Log management device

• US 20060069691A1
• Filed: 09/27/2005
• Published: 03/30/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 09/30/2004
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Brother Kogyo Kabushiki Kaisha
• Original Assignee: Brother Kogyo Kabushiki Kaisha
• Inventors: Kawai, Sunao
• Granted Patent: US 7,707,228 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/3068 where the reporting involves data format conversion

Abstract

A computer program product includes computer accessible instructions that cause a computer to carry out the steps of (a) retrieving a log file from a log file storage that stores log data output by at least one device as the log file and (b) converting the log data contained in the retrieved log file in accordance with a script that is stored in a script storage to output a registration file to be registered with a database. The script includes a description of conversion information, and the registration file is generated in accordance with a standardized language specification.

Claims

1. A computer program product comprising computer accessible instructions that cause a computer to carry out the steps of:

retrieving a log file from log file storage that stores log data output by at least one device as the log file;

converting the log data contained in the retrieved log file in accordance with a script that is stored in script storage to output a registration file to be registered with a database, the script including a description of conversion information, and the registration file being generated in accordance with a standardized language specification.

2. The computer program product according to claim 1,

wherein the at least one device includes a plurality of devices,

wherein the log file storage stores a plurality of log files corresponding to the plurality of devices, respectively,

wherein a plurality of pieces of log data contained in the plurality of log files have different formats corresponding to a plurality of types of information provided by the plurality of devices,

wherein the script stored in the script storage describes the conversion information corresponding to the plurality of types of information, and

wherein the step of converting further includes the steps of:

retrieving the log files from the log file storage;

carrying out the conversion in accordance with the conversion information contained in the script corresponding to the log data to output the registration file.

3. The computer program product according to claim 2,

wherein the types of information provided by the plurality of devices depends on at least one of methods of storing the log data of respective devices and a method of providing the log data of respective devices.

4. The computer program product according to claim 2,

wherein the types of information provided by the plurality of devices depends on types of respective devices.

5. The computer program product according to claim 2,

wherein the script stored in the script storage describes information regarding table items which are described in a table that is generated by conversion corresponding to the log data for each device, and

wherein the step of converting carries out the conversion such that the description of the information regarding the table items to be registered in the registration file is a description that can be registered in a single table.

6. The computer program product according to claim 2,

wherein the script stored in the script storage describes information regarding registration of at least one piece of the plurality of pieces of log data with a plurality of tables, and

wherein the step of converting carries out the conversion such that the registration file is generated from at least one piece of the plurality of pieces of log data.

7. The computer program product according to claim 1,

wherein the device includes an image forming device.

8. The computer program product according to claim 1, further including instructions to cause the computer to carry out steps of obtaining one of the log data and a log file containing the log data and storing the one of the log data and the log file in the log file storage.

9. The computer program product according to claim 1, further including instructions to cause the computer to carry out a step of generating the script based on information input through a graphical user interface and storing the script in the script storage.

10. A log management server capable of executing computer accessible instructions, the server executing computer accessible instructions that cause the server to carry out the steps of:

retrieving a log file from log file storage that stores log data output by at least one device as the log file;

converting the log data contained in the retrieved log file in accordance with a script that is stored in script storage to output a registration file to be registered with a database, the script including a description of conversion information, and the registration file being generated in accordance with a standardized language specification.

11. A log management system, comprising:

at least one device that outputs log data; and

a log management server having a log file storage that stores the log data output by the at least one device and a script storage that stores a script containing conversion information;

wherein log management server executes computer accessible instructions that cause the server to carry out the steps of;

retrieving a log file from the log file storage;

converting the log data contained in the retrieved log file in accordance with the script stored in the script storage to output a registration file to be registered with a database, the registration file being generated in accordance with a standardized language specification.

12. A method of converting a log file into a registration file to be registered with a database, the method comprising the steps of:

retrieving the log file from log file storage that stores log data output by at least one device as the log file;

converting the log data contained in the retrieved log file in accordance with a script that is stored in script storage to output the registration file, the script including a description of conversion information, the registration file being generated in accordance with a standardized language specification.

13. A computer program including instructions to be executed by a computer, the computer program, when executed by the computer, carrying out a method of converting a log file into a registration file to be registered with a database,

the method comprising the steps of:

retrieving the log file from log file storage that stores log data output by at least one device as the log file;

converting the log data contained in the retrieved log file in accordance with a script that is stored in script storage to output the registration file, the script including a description of conversion information, the registration file being generated in accordance with a standardized language specification.