US Patent 7788223 Resource freshness and replication

Aspects of the subject matter described herein relate to resource replication systems. In aspects, a mechanism is described that detects when local resources are stale. Local resources may be stale when the time between a last successful synchronization activity and a current time exceeds a staleness value. If the local resources are determined to be stale, the local member may refrain from certain synchronization activities until the local member is allowed to resume these certain synchronization activities. If the local resources are not stale, additional synchronization activities including synchronizing resources between the member and an upstream or downstream partner may be performed.