Computer system, failure handling method, and computer program

• US 20040078686A1
• Filed: 09/19/2002
• Published: 04/22/2004
• Est. Priority Date: 03/06/2002
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Mitsubishi Denki Kabushiki Kaisha (Mitsubishi Electric Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Mitsubishi Denki Kabushiki Kaisha (Mitsubishi Electric Corporation)
• Inventors: Kanamaru, Hiroo, Arai, Kanehide, Toyooka, Akira
• Granted Patent: US 7,082,555 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 714/38
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/0715 in a system implementing multitasking multitasking per se G06F9/46
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/0742 in a data processing system embedded in a mobile device, e.g. mobile phones, handheld devices
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/0751 Error or fault detection not based on redundancy power supply failures G06F1/30; network fault management H04L41/06
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/0793 Remedial or corrective actions recovery from an exception in an instruction pipeline G06F9/3861; by retry G06F11/1402; for recovering from a failure of a protocol instance or entity H04L69/40
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/3466 Performance evaluation by tracing or monitoring

Abstract

A computer system comprises, a profile for each software module, a software module monitor which detects a failure as failure occurrence information at an early stage at a time of execution of an application based on execution related information recorded in the profile, and notifies a software module manager of the failure, and the software module manager which identifies a failed software module from the failure occurrence information, determines how to handle the software module on the basis of the execution related information and the failure occurrence information, and directs the execution.

Claims

1. A computer system including an application framework providing a function of dynamically adding and deleting a software module as an application, the computer system comprising:

a profile for each software module which records and stores, as execution related information, information concerning execution of the software module, including identification information of the software module;

a software module monitor which detects a failure occurring at a time of execution of the software module added as the application, and notifies a software module manager of the failure as failure occurrence information; and

the software module manager which identifies a failed software module from the notified failure occurrence information, obtains the execution related information from the profile of the identified software module, determines how to handle the software module on the basis of the obtained execution related information and the failure occurrence information, and directs the execution.

2. The computer system according to claim 1, wherein the profile records and stores as part of the execution related information a norm value on an amount of use of a computer system resource for the software module,

the computer system further comprises a resource manager which manages a use status of the computer system resource by the software module at the time of execution, obtaining norm value information on the amount of use of the computer system resource recorded and stored in the profile of the software module, detects a use of the computer system resource beyond the norm value on the amount of use as an occurrence of a failure in the software module, and notifies a software module manager of the occurrence of the failure,

wherein the software module manager has an additional function of determining how to handle the software module based on the failure occurrence information detected by the resource manager, and directing the execution.

3. The computer system according to claim 2, wherein

the software module manager has an additional function of obtaining the norm value information on the amount of use of the computer system resource recorded and stored in the profile of each software module already added as an application and of a software module to be added newly, calculating a norm value on the amount of use of the computer system resource for the application after the addition of the new software module, determining how to handle the software module to be added newly on the basis of a result of the calculation of the norm value on the amount of use of the resource and on the basis of a set value on a permitted amount of use of the computer system resource which is an amount of computer system resource allocated to the application in advance, and directing the execution.

4. The computer system according to claim 2, wherein

the software module manager has an additional function of recording and storing at the profile, as part of the execution related information, one or both of importance information and reliability information of the software module, obtaining one or both of the importance information and the reliability information together with the norm value information on the amount of use of the computer system resource from the profile of each software module already added as an application and of a software module to be added newly, calculating a norm value on the amount of use of the computer system resource for the application after the addition of the new software module, determining how to handle the software module to be added newly on the basis of a result of the calculation of the norm value on the amount of use of the resource, a set value on a permitted amount of use of the computer system resource which is an amount of computer system resource allocated to the application in advance, and on the basis of the norm value on the amount of use and one or both of the importance information-and the reliability information of each software module already added and of the software module to be added newly, and directing the execution.

5. The computer system according to claim 1, further comprising a defective-software-module registration table which registers identification information of a software module prohibited to run on the computer system, wherein the software module manager has an additional function of searching the defective-software-module registration table for the presence or absence of the registered identification information of a software module on the basis of the execution related information recorded at the profile of the software module, determining how to handle the software module to be added newly on the basis of a result of the search, and directing the execution.

6. The computer system according to claim 5, further comprising:

a defective-software-module register which, when the execution related information at the profile includes failure occurrence history of the corresponding software module and an occurrence of a failure is detected as the failure occurrence information by one or both of the software module monitor and the resource manager, adds the failure occurrence to the failure occurrence history, determines on the basis of failure occurrence history whether or not the identification information of the failed software module recorded at the profile of the failed software module is additionally registered on the defective-software-module registration table, and executes the determination.

7. The computer system according to claim 1, wherein the profile records and stores as part of the execution related information a failure handling method for a time of failure in a software module,

the computer system further comprises a software module failure handler which obtains how to handle the failure based on the profile of the failed software module on the basis of the failure occurrence information, and performs a failure handling process in accordance with the obtained failure handling method.

8. A failure handling method realized on a computer system including an application framework, the method comprising:

detecting a failure having occurred at a time of execution of a software module added to the application framework;

identifying the failed software module on the basis of the failure occurrence information detected, and obtaining execution related information of the identified software module from a profile which stores, in advance and for each software module, information concerning the execution of the software module as the execution related information; and

determining how to handle the failed software module on the basis of the failure occurrence information and the execution related information obtained, and directing the execution.

9. A computer program for making a computer system including an application framework execute:

detecting a failure having occurred at a time of execution of a software module added to the application framework;

identifying the failed software module on the basis of the failure occurrence information detected, and obtaining execution related information of the identified software module from a profile which stores, in advance and for each software module, information concerning the execution of the software module as the execution related information; and

determining how to handle the failed software module on the basis of the failure occurrence information and the execution related information obtained, and directing the execution.