US 6609159

Patent Overview — US6609159B1

Title: Methods, systems, and machine readable programming for interposing front end servers between servers and clients.

Patent number / application: US6609159B1; application US09/201,303, filed 1998-11-30. Priority date: 1998-11-30. Publication (grant) date: 2003-08-19. Status listed: Expired – Lifetime (legal status is an assumption, not a legal conclusion).

Inventors: Semyon Dukach, Uri Guttman, Christopher M. Montgomery. Original assignee: Individual; current assignee listed: FAST ENGINES Inc and Hanger Solutions LLC. (Per instructions, ownership-transfer events are not analyzed here.)

Purpose and plain-language scope (from the supplied text): The invention concerns client-server network computing, specifically interposing "front end servers" between servers and clients. The background explains that server programs are typically pre-written object code bought from third parties and cannot be directly modified by end users. Programs called front end servers or middleware exist to enhance such servers, but they require an administrator to reconfigure server parameters and to support the added system complexity. In the Web context, clients are commonly browsers (Netscape Navigator, Microsoft Internet Explorer); server programs are Web servers (e.g., Apache, Netscape, Microsoft), which may host multiple Web sites per computer, and may also run application server programs such as CGI programs, plus stored data like Web pages and graphic files. One computer can act as both client and server. The text notes that HTTP/1.1 multiplexes requests and responses from a given client over a single client connection; some Web servers support it and many do not, and upgrading them can be costly.

Classification: G06F9/54 (and related G06F9/50, G06F2209/54, G06F2209/5016) and H04L67/00 areas (reverse proxies, proxy services, caching).

Source: https://patents.google.com/patent/[US6609159](/patent/US6609159)/en

What the excerpt does not establish: It does not provide the claims, detailed description, figures, or specific embodiments; it does not establish the precise mechanism for interposing front end servers, the scope of claim coverage, or any dates beyond those listed. Litigation, ownership transfers, validity, and prior art are outside this overview.