTP, there are no sessions held open.
As a result, the client can even become disconnected from the network,
but if the client has done a proper job of retaining state on its
end, the final request can be re-sent, and the transaction completed,
once the network reconnects.

------------------------------------------------------------ 
 Chris Smith                                +1.416.348.6090 
 Royal Bank                       [email-masked] 

> -----Original Message-----
> From: David Bourget [mailto:[email-masked]]
> Subject: error handling