A scalable merge technique for information retrieval across a distributed network
is provided, as well as a fault tolerant technique for communicating information
across the distributed network. The merge technique includes multicasting a query
request across a spanning tree of the distributed network from a root node to multiple
clients of the tree, and receiving back at the root node, a merged response produced
from responses from at least some of the clients of the spanning tree. The fault
tolerant technique for communicating information across the distributed network
includes assigning a unique identifier to each query request, automatically reconfiguring
the network upon detection of a failure of a node of the network, and retransmitting
the query request and/or any responses thereto within the reconfigured network.
