System and method for dynamically grouping devices based on present device conditions

• US 10,212,055 B2
• Filed: 09/26/2016
• Issued: 02/19/2019
• Est. Priority Date: 10/03/2006
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: PTC Inc.
• Original Assignee: PTC Inc.
• Inventors: Hart, David Patrick, Taylor, John Louis
• Primary Examiner(s): Shepperd, Eric W
• Application Number:
  US15/275,782
• Publication Number:
  US 20170085444A1
• Time in Patent Office: 876 Days
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/3055 Monitoring arrangements for monitoring the status of the computing system or of the computing system component, e.g. monitoring if the computing system is on, off, available, not available error or fault processing without redundancy G06F11/0703; error detection or correction by redundancy in data representation G06F11/08; error detection or correction by redundancy in operation G06F11/14; error detection or correction by redundancy in hardware G06F11/16
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0681 Configuration of triggering conditions
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/0893 Assignment of logical groups to network elements
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/04 Processing captured monitoring data, e.g. for logfile generation
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/065 related to network devices
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/0817 by checking functioning
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 43/0876 Network utilisation, e.g. volume of load or congestion level
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/34 involving the movement of software or configuration parameters network booting or remote initial program loading [RIPL] G06F9/4416

Abstract

A method to dynamically group devices based on device information, which is associated with a system for monitoring the device information that communicates information between a device and an enterprise. Information is collected from a device information source to obtain an actual status of a device. The actual status of the device is compared to a stored status of the device. The stored status is stored on a server of the enterprise. The enterprise determines if the actual status has been changed from the stored status. When a change is detected, the method performs at least one of the acts of automatically disassociating the device from a group that reflects the stored status and automatically associating the device with a new group to reflect the actual status.

Claims

1. A method performed by a server, the method comprising:

receiving information from a monitoring agent associated with a device that is monitored;

identifying an event associated with the device based on the information;

performing a group evaluation in response to identifying the event;

adding the device to a group based on the group evaluation, the device being added to the group automatically based on one or more predefined rules, the group containing multiple devices including the device that is monitored; and

in response to adding the device to the group, applying business logic to the multiple devices in the group, wherein the business logic specifies performing, over a computer network, an operation on the multiple devices in the group.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the information is from at least one of a time prior to the event, a time of the event, or a time following the event.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the operation comprises sending data to, or receiving data from, the multiple devices;

and

wherein the data comprises a software update.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the operation comprises sending data to, or receiving data from, the multiple devices;

and

wherein the data comprises configuration data for at least some of the multiple devices.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the operation comprises sending data to, or receiving data from, the multiple devices;

and

wherein the data comprises readings from at least some of the multiple devices.

6. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

polling the monitoring agent;

wherein the information is received in response to the polling.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the group is part of a hierarchy of groups, the device belonging to multiple groups in the hierarchy of groups.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the group is part of a hierarchy of groups, the hierarchy of groups comprising one or more groups that are defined statically and one or more groups that are defined dynamically, the group being among the one or more groups that are defined dynamically.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the information comprises a status of the device, and the event comprises the status meeting a predefined condition.

10. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

outputting a notification based on a condition of the device.

11. The method of claim 10, wherein the notification comprises an alarm indicative of an existence of the condition, and one or more alerts that are based on the alarm, the one or more alerts identifying an action to take based on the condition.

12. The method of claim 10, further comprising:

storing data representing the notification in a database that tracks information about the device.

13. The method of claim 10, further comprising:

waiting, for a time, for acknowledgement of the notification; and

absent acknowledgement of the notification within the time, escalating the notification within a hierarchy.

14. Non-transitory computer-readable storage storing instructions that are executable on at least one server, the instructions for performing operations comprising:

receiving information from a monitoring agent associated with a device that is monitored;

identifying an event associated with the device based on the information;

performing a group evaluation in response to identifying the event;

adding the device to a group based on the group evaluation, the device being added to the group automatically based on one or more predefined rules, the group containing multiple devices including the device that is monitored; and

in response to adding the device to the group, applying business logic to the multiple devices in the group, wherein the business logic specifies performing, over a computer network, an operation on the multiple devices in the group.

15. The non-transitory computer-readable storage of claim 14, wherein the information is from at least one of a time prior to the event, a time of the event, or a time following the event.

16. The non-transitory computer-readable storage of claim 14, wherein the operation comprises sending data to, or receiving data from, the multiple devices;

and

wherein the data comprises a software update.

17. The non-transitory computer-readable storage of claim 14, wherein the operation comprises sending data to, or receiving data from, the multiple devices;

and

wherein the data comprises configuration data for at least some of the multiple devices.

18. The non-transitory computer-readable storage of claim 14, wherein the operation comprises sending data to, or receiving data from, the multiple devices;

and

wherein the data comprises readings from at least some of the multiple devices.

19. The non-transitory computer-readable storage of claim 14, wherein the operations comprise:

polling the monitoring agent;

wherein the information is received in response to the polling.

20. The non-transitory computer-readable storage of claim 14, wherein the group is part of a hierarchy of groups, the device belonging to multiple groups in the hierarchy of groups.

21. The non-transitory computer-readable storage of claim 14, wherein the group is part of a hierarchy of groups, the hierarchy of groups comprising one or more groups that are defined statically and one or more groups that are defined dynamically, the group being among the one or more groups that are defined dynamically.

22. The non-transitory computer-readable storage of claim 14, wherein the information comprises a status of the device, and the event comprises the status meeting a predefined condition.

23. The non-transitory computer-readable storage of claim 14, wherein the operations comprise:

outputting a notification based on a condition of the device.

24. The non-transitory computer-readable storage of claim 23, wherein the notification comprises an alarm indicative of an existence of the condition, and one or more alerts that are based on the alarm, the one or more alerts identifying an action to take based on the condition.

25. The non-transitory computer-readable storage of claim 23, wherein the operations comprise:

storing data representing the notification in a database that tracks information about the device.

26. The non-transitory computer-readable storage of claim 23, wherein the operations comprise:

waiting, for a time, for acknowledgement of the notification; and

absent acknowledgement of the notification within the time, escalating the notification within a hierarchy.

27. A system comprising:

at least one server; and

non-transitory computer-readable storage storing instructions that are executable on the at least one server, the instructions for performing operations comprising;

receiving information from a monitoring agent associated with a device that is monitored;

identifying an event associated with the device based on the information;

performing a group evaluation in response to identifying the event;

adding the device to a group based on the group evaluation, the device being added to the group automatically based on one or more predefined rules, the group containing multiple devices including the device that is monitored; and

in response to adding the device to the group, applying business logic to multiple devices in the group, wherein the business logic specifies performing, over a computer network, an operation on the multiple devices in the group.

28. The system of claim 27, wherein the information is from at least one of a time prior to the event, a time of the event, or a time following the event.

29. The system of claim 27, wherein the operation comprises sending data to, or receiving data from, the multiple devices;

and

wherein the data comprises a software update.

30. The system of claim 27, wherein the operation comprises sending data to, or receiving data from, the multiple devices;

and

wherein the data comprises configuration data for at least some of the multiple devices.

31. The system of claim 27, wherein the operation comprises sending data to, or receiving data from, the multiple devices;

and

wherein the data comprises readings from at least some of the multiple devices.

32. The system of claim 27, wherein the operations comprise:

polling the monitoring agent;

wherein the information is received in response to the polling.

33. The system of claim 27, wherein the group is part of a hierarchy of groups, the device belonging to multiple groups in the hierarchy of groups.

34. The system of claim 27, wherein the group is part of a hierarchy of groups, the hierarchy of groups comprising one or more groups that are defined statically and one or more groups that are defined dynamically, the group being among the one or more groups that are defined dynamically.

35. The system of claim 27, wherein the information comprises a status of the device, and the event comprises the status meeting a predefined condition.

36. The system of claim 27, wherein the operations comprise:

outputting a notification based on a condition of the device.

37. The system of claim 36, wherein the notification comprises an alarm indicative of an existence of the condition, and one or more alerts that are based on the alarm, the one or more alerts identifying an action to take based on the condition.

38. The system of claim 36, wherein the operations comprise:

storing data representing the notification in a database that tracks information about the device.

39. The system of claim 36, wherein the operations comprise:

waiting, for a time, for acknowledgement of the notification; and

absent acknowledgement of the notification within the time, escalating the notification within a hierarchy.