Connector Heartbeat

All connectors provided in the Java Dynamic Management Kit implement a heartbeat mechanism. The heartbeat allows both the agent and manager applications to detect when a connection is lost, either because the communication channel is interrupted or because one of the applications has been stopped.

The connector client and connector server components exchange heartbeat messages periodically. When a heartbeat is not returned, or an expected heartbeat is not received, both components begin a retry and timeout period. If the connection is not reestablished, both the connector client and the connector server will free the resources allocated for that connection.

The heartbeat mechanism is only configurable on the manager side, the connector server simply replies to heartbeats. The manager application can set the retry policy as determined by the heartbeat period and the number of retries. The manager application may also register for heartbeat notifications which are sent whenever a connection is established, retrying, reestablished, lost, or terminated.